Plan B

Because my parents were divorced before my memories and have yet to sustain a healthy relationship with a partner, I have a poor understanding of happily ever after.  I’d like to think that I will be with my husband until we are both old and grey (or in his case bald), but I’m a realist. 

Don’t get me wrong, I have no intention of jeopardizing my relationship with my husband who I love dearly, although lately our intimacy has been replaced by companionship, but that’s another story.  I just know that there are factors in the world that neither of us control.  How many great marriages were destroyed on September 11th? And not to be a pessimist, but something horrific could strike my family.  Perhaps because my father lost his dad at a young age and has been obsessed with his death, actually his estate planning, for the last twenty some-odd years, or because my mother is battling Stage 8 cancer (her second stage four cancer) my mind wanders to these dark G-d forbid zones. 

I wonder what I would do and how I would survive without my husband, who has proven to be a pillar, friend and confidante (although not so much that I am ready to reveal this website to him). Obviously, I would endure and I would like to think that I would date again and satiate my current craving for the lust and giddiness and that comes with the initial flirting and dating of a relationship.

I look at my husband’s friends, most of whom I too have become friendly, and wonder of the non-married group could or would step in and replace the void of my husband. When we go out with my daughter’s Uncle X, I consider if he would make a good stepfather. My nerves are calmed by subconsciously lining up a safety net or Plan B for me and my family.

My mother, a serial monogamist, settled on so many unsatisfying relationships and stuck with them until it was unbearable. Of course, I do not see my husband behaving in any of the unacceptable ways of my mother’s partners, but perhaps, psychologically, I want to know in the back of my mind, I have a Plan B, an alternative, a safety net if ever I need one.