hindsight
Shoes: F21, Skirt: Urban Outfitters, Tee: F21, Necklace: Samantha Wills,Sunglasses: Target
I was just thinking today, about how nice hindsight is. How nice it is to get to look back on something, and tell the story of it. Hindsight has a beginning and a middle and an end. And in my experience, most of the time, the ending sounds something like, "it worked out." Or at the very least, "it didn't kill us." The summer after we were married, for example, was a complete crap shoot. Tyson had accepted a job down in Phoenix that had a start date set for three days after our wedding. We loaded our things (what things) into the back of our small silver car and drove straight to Vegas and then on to Phoenix. We were there for exactly two weeks. I remember receiving a package in our brand new, yet very empty apartment, and having to pause when I was writing out my signature, slowly and deliberately feeling out the cursive of my new last name. A girl who was observing me, though I can't remember why she was there, asked me how long I'd been married. "Just 4 days.", I replied. She looked at me incredulously and asked, "What are you DOING here???" Nothing felt right about those weeks. Tyson would head to work for a long, hot day in the sun and I would hang out with this strange new club I was suddenly a part of. Just one of the wives. We would go to the pool, or a large nearby mall, where we'd walk by Victoria's Secret and they'd tell me things like, "Lingerie is overrated, don't even bother."
We decided after those two weeks, that the whole thing wasn't really our jam, and decided instead (after a very generous and kind invite), to drive to Seattle, move in with Tyson's sister and her husband, and just find jobs when we got there. The drive up the pacific coast highway was our sort of honeymoon. On one night, we stopped at a hotel that had a pink tub in the middle of the room (awesome), and I remember it feeling like a splurge to stay there, but it had a great view of the ocean and we loved it.
That summer, we both worked two jobs. Tyson's first job started at 4 in the morning. Mine started at 7 or 8. We'd finish those up and then meet back together in the late afternoon for our second job, which was knocking doors, taking political surveys. Most of the time we were pretty diligent about getting our neighborhoods completed, but sometimes, after a particularly long week, we'd spend the last 10 minutes of our shift back in our car, talking about what movie we wanted to see, and playing solitaire on our palm pilots (that's right I said palm pilots).
That summer was a rough and shaky go at starting our life together. Though we were incredibly grateful to his sister for saving our butts, sharing a two bedroom apartment with another couple three weeks after you're married was ... I don't want to say stupid ... but maybe stupid.
We made it though. Every summer after that was a total dream comparatively. And the hindsight that kicked in eventually, wrapped that summer up into a nice neat little story, with a beginning, a middle and an end that sounded something like, "it worked out." And, "it didn't kill us."
Now, seven years later, as Tyson finishes up his last few weeks of school, we're at the part where I'm jealous of my future self and the hindsight she'll someday have about this very moment in our lives. I'm jealous of her nonchalant and almost flippant, "hey, it worked out" that she'll throw around a few years from now. I wish I could time travel for real. But I've always done this to myself. I have always and forever lived for the future. Lived for the plan. "The plan." And so has Tyson. Until he, in a moment when everything inside of him yelled, DO IT, THIS IS RIGHT, dropped what he was doing and enrolled in the program that he's now about to graduate from. And remarkably (or I guess not so remarkably), everything still feels just as right as the day he did that.
It's hard to write about something when you're right in the middle of it. It's not a story yet, and you have no idea what the ending is going to look like. But so far, the beginning feels promising and exciting. And also, this particular beginning includes you living together as a family again. So. The hindsight potential on this story so far, is looking pretty good.
I was just thinking today, about how nice hindsight is. How nice it is to get to look back on something, and tell the story of it. Hindsight has a beginning and a middle and an end. And in my experience, most of the time, the ending sounds something like, "it worked out." Or at the very least, "it didn't kill us." The summer after we were married, for example, was a complete crap shoot. Tyson had accepted a job down in Phoenix that had a start date set for three days after our wedding. We loaded our things (what things) into the back of our small silver car and drove straight to Vegas and then on to Phoenix. We were there for exactly two weeks. I remember receiving a package in our brand new, yet very empty apartment, and having to pause when I was writing out my signature, slowly and deliberately feeling out the cursive of my new last name. A girl who was observing me, though I can't remember why she was there, asked me how long I'd been married. "Just 4 days.", I replied. She looked at me incredulously and asked, "What are you DOING here???" Nothing felt right about those weeks. Tyson would head to work for a long, hot day in the sun and I would hang out with this strange new club I was suddenly a part of. Just one of the wives. We would go to the pool, or a large nearby mall, where we'd walk by Victoria's Secret and they'd tell me things like, "Lingerie is overrated, don't even bother."
We decided after those two weeks, that the whole thing wasn't really our jam, and decided instead (after a very generous and kind invite), to drive to Seattle, move in with Tyson's sister and her husband, and just find jobs when we got there. The drive up the pacific coast highway was our sort of honeymoon. On one night, we stopped at a hotel that had a pink tub in the middle of the room (awesome), and I remember it feeling like a splurge to stay there, but it had a great view of the ocean and we loved it.
That summer, we both worked two jobs. Tyson's first job started at 4 in the morning. Mine started at 7 or 8. We'd finish those up and then meet back together in the late afternoon for our second job, which was knocking doors, taking political surveys. Most of the time we were pretty diligent about getting our neighborhoods completed, but sometimes, after a particularly long week, we'd spend the last 10 minutes of our shift back in our car, talking about what movie we wanted to see, and playing solitaire on our palm pilots (that's right I said palm pilots).
That summer was a rough and shaky go at starting our life together. Though we were incredibly grateful to his sister for saving our butts, sharing a two bedroom apartment with another couple three weeks after you're married was ... I don't want to say stupid ... but maybe stupid.
We made it though. Every summer after that was a total dream comparatively. And the hindsight that kicked in eventually, wrapped that summer up into a nice neat little story, with a beginning, a middle and an end that sounded something like, "it worked out." And, "it didn't kill us."
Now, seven years later, as Tyson finishes up his last few weeks of school, we're at the part where I'm jealous of my future self and the hindsight she'll someday have about this very moment in our lives. I'm jealous of her nonchalant and almost flippant, "hey, it worked out" that she'll throw around a few years from now. I wish I could time travel for real. But I've always done this to myself. I have always and forever lived for the future. Lived for the plan. "The plan." And so has Tyson. Until he, in a moment when everything inside of him yelled, DO IT, THIS IS RIGHT, dropped what he was doing and enrolled in the program that he's now about to graduate from. And remarkably (or I guess not so remarkably), everything still feels just as right as the day he did that.
It's hard to write about something when you're right in the middle of it. It's not a story yet, and you have no idea what the ending is going to look like. But so far, the beginning feels promising and exciting. And also, this particular beginning includes you living together as a family again. So. The hindsight potential on this story so far, is looking pretty good.
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