Where Did All The Donkeys Go?

Two horses graze on the fields next to my compound. They are tied to a particular area of the field and every day or two, their grazing zone moves as they make their way through the tall spring grasses. Across the road from them is a yard full of chickens who will run toward visitors instead of away from them – probably conditioned by my neighbor who I've seen given them his stale bread. These chickens are not chicken. Down the hill in the other direction is trip of goats. They aren't visible from the road, but their bleating makes it clear they're never far and a few are rather loud talkers and sometimes create some concern for me when I'm sitting outside while on a Zoom call. Around the bend from the horses, two donkeys typically graze on a another hillside. This is the agrarian neighborhood of the Koumana hillside.

In our typically twice daily FaceTimes, my kids hear goats and sometimes donkeys and ask for an up-close view. So, earlier this week, we decided that I would do the next FaceTime from my phone so I could walk them around "the neighborhood". Only that morning, I noticed only one donkey around the bend as I went into town – and he/she was further down the hillside than usual. On my way home, I saw no donkeys. I realized that I might have a problem ahead of me at my 5pm here/7am there call. I had assumed just the day before there would be no change in the animal situation, but as I found out, when you assume, you not only make an ass out of you and me but also the asses down the road. 

At 5:00, our little tour went about as expected. The kids loved seeing the compound, the neighborhood, the chickens, the horses and then, as I rounded the bend seeing no donkeys, I realized that I was passing an incredible viewpoint which could see clearly down the green hills to the incredible beach cove below, out to the sea. It was picturesque and I asked if they remembered the views here on Patmos. 

"Yes, we do. Daddy, we want to see the donkeys!" Ailyn responded impatiently. I went down the hillside searching for any donkey I could find. No luck. My only guess was that the donkeys had been taken in due to the earlier rains. But despite better weather since, the donkeys have yet to reappear. Nonetheless, the kids inquire about the donkeys daily and I am hoping for a donkey reappearance.

Although to me, the donkeys were an interesting, perhaps charming side-fixture of my Patmos neighborhood, to the kids they seem to the most interesting thing going here in Patmos – despite, or maybe because we never saw donkeys during our entire summer of 2019. And while I gave no real thought to the donkeys before – now I spend a fair amount of energy trying to figure out where did all the donkeys go?

At home, I tend to be the parent less concerned about making our kids happy. I of course want their happiness and well-being – but pleasing them for its own sake is not so much my thing. I think given the right opportunities, kids can more or less make themselves happy. With safety, space, security, the right amount of freedom and maybe some toys – kids can usually figure out how to be happy. Emily tends to be the parent that wants to do special things for them – take Ailyn horseback riding, go on lunchdates, go to a children's museum, take them to play at The Village. During summer, she has "Special Thursdays" where she does some fun, planned thing with them each Thursday.

Having planned, special fun moments to make them happy and create particular memories is important to Emily, perhaps because she also had that growing up. Emily and her sister Molly got "special time" with their dad each Saturday – with a three-week cycle of them each getting an individual day with their dad, followed on the third week by a day of the two of them together with their dad. I think this was a way to make up for the fact that Jack was a very busy attorney with a thriving practice that consumed so much of his week – often missing dinner and school events while he built his successful career.

I have always viewed it that I have a certain security in my relationship with my kids that I don't need to plan special events for them to feel close to me and that our time – whatever it might be filled with – is generally fun. My dad usually took me with him on errands Saturday mornings and I remember those as good times. The post office and gas station were staples of our time together and the occasional breakfast at McDonalds. Eventually, checking our boat on the lake and making sure the batteries had water, the bilge was pumped out and the cover clean were part of the routine. I remember these as fun times. Not altogether different than following my Grandpa around the backyard taking care of the swimming pool was together-time. At least to me – but I assume to kids in general – not all things have to be "fun" to be fun. In fact, I think it's in the mundane that the real relationship growth and learning occur.

But these donkeys are like a little glimpse of the parental apology that divorced parents often make – and that in his way, Jack was making for his career focus. I have gone looking around for donkeys a few times just be able to show my kids and make them happy. Even as I write this, I think, "Why??!!"

But it's obvious. I'm not there with them. Our time together is on FaceTime. I feel badly they miss me and of course I miss them. There's the quiet and undiscussed possibility that their parents will divorce which they don't seem focused on but I imagine is in their psyches. Clearly, delivering on donkeys will solve this.

This is not the parent I want to be – whatever happens. Donkeys themselves seem benign enough. But it's a short slide from donkeys to being a Disneyland dad, so I suppose I had better watch myself.

On another note – it is weird that the donkeys have disappeared and it would be nice if someone at least left a note or sign saying what happened to the donkeys, especially when the horses are still there working their hillside. 

What also seems to have disappeared for me lately is the constant anxiety around making Emily happy. When I'm around her, so much of my mind and emotional space is focused on how she is doing, what she needs, is she happy or upset, what I could do to make things better for her and us? In the course of time, in the line of duty, but also in the pursuit of my own inner peace, I have spent tremendous personal resources being attuned to Emily and finding solutions to her moods and needs. When she is upset, I react by trying to reestablish a disturbed equilibrium. I want to return to happy, stable and what our couples therapist calls, "the bright eyes" – the "happy to see you, I love you, you're my special person" look that we give the people we love.

By the end of couples therapy, many things were made clear and even important changes made. But one clear thing that seemed unchangeable is that I really only need one thing from Emily – the bright eyes. In a very exaggerated, crude and dismissive sense, for me, the bright eyes are the only thing a spouse is uniquely good for. Of course a good relationship involves many aspects of partnership and caring. But I am quite self sufficient and have a high tolerance for dealing with the challenges of life on my own. I can get many needs met through friendships and family relationships too. If Emily feels boring and I want an interesting conversation, I have several friends I can call whose smart, deep thoughts will engage me and fill that need. If Emily won't take care of me when I'm sick, off the top of my head I can think of five people I can call who would help me without hesitation. And if Emily doesn't listen or offer me the emotional support I sometimes need, I have phone numbers for that too. But the bright eyes – that is something that comes uniquely from a spouse or partner. That feeling that you're their person and they're yours. 

So when I show up with the bright eyes, present to be Emily's person and for whatever reason she doesn't offer that to me in return, my equilibrium is thrown off. Like a heroin addict, I jones to the get bright eyes back and am willing to go to great lengths to figure out how to do it. There is no peace without the bright eyes and the search for them is exhausting. Moreover, they come back in moments, flickers, sometimes longer spells. Like the Pavlovian response a slot machine causes for a gambler, the small and short-lived rewards fuel the addition. The possibility mixed with scarcity doesn't make me think it's time to find a different path, but instead keep me focused on my hunt – like a truffle pig.

Being here, I realize part of my calm is that I'm out of the forest. There are no truffles here. I guess that makes me just a pig? But I'm a happy pig because I'm no longer stuck in the relentless pursuit of something scarce to which my brain is addicted. Maybe I can be a farm pig or one of those pigs that live in people's backyards with its own little pig-house? I don't know. But I'm pretty sure I shouldn't be hunting truffles.

Here on Patmos, I'm calm. I'm becoming happy – in a quiet, content way. I talk to more friends  back home and elsewhere than I have in years – because I have the time and space. It's nice and warming. But I also just don't have to think about how to restore the bright eyes. I'm actually fine without them. The problem becomes if I can get by fine without them, what does or would Emily add to my life if she doesn't offer them consistently? And the initial answer – perhaps the real, underlying truth I've been trying so hard to ignore for both my sake and my kids' – is not much. There is so little friendship Emily offers, her support so rare, her care so scarce, what she has to say so infrequently interesting that the rest of the package isn't very valuable without the bright eyes. 

One obvious question to examine for myself is why are the bright eyes of so much value to me that I can become a slot machine pulling truffle pig? That has been well explored in couples therapy and I won't go into it here. But rest assured, I've got a handle on how that works now and might make some different choices in future relationships based on by improved understanding of myself.

Another critical question remaining is when did the bright eyes begin to flicker? Where did the real turn in the story come? While we could pick apart smaller moments and issues going back early in the relationship, the real beginning of the current problem began about 3.5 years ago when I became demanding about Emily addressing her anxiety. Prior to getting pregnant with Sennen, Emily came off medication that among other things balanced her anxiety. She needed to come off it to get pregnant and the implications were worrisome at the time. Her doctor was very helpful and supportive and did things safely, monitoring her carefully. Emily did amazingly well for some time. After two pregnancies and periods of nursing, Emily decided that she was doing just fine and didn't need to return to medication.

I tried to support that decision. However, for very understandable reasons – a full career, two young children and the much more complex life that comes with it all – Emily's anxiety began to surge. I tried to support it. I tried to accommodate it. At times I felt like a failure for being so triggered and overwhelmed by her anxiety. I realized that perhaps someone else would have been better at supporting Emily's anxiety, but perhaps because I manage my own, or perhaps just because I'm me – I couldn't. Not well enough. I told her it was too much and asked her to consider that she was unmedicated and now very anxious – perhaps it was time to revisit that.

She was nonplussed. I was telling her what was wrong with her and demanding she do something she didn't feel like doing. There was no concern for how her anxiety was impacting me, nor a sense of responsibility for owning her own issues. I argued repeatedly that if she had come to me with the same complaint – that my issues were overwhelming her, I'd be taking action immediately. It's my responsibility to own my shit and not adversely impact my spouse and kids. I would take Emily's concern as a mirror to help me see myself better. That's not how it went with Emily. Instead it sparked a resentment that burned quietly until it grew and compounded.

After another year, Emily herself felt overwhelmed enough by her anxiety that she decided to see the doctor and do something about it. The new medication has not been as effective as the old – but it created noticeable improvement. By that time the resentments of my wanting a change in behavior in her and not being willing or able to accommodate her fully had changed things for her. I was demanding and critical, not supportive and accepting. I shouldn't have been trying to "force" her to medicate – even though we entered the relationship with her on medication and she herself eventually realized she needed it. When I asked her what the difference was between what I saw and asked for versus what she saw in herself – she said it was that she was deciding when she was ready – and not me demanding it.

As someone who takes medication myself, I find that a hard position to relate to because friends and family I trust are valuable sources of input for how I might know if something is off if I can't see myself clearly. It's not easy to make a call sometimes, but you have to trust the people closest to you care and have your interest at heart. I have always been grateful to my friend Alex whose words and care led to my own diagnosis. It was not easy for him to confront me and it was not easy for me to trust him. Except that I knew I would trust him on anything else and that he had no other reason for saying what he did.

From couples therapy, I've come to learn Emily is quick to feel criticized and controlled. Her upbringing plays a big part in it and I can't unweave those strands for her. I don't think she's going to do it for herself – at least not at this time in her life, if ever. Her feelings that I criticized and didn't accept her – whether founded or not – cannot likely be undone. I have to assume she will not reevaluate things in a new light, or question whether her feelings align to an exterior reality. I believe for Emily, her feelings are her truth. Her feelings trump promises, excuse behaviors, validate lies. I don't know how to untangle all of that and there is no use in asking that she reconcile facts with feelings because doing so invokes more feelings of criticism and unacceptance. Only Emily can offer us a path out of the maze.

Perhaps it's a moot point. Maybe I'm already out of the maze. Maybe I'm not going back in and if she wants us to continue life together, she'll need to at least poke her head out of the maze too. For me, to reenter the maze is going back to slot machines and truffles. I'm not sure that's something either of us need again.

Maybe all anyone needs to know at this point is where did all the donkeys go? And then, that mystery sorted out, leave them where they are.

(These donkeys were found 45 minutes after this post was written)