It all started so...unpretentiously, innocuously, impossibly, even...

...when a professor didn't show up for the first day of class. This was a basic woodworking class, required for all Fine Art majors, designed to provide a working proficiency with various types of machinery and power tools. When I had been in junior high school, I had really wanted to take a class like that, but was limited by the gender-defined policy of the school, so I had yawned my way through a course in cooking and sewing, which I had already learned at home. In the intervening years between 8th grade and college, I had given up on the interest and developed that all-too-common fear (a fear based in ignorance and unfamiliarity) of Noisy Machines With Spinning Sharp Parts. Add to this, the fact that the only shop teacher I had ever encountered (he doubled as an instructor in another high school class I had) was an insufferably arrogant macho sort. So I had a few preconceived notions and wasn't thrilled (was even a bit resentful, actually) about having to take the class in the first place.

I was not bothered in the least when, some fifteen minutes after the start of class, no one had come in to teach it. I just kept on happily reading the book du jour. At this point, someone official came in and announced that Matthew (the professor in question) would not be in that day, since he was on his honeymoon and wanted to spend an extra day with his new wife. I left with a sense of relief (put that pesky class off for one more day!) and was, for a passing moment, charmed at the thought of this man so deeply in love that he would skip a day of work to prolong his honeymoon.(even if he was probably an insufferably arrogant macho sort)

By the next time class met, I had mentally prepared myself for grisly cautionary horror stories about how careless students had sawn their arms off, shot finishing nails into their feet, or gotten their hair caught in drill presses. The obligatory Safety First lecture, designed to put the fear of blades into you (I had occasionally had this speech described to me in gory detail by others who had taken similar classes)...Well, he walked in ten minutes late(I was momentarily amused, imagining him and his new wife sharing just one more long kiss before he dashed out the door late for work)...this tall, nicely-proportioned man with impossibly white hair and dark smiling eyes and an alarmingly disarming grin, wearing a blue lab-coat. (kinda cute, actually, for a maybe insufferably arrogant macho sort) He had a mysterious box under his arm. It was a box of epiphanies, but I didn't know that yet. He set it down on the desk.

Without a word, he opened the box and proceeded to pass its contents around the room. Voluptuous pieces of rosewood, ebony, koa, zebrawood, teak, brazilian purpleheart, birdseye maple, philippine mahogany, padauk...it was a veritable rainbow of wood. My aforementioned fear evaporated, never to return, as I was overtaken by the seductive enchantment of exotic hardwoods. To be able to work with such warm beauty, I would brave any machinery I had to, Spinning Sharp Parts and all.

As the slices of wood made their way around the class that day, Matthew finally spoke, most passionately about the joys of working in wood, and giving the usual first day information for the class. The class curriculum was elegantly simple...a standard first project, designed by him to acquaint us with all the basic machines in the shop...and then, we were on our own for the rest of the quarter. We could make anything we wanted to make. He was there to guide, advise, and assist, as needed. (Wait a minute, did he say...'anything we wanted?'...ANYTHING!? Hmmm, I thought...) By the time I left that day, I was utterly, shamelessly in love<sigh!>...with hardwoods, and dealing with a major case of cognitive dissonance(in a good way)...The epiphany-box of hardwoods, the class, and the teacher were all so different from what I had expected...

I had to admit, his strategy that first day, which had so effectively disarmed my unvoiced fear and replaced it with enthusiasm, was evidently the product of great intellect, understanding, and deep compassion. Nicely done, I had to grudgingly concede...for a man who just might tend on occasion to be an insufferably arrogant macho sort. I had to admit I was impressed. It didn't surprise me one bit when I happened to notice in his office, bachelor's and master's degrees in industrial arts, and a doctorate in psychology, just kinda stuck there in the midst of scribbled notes, hand-drawn schematics, and photographs tacked to the wall. In describing his education, Matthew, who never went by DR. Matthew, or Matthew, PhD, or Professor Matthew, just chuckled and referred to himself as a 'doctor of sawdust.'...A man of impressive humility.

A week or so later, we were finishing up that first project, and, when he asked about what some of us were considering as second projects, I got the chance to voice that delectable 'anything' I had been turning over in my mind since that first day. Most people had pretty standard beginner things in mind...bookends, memo holders, fruit bowls, and the like...but not me.

There was only one thing I wanted to make, one thing I really needed...a large set of bookshelves for my fantasy/sci-fi paperback collection. I was almost afraid to mention it, that it would sound presumptuous, or at best, unrealistic. But I went up to him, with my design in hand, mentally prepared for him to laugh out loud. He regarded me for a long moment with those dark, thoughtful eyes of his...I could sense that I had just distinguished myself in his estimation. Unbelievably, I had impressed him. When he spoke, he simply asked what kind of wood I'd like to use, and said that he had some really nice white oak in his storeroom...no trying to talk me into something more 'beginnerish,' no discouraging spiel about how complicated it would be...He did a most rare thing, in my experience. He simply took me seriously, and evidently believed in me. (Those shelves are downstairs, in my living room, to this day.) And I was way beyond impressed...dangerously so.

At this time, Larry and I had been married for four years. I had no close friends, only a handful of casual school acquaintances. Larry was still my only confidant, only family, only and truest friend, only source of emotional support, my entire universe. He was working full-time, going to school full-time and doing a hundred-mile roundtrip commute each day between home, work and school. I was buried in this time/effort intensive fine arts major program (which meant I practically lived in the art department...I only went home to sleep and feed the cats) working to maintain my modestly impressive GPA (which was, at the time, essential to my redefining myself as someone not totally worthless). Both of us were perpetually exhausted and stressed. And both of us were very rough around the edges and difficult to live with. We loved each other utterly and completely, but we didn't really like each other very much at all.

And then there was Matthew, who spoke kindly to me, respected me, valued me, believed in me at a time when Larry just wasn't (and couldn't, really...I was just too needy at that stage in my life...it's a crushing burden, being a universe) meeting those needs...Matthew had gone in my estimation from an insufferably arrogant macho sort to a clever, charming and compassionate sort. As weeks passed, I found myself going to his shop when I wasn't in other classes...just to talk, hang out, whatever with him. He always seemed to find time to listen to me. I found myself again dealing with cognitive dissonance...the heady notion that there might just be life outside my known 'universe' and the terrifyingly unthinkable corollary...that I was, beyond all belief, a married woman in love with two married men...Larry, and now Matthew.

I was trapped. I couldn't break away from this extraordinary man who seemed instinctively able and willing to meet those emotional needs. So I just did like I had been doing for weeks. I talked with him about anything and everything. He happened to be a strong Christian and as wise as he was clever, charming, and compassionate. Of course, I never gave him even the slightest hint of my feelings, never once did or said anything inappropriate. Nor did he. I just kept my heart and its secret duality of exultant delight and forlorn misery inside my wall of casual impassivity.

And every night I'd go home with Larry, my universe (whom I still loved desperately, passionately and forever), lay my head on his shoulder and honestly, openly spill my heartful of misery out to him, tell him how very in love I was with this other man, with Matthew. Placed in this absurd and volatile situation, he demonstrated uncommon wisdom and courage. He listened to me, comforted me, and prayed for me. He never showed jealousy, possessiveness, or condemnation. He made no demands, and never pressured me to make my choice. He understood that it was something I had to work out for myself. He patiently gave me the latitude I needed in order to do that, but was always there for me at the end of the day.

And this went on until I ran that fateful, scandalous scenario in my mind, the 'if Matthew and I ran away together' scenario. I had avoided it for many weeks, because the implications were so frightening. When I finally did, something at once wild and logical took place...Quite simply, I couldn't do it, not even in my imagination. I realized that this would never, ever happen, given the type of people we were. Matthew, the strong Christian, could never do such a thing. If he could do that sort of thing to Larry and to his own wife, he would not be the kind of man I could truly love, trust, or commit the rest of my life to. He would, in the very act of becoming romantically involved with me, demonstrate that he lacked all of the character traits I valued most in a husband. I realized it was an absolutely unworkable scenario, both in the privacy of my mind and on the larger platform of our lives...and the simple truth of that realization set me free...completely and permanently freed me from that trap, like that epiphany-box of hardwoods had freed me from my fear a few months back...

Because that one realization of the impossibility of the scenario, like that epiphany-box, contained other related realizations...ones which I now took out and examined...

1.) For me, it was no longer possible (like it had been a few years earlier, when I met and married Larry) to sacrifice even an unsatisfying marriage for the unknown quantity, no matter how tantalizing, of a possible romantic relationship with someone else.

2.) That consuming wildfire of passion and soaring emotions that surrounds and infuses a new love relationship is a very powerful thing...a happy exhilarating insanity designed by God to forge bonds of intimacy and grace that will outlast the forces that tear relationships apart. But it is not reliable, not stable. It ebbs and flows throughout the years of the relationship. It is not to be confused with actual love.

3.) Love is what is still there amid the ashes of passion, strong and immovable, when the wildfire dies down to embers. Love was not those fiery moments of losing myself in conversation with Matthew. Rather, love was the branch of wood offering itself to be burned...for me. Willing sacrifice. Love was that quietly strong, stable, reliable shoulder I raged, wept, bled my pain into at night.

4.) The time-honored idealistic romantic notion that there is only one perfect love out there for any given person is complete nonsense. The quest for perfection in any person other than the Divine, is a ruthless, deceptive ideal, no less than an idol. Given favorable circumstances and fortuitous timing, amiable compatibilities have the potential to become viable, eminently successful marriages. Thus, any concern that by staying with Larry, I might be missing out on that 'one perfect love meant for me' was totally groundless.

5.) It is possible and acceptable for me to love my friends (and to be loved in return!) as deeply as I do Larry. The difference between marriage and friendship is not a matter of degree, but a matter of direction. Love is that single overarching commitment composed of thousands of smaller commitments...the greater commitment reinforced, reaffirmed at every juncture of daily life. The commitments of a marriage differ from those of a friendship, but the love is the same.

The same box of epiphanies that freed me to commit myself wholly and without reservation to Larry, even at the utter nadir point of our marriage also freed me to go beyond that known universe to find the acceptance and love of friends to meet some of those emotional needs within me. Larry didn't have to be my universe anymore, he was free to be lover and closest, but not only, friend.

With that freedom realized, I walked my beloved husband to his class, kissed him goodbye and headed off across campus to spend an hour or so with my dear friend, Matthew.