LETTERS FROM HOME: RESISTANT TO PEACE, LOVE AND UNDERSTANDING

Feb. 22, 1996

Dear David,

The pooches are fed and playing in the yard, DC is off to work and it's too foggy to play golf. So here's a letter.

Back in the '70s, Randy L. and I co-wrote a song together called "One to One." The lyrics were mine, the music his. The music was good enough for a fledgling country singer named Jolene to record. She changed some of the lyrics, though.

One of my bad lines was "One to one went far beyond understanding." I was trying to express my lack of ability to comprehend the relationship the rest of the world seemed to take for granted. That two people in love living together relationship.

Since then I've discovered that the rest of the world often was doing a lot of pretending and taking for granted, and that this one-to-one business is far more art than science.

No school teaches this art. Only experience. "I bruise you, you bruise me, we both bruise so easily."

So you find answers where you can. Browsing in a bookstore a few days ago I saw a quote by a Buddhist who'd written a book about peace. He said, "When you really understand someone it is impossible to resist loving him or her."

That sounds true to me, especially the idea that love is a natural state confounded by our resistance to it, and that understanding springs the locks on our hearts.

DC and I have had a wobbly week. It started when she misplaced her glasses, which are crucial to her work. Her solution was to turn every coat and purse inside out and the house upside down looking for them. Mine was to ask her questions about when she used the glasses last. My questions only seemed to exasperate her.

She ransacked the Mount Everest of books and magazines on my bedside table and dumped them on my side of the bed.

When I returned home from work late that night, the books and magazines were still on my side of the bed.

"I was going to straighten them but I didn't know what was important and what I could throw out," she said.

"Everything's important," I said.

Then she pulled a blackened banana peel out of the pile.

Summoning up my best passive-aggressive response, I turned around, went downstairs and fell asleep watching TV. The next morning we barely spoke except to exchange "I'm mad at yous."

The next night she asked if I'd like to take a vacation.

"Alone?" I asked.

She thought a couple days of me playing golf at Lake of the Ozarks would do both of us good. Seems she's tired of washing my dirty dishes.

Instead of me heading for the hills, we decided to eat every meal out during my two days off.

So now we have more understanding and bruises. Surely it's possible to get the understanding up front -- simply by asking for it.

The Buddhist says so. Take your loved one's hand in yours and say, "Have I understood you today, my darling?" Sounds silly, doesn't it.

So much resistance.

Love, Sam

~Sam Blackwell is a staff writer for the Southeast Missourian.