i got a rock.

my favorite cartoon of all time is the Charlie Brown Halloween special, where they all go trick or treating and after each house compare the loot they are given. Each time Charlie Brown announces sadly, "i got a rock."

this is funny, because this so summarizes a common experience for a lot of us. however well meaning and sincere we might be, when everyone else reaps the rewards of life, we get rocks. (-:

that is not to say that i didn't have a part to play in the creation of many of my own troubles. i own up. i take responsibility for those things. however, what is distressing to me is that even while a great many or even most of my friends and acquaintances put no more thought or care into many of their own bad (or good) decisions, than i did, they someone always seem to get candy anyway. while i got rocks.

and at some point, you really can't do anything but be mildly amused at your own bad fortune. it's either laugh or cry. or just quietly comment with resignation at the contents of your trick or treat bag, as good old Charlie Brown does.

i had the best time yesterday with some good old friends of mine. two couples came down here to visit and hang with me for the day. and it struck me, as it always strikes me, how very happily married these two couples are. and how after all these years, and through thick and thin, their marriages have only grown stronger and better. even while i'd have to say that these two couples are in many ways strikingly different than each other. the commonality though, is that they really would never think of leaving the other, in good times or in bad. there is never any question about forgiving with them. forgiving of each other is a given. always.

i love that. i do. but it does strike in contrast to my own life. they got candy. i got a rock.

now, both these couples know my ex husband. and they were friends with him and they know him to be both a good person and a bad husband to me. they also know that i was not a perfect wife. anyway, i think they all like him still and will often ask me of his well-being. how he's doing, what he's up to. if i've heard from him. and in response, last night, i showed them a piece of sculpture that he'd recently given me. (he made it) and i told them how he'd called me recently to tell me that he hoped his recent endeavors to to promote public schools in the state he lives in now, would in some measure, make up to me for how he'd treated me. and that even if i, too, wasn't perfect, he still feels that he owes me something.

and quite honestly, they (my friends) (and i) find that very sweet. and so in the long run, i guess in the end, i got something more than a rock.

now the other interesting thing to me last night, was at one point in the evening, one of the husbands made reference to the other guy in my life, who turned out to be a rock for me. and it's interesting to me, because really all of my friends and my family absolutely know not ever to mention him to me in any way at all. they really all know tht it's too sore a wound for them to touch. but my friend last night, had the audacity to make a teeny tiny little joke about him.

and what's interesting to me, is that for once, this really didn't hurt. i didn't even wince. in fact, i actually laughed. because it occurred to me that the "joke" was said with the greatest of affection for me. somehow it conveyed to me, that i wasn't considered by my friends to be a "loser" in that relationship or in life, that i wasn't really a loser at all, that i was really was someone of value to them. and that he was indeed a rock. and that i didn't deserve that rock at all.

yes, i'm sure my friend didn't have any idea that his comment, meant all that to me. but just the same it did. and i guess i can say aloud now "yeah, i got a rock, but i sure didn't deserve it."

and it occurs to me today that if i look into my bag of candy here, that scattered in with the rocks are some really sweet things, such as the good friendship of some very wonderful people. and a great family, who loves me. it's really not all rocks at all.