December 19, 2024 • 56 mins
Ryan & Nicole conclude the story of how they met all the way through their enagement and marriage, and then pivot to the larger discussion of the relational threads that emerged, drawing conclusions about intimacy and longevity, and how the former evolves over the course of the latter. In particular, they discuss the concept of "contracts" between intimate partners which are forged at the beginning, often implicitly or sub/unconsciously, and must be discovered, understood, and renegotiated over time.
Discussed: origin story, how we became a couple, engagement and marriage, Richard Boswell, telling stories differently over time, being seen, vulnerability, honesty, seeing one another's best selves, love as honesty, loving honesty vs. cutting, proverb of Solomon, relationship contracts, renegotiating relational contracts, iterations of relationships, 17 us's ago.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
This is Ryan Thomas Neace.
(00:03):
And this is Nicole Neace.
And this is the Closer Podcast.
Hi everyone. This is episode 9, Origins part 2.
So what we're going to do today is give you the end of our Origins story,
(00:27):
which has already been recorded.
And at the end of episode 8, Origins part 1,
we sort of ran into something we didn't expect with me,
and I was sort of moved, and we were kind of processing our way through that.
And that was a great way to sort of end that piece.
(00:50):
But in starting this continuation of it, we're actually going to wind back a few minutes
and sort of let you hear that again.
So if you hear something today for the first few minutes,
it sounds like you heard it last time. You did.
We thought this would be a good way to provide the necessary context
for the end of our Origins story.
And so all of that had been recorded already, and you're going to hear that.
(01:13):
After that, there'll be a little musical interlude,
which will bring you then to the true Origins part 2, episode 9,
where we talk about what we noticed.
Because as is the case throughout the Closer podcast thus far,
and so far as we're concerned should be the case here forward as well,
there's a certain relational thread that exists in the way that we interact with one another,
(01:40):
which is really what the Closer podcast is about.
When we're talking about letting folks one step closer to us,
or sort of one concentric circle toward us,
we're really letting them in on what we often call process talk,
which is yes, we're sort of talking about a thing.
But en route to talking about that thing, a bunch of other things happen,
(02:02):
and things that in maybe a normal conversation you sort of step right over.
But as therapists, and really more just like we became therapists because we're already like this,
we're interested in those sort of in-between discussions.
And inevitably en route to doing our Origins story here for you all,
we had a lot of that happen,
so we're going to kind of talk about what we noticed as we did that.
(02:28):
Sounds like a plan.
All right, so here it is, Origins, Part 2, Episode 9.
You were willing to do that, be with me where I was at, and sort of see what happened.
Whenever I came back, I was like, okay, let's do this.
And then you get a lot more of my intention.
(02:51):
I don't know why that...
What's happening?
I don't really know.
I think it's just like hearing you say that,
(03:17):
which is not the first time I've heard you say it,
I just like...nice to remember, like...I don't know exactly.
(03:39):
Remember that about me?
Like nice to be noticed, you know?
Like, yeah, whenever I put myself into something, you know, like I'm really there.
Like I really inhabit the space once I'm into it.
And maybe that was like a...I think that's like a bruise for me,
(04:04):
like over, like not just romantic relationships,
but like relationships as sort of like people not noticing
like the level of intentionality I put into things
and or treating it very casually if they do notice.
And maybe I think a lot of women didn't know what to do with it
(04:28):
because it's also intense sort of thing or something.
I only know that because that's the feedback.
I'm just like, well, this is just who I am.
I don't know what you want from me.
You don't want me to show up at your house at midnight?
No, I'm just kidding.
I didn't do stuff like that.
Me neither.
Maybe I...you know, I'm not above it.
You were also 20-something.
I mean, come on.
(04:49):
I didn't see that coming.
I didn't expect to be moved by that.
It's weird.
I like it.
I like you remembering that for yourself and what that feels like.
Yeah.
(05:13):
I mean, because I mean, clearly I'm...
and if it's not clear, let me state it right now,
really happy I played the long game here.
It just was...
I just...there are a few things in my life that I can count probably on one hand.
And when I met you, there was only one thing before that.
(05:36):
You were the second thing that I just knew in my gut.
I just knew without a doubt.
There was no if, ands, or buts about it.
This was going to be something that I pursued.
And regardless of the outcome, I was going to be happy that I pursued it.
Like that just...I just felt certain, utter certainty.
(05:58):
And there has only been maybe two more things past that point in life.
And I'm glad I listened to myself.
I'm glad I didn't listen to other people.
Yeah.
I'm glad that I waited and got to experience this other version.
(06:19):
And it was like you caught up to me lightning speed fast after that.
Yeah.
You know?
Yeah.
Because I mean that was October and we got engaged Christmas Day.
Hmm.
I mean, and then we got married the following July,
almost a year from the day that we both moved to Nashville.
(06:42):
Yeah.
Yeah, so we...when I came back from that trip, we started spending a lot of time together.
Yeah.
You asked me like two weeks after in the grocery store, pharmacy aisle, to be your girlfriend.
Yeah.
I did.
I remember that.
(07:03):
You do.
I think there's just a lot from that time period that I have never like,
with as much access as I have to myself these days.
(07:25):
I have never recently since having that access gone back and like talked that through process this time period.
And I think there's just like a lot of things that make sense to me now, but not exactly with words.
(07:52):
It's like in my body about where I was at at that time that maybe I think I like failed to appreciate
(08:16):
how pivotal that timeframe was and meeting you and how like,
if I can just see it plain as the nose on my face right now, it was such an...you were so instrumental.
(08:46):
Because I was like really lost.
And I think I like was trying so hard to figure it all out.
And I couldn't then, and I haven't apparently since I've been able, ever really articulated what was happening for me.
(09:18):
It's like I was so out of touch with my body.
I was not feeling it at the time, but I was.
But like the connection between my body and my head was so fried, so severed,
that now I'm just like, whoa, it's like really hitting me.
(09:40):
Because that thing that I was doing with you really was like pretty much every woman that was a decent match for me,
I would do that with.
I would like be periodically just totally unavailable.
And I think a lot of it was if I was to put words around it, it was like,
(10:06):
I think I had so much shame or something that I just would not, could not let it in.
Because I've said this to you before and you've always been so wonderfully gracious in accepting it.
There were a few women, not a ton, but a few that I dated that were as really good to me like you were.
And they were like really a friend to me.
(10:30):
And I really view them as having helped prep me for you.
But like I just forgot, I think, and in a way that feels like I didn't even barely know it then, but I did.
But it was all in my mind. I was just really hurting back then.
(10:55):
There's a lot to remember at once.
So when we started doing the dang thing for real, yeah, it didn't take long.
And the way this went down was I was going home to St. Louis for Christmas and was thinking that I was going to pop the question soon, but not in December there.
(11:34):
I had no money and I wanted to, I needed to save for a ring.
And so I got home and I was talking to my parents who had met you and really liked you and spoke very favorably of you and seemed to also really see something there.
(11:55):
And my dad was asking me like, you know, hey, are you going to, you think this is, you know, are you going to ask this girl to marry you sort of thing?
And I'm like, yeah, I think so. Yeah. And he's like, like, soon. I'm like, well, I'd minimum, I don't know, six, eight, twelve months.
I've got to, you know, and I was not exactly known for my saving habits.
(12:21):
And my dad, like, just was like, well, what if I just gave you the money for the ring?
And that can be like your engagement or your wedding present or something. I don't remember what he pitched.
(12:44):
I just sort of stopped it like he's my dad's going to give me the money.
And I knew that for real, probably, probably a year on the salary I was making.
I mean, and then it would have been, you know, a tiny little ring.
And I was like, yeah, that works. You know, which is also very me. Right. Like I, yes, I just I'm like, yeah, OK.
(13:10):
That's like sort of like I wouldn't have almost the other way is not me. Me saving for 12 months, me having a relationship where somebody helps me out.
No, that's and me like deciding on a dime to pull the trigger right then.
And so right then we left and went ring shopping. My mom and my dad and I. Yeah.
(13:32):
And I feel like I knew you well enough. You definitely were not like a oh, my gosh, don't you want to bring Nicky along for the you were not picky like that by any stretch of the imagination.
And so I had the ring and then we had this whole plan that we would dispense with the whole thing during the Christmas celebration when all the family was over.
(13:57):
No pressure, but everybody's watching. My grandparents were both still alive on my dad's side and both of my brothers were there and their spouses and some of the kids.
But yeah, that was the plan. Yeah. It was a good plan. You usually like to tell this part of the story.
(14:18):
It was pretty great. I was sitting next to your grandmother. You were sitting at my feet because there wasn't a lot of actual furniture to sit on. The kids were doing rip fest.
So they were all opening their presents. There was cameras everywhere, which I took. This was my first Christmas with you guys. So I just was like, oh, they're filming the kids opening presents.
And that was pretty normal. I mean, you know, it was back in the era. There was no smart phones yet. Right. Yeah.
(14:41):
So I just remember sitting there watching and you and I had already exchanged our presents. So I wasn't looking to get anything from anyone or whatever.
And your mom had handed me a present. Right. It was the last one under the tree. And I was like, oh, okay.
And I got it. And on the front, it said it was from you and it was a long, like, rectangular box.
(15:07):
And so you and I had talked about diamond earrings. So I remember being like, oh, he got me diamond earrings. Act surprised. Act surprised.
Just remember being like, you already know what it is. Come on, come on, come on.
And so I'm opening it up. And as I opened it up, it was actually the ring and the band side by side instead of behind each other.
So it's a longer box. So it was good trickery on your part. And I was totally taken by surprise.
(15:32):
And then when I looked up, there you were on your knee proposing. Little did I know that was intentional that you sat down there on the floor.
I had thought you were just being kind and offering me the seat on the couch. I needed to be free to pivot. Yes.
And pivot you did. And you proposed. Honest, I don't remember anything that you said because I was so embarrassed because all of a sudden I realized everyone was watching us.
(15:58):
Yeah, I mean, truly everybody was. I mean, that was the idea. Yeah. And I was in a sweater.
So it was very hot because I got hot very quickly. I do remember romantic things and crying. Yeah.
I remember feeling absolutely positive that yes was the right thing to say. And I had actually in the like 24 hours called your parents.
(16:22):
And said like, hey, I know we just met, but this is the deal. Yep. And they gave their hearty amen.
Yeah. I don't know how hearty it was, but they gave it. It was hearty. They were in after they met you.
(16:50):
So we got married six months later in July of 2008. Yep.
And in between the proposal and getting married for me right before we got married, like literally, I think maybe three weeks or something like that.
And for you, I think it was within a few weeks post getting married. We both lost our jobs. Yeah.
(17:15):
And so we were trying to figure out what to do. And in some senses, it really ended up being a blessing because we were both on unemployment.
We were both not working, just married and making money, though admittedly it was a meager amount. But back then we were living on love anyways.
Didn't have much money any dang way. And so we were trying to figure out what to do.
(17:36):
And I think somehow in the process of trying to come up with what to do, we decided to move back to Virginia where I was.
I had enough connections in mental health and at the university that I had gone to and worked at there that we thought, oh, we will we can make it there.
And I had been offered a scholarship to the University of Delaware's Family Studies Program.
(17:58):
I was going to do a Ph.D. there. And we actually took a deferment.
I think we just sort of did not feel capable of making the jump as quick as they were wanting us to or something.
I don't really remember. But like so we end up saying, can we have a year?
(18:19):
And they said, yes, that the scholarship and so forth would remain intact.
And then. While living in Virginia, as a matter of fact, we had just so this is like the following January, so we're married July of 08, following January.
And then in January of 09, we're visiting here, San Diego, visiting your family and we're doing a photo shoot.
(18:46):
And so we have these really lovely photos to commemorate this sort of memory.
We discover, oops, Lily is on the way. She has been conceived and our surprise baby.
Something about that, we started reconsidering the wisdom of the Delaware thing at all. Right. Which is crazy.
(19:08):
I mean, it would have totally been a different trajectory for us.
Yeah, I would have been in academics. We would have lived in Delaware of all places.
The cold, the boring state. No offense if you're from Delaware. Love you.
Thanks for listening. And so we ended up turning that down. Yeah.
(19:32):
And I ended up starting a mental health practice there. My first one.
With a mentor of mine and.
Nikki really, you know, part of I think the deal was that we wanted you to be able to be home. Right.
And we just sort of realized, like, if we go to Delaware and I'm doing, I mean, not only am I going to be busy 24 7 with Ph.D.
(19:57):
Plus, you know, assistantship and all that was involved in that, that also we would not have enough money. Right.
With just that to live. And so you were going to have to work as well.
And then it was like, oh, gosh, what are we going to do? Oh, hey, this sort of like doesn't work.
Yeah. Moving to a new city where we had no friends, no support, no family.
Like that. It didn't make sense. And no money. Yeah.
(20:21):
And I and I'm going to work, but I'm not going to work like there was no guarantee of a job.
Yeah. And that that your job would produce enough return to do anything but offset child care.
And it was like, oh, my gosh, just very quickly. I mean, when we talked with them about it, we I remember when I talked with like the committee,
they were kind of just like, oh, you'll figure it out sort of thing. And we were like, oh, I don't think we will.
(20:46):
We don't want to figure it out. We don't want to figure it out that way.
And so we ended up staying there in Virginia, of all places, which is, you know, such an interesting decision, because I when when I moved to Nashville to be with you,
I mean, part of the motivation on the level of things not having to do with you and I was just I really did not love that area of Virginia.
(21:08):
So we decided to say, yeah, we did. This was in 2009.
And so we ended up staying in Virginia all the way until 2013, at which point we moved back to St. Louis.
But all that to say that is the sort of capstone of the story is the proposal married six months later in Virginia six months after that,
(21:35):
and that then sets the next decade plus of our lives.
So what stood out to you about the telling of the story this time?
There were certainly some ways in which it was the same.
(21:58):
I think I heard some differences in the way that you told it. And what did you notice both, you know, about the telling of the story and then and what came up for you?
Yeah. Or me, I suppose. But yeah, I think I have a couple.
I think you were right with I did tell a story slightly different than you historically and I have historically told it.
(22:24):
And I think the reflection I had over the weekend when just sort of thinking about how I told it, what I left out or what I explained more or whatever was influenced by the fact that I.
Well, one, I haven't had to tell the story in a really long time.
I think I said that in the other podcast and origins one. We haven't had a reason to share that story in a long time.
(22:51):
And so like my connection to the story feels slightly different than it did when we used to tell that to people all the time when we were first meeting them and we were young.
How?
I think early on that story, our origin story was so important to the identity of our relationship.
(23:16):
And that's really all we had, because if you hear our story, we met each other, got married and had babies in a very quick period of time.
And.
That was that was all there was to the story.
And now we have 17 more years between that time period is so much more of our relationship is made up by those things during that time so that the origin part doesn't or hadn't felt as relevant, except for then telling it and listening back to it.
(23:49):
I'm like, oh, I'm noticing some things that I tell differently.
Why did I tell them differently?
And then also noticing what feels most important to me.
And then there was which I will go into depth about that a little bit more.
But there is also a reflection I had about hearing you tell the story and watching the things that sort of happened for you telling the story, which were very new.
(24:15):
So can we talk about those for just a second?
Let's let's maybe do like one of each or something like what?
Can you give an example of like something that you told differently this time?
And then if you have it, if it's in there to give, like, why do you suppose that you told it differently?
I mean, I realize some of this is probably just it's just what came out.
(24:36):
Yeah. But if you had to assign meaning to it or or even speculate like, yeah.
Why did you tell that thing differently?
Do you suppose?
One thing that I told differently was maybe it wasn't even so much told it differently, but the inflection or the enthusiasm behind the way I said it was different.
(24:57):
When we first would tell the story all the time, I put a lot of like gusto behind the breaking up with me part and like really drawing out each individual thing that happened.
Because in this version, we just sort of said, yeah, you broke up with me.
Cinematic kiss in the rain. Bye. Right.
(25:19):
But, you know, it was a it was a several hour experience.
It took several hours for us to have that break up that night.
And I think I used to tell more detailed experience of what that was like.
You alluded to something, I think, about like it took a while for that break up.
And I sort of wondered what you meant by that is you're saying literally the process of breaking up as a discussion the day that it happened took several hours.
(25:48):
Yeah. Several hours.
You know, like I skipped the time in the car listening to whoever that guy was that you really liked and you kept playing the song over and over and over again.
And I remember like months from months afterwards, I couldn't stand hearing that guy's voice.
I think that's why that guy's voice is so great.
No, no, no, not Scott Matthew, not that guy, though, that that guy's voice still.
(26:12):
It was it was like another like kind of bubblegum me guy's voice, which is not on par with most of your music taste.
But it was like some song that honest God had blocked it out.
I can't I didn't like it that much.
But whatever it was, it played on a loop in your car.
And I was like, oh, my gosh, I'm going to while we were breaking.
Yes. And it was like so annoying.
(26:35):
Wow. I'm just thinking like because remember, this was before smartphones and stuff.
So it was a CD. I'm pretty sure it was a CD that had a single track or that I was like a CD single.
Yeah, it might have been. Yeah.
Or you just had it on repeat because you tend to like listen to songs over and over and over again.
I just know that it was saying I'm I'm a habit forming. Yes.
(27:00):
But like little things like that, things that felt relevant for me to paint a picture.
But why was it not relevant this time to be labor that point as much as you once did?
I think it's sort of like what I was alluding to is like I have less wrapped up in the identity of that story as what it what it means for the two of us to be together.
(27:21):
How we are together, who we are individually.
Like I didn't have many stories to tell about us.
Now I've got almost two decades worth of stories.
And I mean, yes, I'm sorry. I'm being annoying.
Why was that so relevant the first time? Why was it?
Oh, because it was so painful.
Like the breakup was so painful.
And I wanted people to know that, like, you really just put me through the wringer, you know, like and not like in a oh, I hope everyone knows.
(27:50):
What a jerk face he is and that kind of stuff.
But no, it actually in in an odd way, it's it spoke to at least for me, it spoke to like the dynamic dynamics of our relationship and that like this really long hurtful breakup happened.
And yet sneak peek here we are together some, you know, almost two decades.
(28:16):
It sounds like you told it for dramatic flair.
Yeah, probably, though I don't know that I had that in.
I don't think I had that awareness when I was telling it.
This is like hindsight awareness.
Yeah. Yeah.
You mean sort of like what I said that you told it in this particular way that seemed to.
Yes, but I think even the telling of it this time still sort of gives a very story like format.
(28:39):
I just downplayed some of the other pieces that historically, which you know what?
If we sit down with some new friends at some point and we tell the story to them again, I might tell that version.
There was this is one of the things I said a certain amount that I don't know that I was intentionally holding it back, but I just was like, well, this is the story.
(29:03):
Some friends might get even closer versions of the story, depending on how I'm feeling that day and what feels relevant.
Yeah, but it was a modified version.
It did not.
It wasn't the same that I used to tell, which was almost like wrote.
I mean, I could have like someone could have thought I rehearsed it, but I did not.
(29:26):
Yeah, I just really saw it that way.
Yes, and in a way that I don't that I'm not really at all meaning critically. That was how I tended to experience it.
You're putting names on my sort of original experience back in the day in a way that apparently I said we laughed about this and I found it annoying or something like.
And I think I think a lot of it was just about how you were orienting to the request at the time for the story to be told.
(29:54):
Yeah, you know, it's just it was like it makes maybe a larger sense.
Maybe they got a larger statement about how you tended to orient to people period or something.
Yeah, and now I see you as being much more genuine.
Yeah, and much more.
That wasn't a bad you back then.
Yeah, and it wasn't wrong to tell it that way.
It's not annoying, but.
(30:18):
But but it was just like, yeah, yeah, this is it because I've never been able to articulate this for it was like,
why aren't you giving people like the real version of you?
What is with this rehearsed thing that you're doing?
Like people like you just as you actually are.
And maybe what you would say, and I think you have said to me in the past is, well, no, that is me too.
(30:40):
But that I am a person who right?
Well, and I think I actually was that way when I was telling it that way.
I mean, I would say I've done a lot of self development in the last 17 years.
Yeah, so the person who's telling the story now has all of those insights and all of that.
But you see, I'm giving you a compliment.
Yes, thank you for this was something that I saw in you already back then.
(31:05):
And I often would find that like the telling in that way.
And that's just one example.
There are other things in a relationship that were sometimes I'm like, who are you and what have you done with my wife?
Yeah, like.
And it's a you that comes out in a certain context and and there are many sides to you in that way.
And so I'm sometimes confused.
(31:29):
Or something, because I think I see the like spontaneous you who just doesn't tell it the same way every time or something.
Right. Yeah.
I want the one thing that I noticed that you didn't say this time was and it was sort of hard
because we already seemingly got into the weeds a little bit about the harmony process.
(31:51):
Yeah. You know, it's hard to tell.
But it was such an extensive process in spite of the fact that we rolled through it relatively quickly.
And, you know, you always used to talk about the questions that I asked you.
Yeah. And but it sounds like based on your reaction, even just now, it was just sort of something you omitted.
It wasn't something that you necessarily think there's any meaning there.
(32:14):
No, I mean, those questions aren't necessarily relevant for without the larger story.
And right. So there was just some questions that I asked you that was part of what caught your attention.
What you did say was that these other guys asked you these sort of lazy goofball questions.
Yeah. Yeah. Your questions.
I actually am, you know, like it's it surprises me that I didn't say those because I that was one of my most favorite things.
(32:40):
I mean, obviously, it's the thing that drew me to you.
I don't know why I didn't say it other than I think I was just sort of like going through the story.
Yes. And again, to be fair, there's a lot of context around the questions that I did ask.
You have to tell a larger story. Yes.
But OK, so that doesn't sound like that was terribly meaningful.
Other stuff.
The other thing that I thought about what stood out to me was listening to you tell the story.
(33:07):
There were things that you you shared that were new insights for me.
It seems like some new ones for you that when you've told the story before, obviously, maybe because you didn't have access to those things at the time.
But even in the parts that you have told before, there was a different, I guess, softness towards yourself.
(33:33):
That then what I historically remember you being when you would tell the story.
I mean, most of the time when I would tell the story, you would just sit there and be like, yeah, yeah, yeah.
OK. And you would maybe throw in a bit here or two, but you wouldn't say much.
I don't know that I've ever really heard you tell the full story or even with the same kind of detail that you gave.
No, I don't think you have.
(33:54):
But, yeah, there was a lot of new data for me there.
And you're right. I when you used to tell the story, I would just sort of abstain.
And I'm trying to even understand sort of in real time here, like what was going on for me.
The only thing I can point to is just that like sort of the nitty gritty details about who I was at that time are sort of like unavoidable in the in the telling of that story.
(34:30):
Meaning like you kind of have to see that.
Well, what I referred to last time was like I there's like a certain instability there and an inability to kind of make a decision or something relationally.
I don't really know. It's I'm intuiting all this right now because I don't have a good sense necessarily.
(34:52):
But I suspect that it is something about me kind of not wanting to be seen.
And then it's so interesting that in the telling of the story, what I said last time was that it was nice to be seen and nice to be noticed.
(35:16):
Yeah.
So maybe. And I think this has been a trend in other areas of my life.
There was a bunch of things about me that I was trying hard not to see myself.
And or some of them that I don't think I knew were as unique as they are.
(35:42):
I think a big detail of my life is sort of always feeling different and then not wanting to feel different.
Yeah. And in not wanting to feel different, I would ignore things about me that were or I would downplay them, refuse to see them as novel or different.
(36:04):
And I felt that somehow I was awarding off people noticing.
And that way I could just kind of blend in. And when you would tell the story like you would, for example, highlighting the questions I asked you that differentiated me, I would always sort of be like.
(36:28):
And again, as I'm saying this, like I'm putting words to this. Yeah. This is this thing that I know I said it last time and I probably said it multiple times throughout our first almost 10 episodes.
And I certainly am saying it a lot in our personal lives. Yeah.
I did not know that the body spoke.
(36:53):
Like. My body was relegated to silence very early on in my life. Yeah.
And I didn't even know that either, by the way, I knew that there was a part of my experience that I didn't speak from.
I did not understand how integrally said a word integrally.
(37:17):
I thought you're I did not know and what an integral way that.
Was tied to my body.
And so from the vantage point of my body, which is now actually having dialogue with the rest of us, us being me. Yeah.
(37:42):
I can say that I am aware of things such as I was really trying to not be visible.
And when you're telling of the story would make me visible, even though clearly like that's the that's like the right way to tell it.
If you're telling a story of how two people met and came to love one another and decided to spend their lives together.
(38:07):
And that's clearly the way that I mean, if you were looking for a sort of an ideal way to tell that story, that's how you would want to tell it.
I was sort of set from the jump at odds with that.
Because to be noticed.
(38:28):
And to attend to my differences.
Was to do a thing that I had decided I wasn't going to do. I would just try to like not stick out.
Which I mean, if you've ever known me, it's the most hopeless.
But like this is all new to me.
Like this is I'm hearing myself say this for the first time. Yeah, I mean.
(38:53):
Hearing it in the way that you're saying it.
I have all these years of context for that, right? So it makes some sense to me.
But if I if I just connect it to the origin story or telling of the origin story.
(39:14):
I don't I feel something weird. I don't know quite what the emotion is that in.
Pointing out the ways in which what you did differently than other men who could have potentially have been a partner to me.
I don't know it.
That that caused you to sort of like this is the thing that I don't want.
(39:41):
And like kind of go inward like that. I'm like, man, here I I thought all these years I was like telling the story about like.
One of the best things about you.
That to this day, I still think it's like one of the best things about you.
And that it was absolutely like.
(40:04):
One of the top reasons why I was drawn to you.
Yes, but the part the part that makes me.
Like I have tears in my eyes right now, the part of that, though, that actually makes me.
Feel some kind of way is not that you thought that because I think I've always known that it's that you're finally seeing the other part too.
(40:30):
The part where it was like, yeah, but you were telling a thing.
That a really wounded part of me did not want to told.
And like that actually makes me feel seen.
That you do see that now.
Yeah, and the truth is.
(40:51):
I don't know that you could see it until I saw it right.
Yeah.
I certainly think I saw.
Because for some time now we've talked about the ways in which you feel feel different.
People scribe difference to whatever and those have always made sense to me for the most part.
(41:12):
It is really new to think that to hear about a part where actually is the very beginning stages.
It didn't even know you yet.
Really, right.
It was in the getting to know you stage that just by you showing up the way that you do that it drew me to you.
And then by telling that story to people it like poked that area for you.
(41:37):
And I'm just like it.
I would have never put the two together.
Because while well what you asked me clearly was different enough from the other men in there.
What's your favorite color questions?
I would have never have used the word different like in the way that it feels like this has like a negative connotation to it.
(42:01):
Like you're so different.
You're an oddball or something.
No, I never thought that though.
It's not that.
It's just I don't want people to see me.
I just don't want people to see you.
And I'm out here like.
Yeah, and you can see that.
I mean it's actually enlightening for me that like you can see that this provides a backdrop for so much of my back and forth relationally.
(42:29):
Yeah.
Which I described and I was like that in a bunch of relationships.
Yeah.
At least by my own estimation where this is why I could only go so far and then I would double back again and then I could only go so far.
Then I would double back again and it's actually contextualizes why it was so monumental that my dad, my parents intervened when they did.
(42:56):
Yeah.
Because it's possible.
Given my what we are saying here.
Yeah.
That the level of retreat that I might have done had they not gone ahead and sort of advanced the timeline.
That I could have retreated again.
Yeah.
(43:19):
But again, I just want to say this to you.
I really need you to see these aspects of me.
And they're so
like such a long and windy corridor to get to them.
I don't even have access to them until we sort of have meaningful conversations.
(43:43):
And to our point, we haven't done this in years and years, let alone had a protracted discussion about it.
But like
I need you to see that there are a great many things about me
that like I don't really wish the world to see, but like one of the struggles of like having a personality like the one I do is that people see them anyways.
(44:13):
Yeah.
Whereas like if you live the world from my vantage point, dude, I have been, I think of myself actually as incredibly street smart on the one hand.
And then on the other hand, I have been duped relationally left and right and left and right.
And apparently people have this like ability to like show up in spaces as other things other than themselves.
(44:40):
And for me, apparently, even when I'm trying to do that, I kind of can't.
And so I end up walking around in the world feeling immensely vulnerable.
Remember the Kafka quote that we talked about, like life is a costume party and everybody dressed up as such.
And I showed up with my real face.
(45:02):
Yeah.
I don't know if that like really makes sense to you as I'm as I'm like applying it.
But what are you thinking about what I'm saying here?
I see your wheels turning.
Yeah, there's there's so many thoughts.
I think it also because the more we like go back in time, the more I'm like accessing like different conversations and moments that we had, especially when we were dating, like especially that year in Nashville.
(45:30):
And like my understanding of that version of you.
Right.
And I remember I remember you really like identifying a lot with rap music and like and you would make reference dark, darker rap music at that.
Yeah.
And you would reference like your younger self a lot.
And there was a lot of like back and forth.
(45:52):
And I remember always sort of being like, yeah, like that's not that's but that's not who you are.
That's not the version of you that I'm like interacting with.
So I don't know why you keep going and hanging out in that space.
Right.
And like, which was actually helpful.
Yeah.
That's another point about it.
But keep going.
(46:13):
Yeah.
And I think so, like, as I'm hearing you reflect on how how I would describe you to other people that even that like touched tender parts.
I'm like, I think that you did show up to some degree as a 27 year old guy who had some shit figured out, but a whole lot of shit not figured out.
(46:35):
And you did your best to always be honest and in that honesty.
I think that's where you got stuck a lot.
Like people hurt you a lot because you were you were very honest.
And like, I'm thinking about what you said to me about, like, why did I tell the story the way that I did and that you could see something in me, even back then that, you know, it's taken me time to get to now.
(47:10):
And I think I had to. It's not like I had a choice in some degree, but I was that person because that's who who I was, who I was.
And that person was a good compliment to you.
And I think in whatever way that I saw, I did see you even in the ways that it sort of like seems like it created some pain.
(47:37):
I don't know. There was something, something in our partnership.
You could see me for my future self. Maybe I could see you for your future self.
I don't know the best parts of each other because you've always beckoned that out in me.
You've always called forth that part of me to push myself harder and and try to do things that may scare me and to just trust.
(48:10):
And I think when I, you know, in the origins one story I talked about, there was only one other thing that in my gut I knew before I met you, you were number two.
And part of you being number two was because you showed up like you did.
And I knew there was no subtext. I didn't have to guess.
(48:36):
I knew like even the way you tell like the back and forth and how I said it was really nice.
And you're like, that's a really generous way. Right.
I'm just like, no, you're talking about whenever you were all.
And did you think that I was just like the way you saying the best thing ever.
(48:59):
And then I'm like, I'm all I heard that too.
I'm like, well, I know. I mean, I didn't feel that about anyone.
Like ever. I like. But yes, it's such a harsh like. Yeah. Right.
I just but it's the truth.
I know. Because for me, like.
(49:27):
Like. If I really, really, really love you, why would I say anything but the honest truth?
Because like, I guess, like at my core line, dude. Yeah.
Even like a dishonesty in presentation.
(49:51):
Bordering on, you know, even things that people might file under the heading of like being diplomatic.
Yeah. I still am sometimes like, gosh, we're so close to not saying what's really going on.
And there's no way that's loving. Yeah. It is not loving to tell you something that is.
(50:13):
But when I hear it, I'm like, well, I feel you.
Well, I think you what you I think that's a very true statement.
And I is that what you were driving at here?
Yeah. I mean, I assign myself to that same statement because of what I've learned from you.
But there is a difference between.
(50:34):
And this is where I think us and the world can get confused.
There is a difference between being honest and truthful.
And that's very loving and saying honest, true things in a hurtful way.
And you have always done your best to say them in non hurtful ways.
And so it still can produce hurt. Right.
(50:55):
But there is a difference between them. Right.
And I think a lot of us don't know how and I'm going to include myself.
I've had to learn how to do this, and I'm still really working on it.
How to say an honest, loving thing in a way that speaks right to the truth.
But and it may hurt you, but it will also wrap you up in love.
(51:20):
And yeah, that's so different than just cutting someone totally, totally.
And it's never an excuse to be cutting, though.
Sometimes I hear, you know, when I listen to myself talk, I'm like, oh, I thought I was dispensing that in a way.
But the difficulty is that sometimes there really isn't much way to put kid gloves on.
(51:44):
One of the proverbs of Solomon is wounds from a friend can be trusted, but an enemy multiplies kisses.
It's that sort of thinking. Yeah.
But there was a complementary fit there. And this is why this stuff is so freaking tricky.
(52:05):
It's so tricky at the beginning of a relationship, let alone when you extrapolate it.
Fifteen, twenty, forty, fifty years from the origin point.
Oh, my gosh, it becomes hopelessly complex. Yeah.
And what I mean by that is, yeah, you didn't see some of this at the beginning, partially because I didn't see it.
(52:31):
And also in order to come out from behind so much of the hiding that I was doing, I sort of like needed you to not see it.
Yeah. So that you could, A, just sort of proceed with the relationship on the basis of what you did see.
(52:53):
And then B, by continuing to point to me in the loving way that you did, I was able to step into finally seeing it.
Often, as you know, some of the later stories, there are a great deal of struggle and trial and error and not just between me and you, but all the relationships in my life.
(53:23):
But this is the weird complexity of complementarity and of intimacy is that I needed you to not see. And also, by the way, now I need you to see.
And think about it. How many times in our relationship have we discovered that we like made a contract with one another?
(53:44):
And then we examine the contents of the contract and we're like, oh, this doesn't work anymore.
Yeah. Remember when we first did that in marriage counseling with the boss?
Like we noticed at that time that there were things that we had apparently agreed to at the outset of our marriage.
Some of them were explicit. Most of them were totally implied, unsaid.
(54:07):
But we could look back and go, clearly, this is what we were saying to one another. Look at our actions. This is what.
And then we were like, we just don't think at this phase of our relationship that's working anymore.
Right.
And because we could see it, because we could be in agreement that it was no longer working, and because we loved one another and frankly, we had some luck and a lot of help, we could go, oh, let's just renegotiate then.
(54:32):
Right. If that wasn't what's working. Oh, and by the way, neither of us even want that anymore.
Yeah.
What do we want? And could we find new terms? And maybe this has been like the truest thing we could say about us from origin to now is that like iteratively, we keep rediscovering it again, just like we have done on an individual basis with ourselves.
(54:56):
It's like my friend Rob says, oh, that was like 17 Rob's ago.
Yeah.
Yeah. This is like 17 us's ago.
Yeah.
And you need to be able to have the freedom to come back and renegotiate.
Yes. And I think we both offer each other freedom to come back and renegotiate.
And some of us, one of us may see it before the other one or the need may arise for one of us before the other one, or sometimes it's at the same time, but there's always freedom to come back and renegotiate.
(55:24):
Yeah.
Yeah, and hope that that kind of renegotiation will right the ship again.
Yeah.
And between me and you, in a way that I think is somewhat atypical.
(55:45):
We just don't give a fuck what anybody else thinks, period.
Point blank.
Like, I don't care what you think about the fact that you may have known us in one setting and we were whatever.
And now it's like this, though the truth is, I don't think that's something people would even say about us.
I think people would say that we've always been us, but maybe that's it.
The key is that in the context of an intimate relationship, being us looks one way at one stage and another at another and so on and so on.
(56:16):
To where over the course of a lifetime together, we've been so many different things in so many different seasons.
As you should be.
As you should be.
Damn skippy.
Colin Robinson.
You know I had to say.
This is Ryan Thomas Neace.
(00:03):
And this is Nicole Neace.
And this is the Closer Podcast.
Hi everyone. This is episode 9, Origins part 2.
So what we're going to do today is give you the end of our Origins story,
(00:27):
which has already been recorded.
And at the end of episode 8, Origins part 1,
we sort of ran into something we didn't expect with me,
and I was sort of moved, and we were kind of processing our way through that.
And that was a great way to sort of end that piece.
(00:50):
But in starting this continuation of it, we're actually going to wind back a few minutes
and sort of let you hear that again.
So if you hear something today for the first few minutes,
it sounds like you heard it last time. You did.
We thought this would be a good way to provide the necessary context
for the end of our Origins story.
And so all of that had been recorded already, and you're going to hear that.
(01:13):
After that, there'll be a little musical interlude,
which will bring you then to the true Origins part 2, episode 9,
where we talk about what we noticed.
Because as is the case throughout the Closer podcast thus far,
and so far as we're concerned should be the case here forward as well,
there's a certain relational thread that exists in the way that we interact with one another,
(01:40):
which is really what the Closer podcast is about.
When we're talking about letting folks one step closer to us,
or sort of one concentric circle toward us,
we're really letting them in on what we often call process talk,
which is yes, we're sort of talking about a thing.
But en route to talking about that thing, a bunch of other things happen,
(02:02):
and things that in maybe a normal conversation you sort of step right over.
But as therapists, and really more just like we became therapists because we're already like this,
we're interested in those sort of in-between discussions.
And inevitably en route to doing our Origins story here for you all,
we had a lot of that happen,
so we're going to kind of talk about what we noticed as we did that.
(02:28):
Sounds like a plan.
All right, so here it is, Origins, Part 2, Episode 9.
You were willing to do that, be with me where I was at, and sort of see what happened.
Whenever I came back, I was like, okay, let's do this.
And then you get a lot more of my intention.
(02:51):
I don't know why that...
What's happening?
I don't really know.
I think it's just like hearing you say that,
(03:17):
which is not the first time I've heard you say it,
I just like...nice to remember, like...I don't know exactly.
(03:39):
Remember that about me?
Like nice to be noticed, you know?
Like, yeah, whenever I put myself into something, you know, like I'm really there.
Like I really inhabit the space once I'm into it.
And maybe that was like a...I think that's like a bruise for me,
(04:04):
like over, like not just romantic relationships,
but like relationships as sort of like people not noticing
like the level of intentionality I put into things
and or treating it very casually if they do notice.
And maybe I think a lot of women didn't know what to do with it
(04:28):
because it's also intense sort of thing or something.
I only know that because that's the feedback.
I'm just like, well, this is just who I am.
I don't know what you want from me.
You don't want me to show up at your house at midnight?
No, I'm just kidding.
I didn't do stuff like that.
Me neither.
Maybe I...you know, I'm not above it.
You were also 20-something.
I mean, come on.
(04:49):
I didn't see that coming.
I didn't expect to be moved by that.
It's weird.
I like it.
I like you remembering that for yourself and what that feels like.
Yeah.
(05:13):
I mean, because I mean, clearly I'm...
and if it's not clear, let me state it right now,
really happy I played the long game here.
It just was...
I just...there are a few things in my life that I can count probably on one hand.
And when I met you, there was only one thing before that.
(05:36):
You were the second thing that I just knew in my gut.
I just knew without a doubt.
There was no if, ands, or buts about it.
This was going to be something that I pursued.
And regardless of the outcome, I was going to be happy that I pursued it.
Like that just...I just felt certain, utter certainty.
(05:58):
And there has only been maybe two more things past that point in life.
And I'm glad I listened to myself.
I'm glad I didn't listen to other people.
Yeah.
I'm glad that I waited and got to experience this other version.
(06:19):
And it was like you caught up to me lightning speed fast after that.
Yeah.
You know?
Yeah.
Because I mean that was October and we got engaged Christmas Day.
Hmm.
I mean, and then we got married the following July,
almost a year from the day that we both moved to Nashville.
(06:42):
Yeah.
Yeah, so we...when I came back from that trip, we started spending a lot of time together.
Yeah.
You asked me like two weeks after in the grocery store, pharmacy aisle, to be your girlfriend.
Yeah.
I did.
I remember that.
(07:03):
You do.
I think there's just a lot from that time period that I have never like,
with as much access as I have to myself these days.
(07:25):
I have never recently since having that access gone back and like talked that through process this time period.
And I think there's just like a lot of things that make sense to me now, but not exactly with words.
(07:52):
It's like in my body about where I was at at that time that maybe I think I like failed to appreciate
(08:16):
how pivotal that timeframe was and meeting you and how like,
if I can just see it plain as the nose on my face right now, it was such an...you were so instrumental.
(08:46):
Because I was like really lost.
And I think I like was trying so hard to figure it all out.
And I couldn't then, and I haven't apparently since I've been able, ever really articulated what was happening for me.
(09:18):
It's like I was so out of touch with my body.
I was not feeling it at the time, but I was.
But like the connection between my body and my head was so fried, so severed,
that now I'm just like, whoa, it's like really hitting me.
(09:40):
Because that thing that I was doing with you really was like pretty much every woman that was a decent match for me,
I would do that with.
I would like be periodically just totally unavailable.
And I think a lot of it was if I was to put words around it, it was like,
(10:06):
I think I had so much shame or something that I just would not, could not let it in.
Because I've said this to you before and you've always been so wonderfully gracious in accepting it.
There were a few women, not a ton, but a few that I dated that were as really good to me like you were.
And they were like really a friend to me.
(10:30):
And I really view them as having helped prep me for you.
But like I just forgot, I think, and in a way that feels like I didn't even barely know it then, but I did.
But it was all in my mind. I was just really hurting back then.
(10:55):
There's a lot to remember at once.
So when we started doing the dang thing for real, yeah, it didn't take long.
And the way this went down was I was going home to St. Louis for Christmas and was thinking that I was going to pop the question soon, but not in December there.
(11:34):
I had no money and I wanted to, I needed to save for a ring.
And so I got home and I was talking to my parents who had met you and really liked you and spoke very favorably of you and seemed to also really see something there.
(11:55):
And my dad was asking me like, you know, hey, are you going to, you think this is, you know, are you going to ask this girl to marry you sort of thing?
And I'm like, yeah, I think so. Yeah. And he's like, like, soon. I'm like, well, I'd minimum, I don't know, six, eight, twelve months.
I've got to, you know, and I was not exactly known for my saving habits.
(12:21):
And my dad, like, just was like, well, what if I just gave you the money for the ring?
And that can be like your engagement or your wedding present or something. I don't remember what he pitched.
(12:44):
I just sort of stopped it like he's my dad's going to give me the money.
And I knew that for real, probably, probably a year on the salary I was making.
I mean, and then it would have been, you know, a tiny little ring.
And I was like, yeah, that works. You know, which is also very me. Right. Like I, yes, I just I'm like, yeah, OK.
(13:10):
That's like sort of like I wouldn't have almost the other way is not me. Me saving for 12 months, me having a relationship where somebody helps me out.
No, that's and me like deciding on a dime to pull the trigger right then.
And so right then we left and went ring shopping. My mom and my dad and I. Yeah.
(13:32):
And I feel like I knew you well enough. You definitely were not like a oh, my gosh, don't you want to bring Nicky along for the you were not picky like that by any stretch of the imagination.
And so I had the ring and then we had this whole plan that we would dispense with the whole thing during the Christmas celebration when all the family was over.
(13:57):
No pressure, but everybody's watching. My grandparents were both still alive on my dad's side and both of my brothers were there and their spouses and some of the kids.
But yeah, that was the plan. Yeah. It was a good plan. You usually like to tell this part of the story.
(14:18):
It was pretty great. I was sitting next to your grandmother. You were sitting at my feet because there wasn't a lot of actual furniture to sit on. The kids were doing rip fest.
So they were all opening their presents. There was cameras everywhere, which I took. This was my first Christmas with you guys. So I just was like, oh, they're filming the kids opening presents.
And that was pretty normal. I mean, you know, it was back in the era. There was no smart phones yet. Right. Yeah.
(14:41):
So I just remember sitting there watching and you and I had already exchanged our presents. So I wasn't looking to get anything from anyone or whatever.
And your mom had handed me a present. Right. It was the last one under the tree. And I was like, oh, okay.
And I got it. And on the front, it said it was from you and it was a long, like, rectangular box.
(15:07):
And so you and I had talked about diamond earrings. So I remember being like, oh, he got me diamond earrings. Act surprised. Act surprised.
Just remember being like, you already know what it is. Come on, come on, come on.
And so I'm opening it up. And as I opened it up, it was actually the ring and the band side by side instead of behind each other.
So it's a longer box. So it was good trickery on your part. And I was totally taken by surprise.
(15:32):
And then when I looked up, there you were on your knee proposing. Little did I know that was intentional that you sat down there on the floor.
I had thought you were just being kind and offering me the seat on the couch. I needed to be free to pivot. Yes.
And pivot you did. And you proposed. Honest, I don't remember anything that you said because I was so embarrassed because all of a sudden I realized everyone was watching us.
(15:58):
Yeah, I mean, truly everybody was. I mean, that was the idea. Yeah. And I was in a sweater.
So it was very hot because I got hot very quickly. I do remember romantic things and crying. Yeah.
I remember feeling absolutely positive that yes was the right thing to say. And I had actually in the like 24 hours called your parents.
(16:22):
And said like, hey, I know we just met, but this is the deal. Yep. And they gave their hearty amen.
Yeah. I don't know how hearty it was, but they gave it. It was hearty. They were in after they met you.
(16:50):
So we got married six months later in July of 2008. Yep.
And in between the proposal and getting married for me right before we got married, like literally, I think maybe three weeks or something like that.
And for you, I think it was within a few weeks post getting married. We both lost our jobs. Yeah.
(17:15):
And so we were trying to figure out what to do. And in some senses, it really ended up being a blessing because we were both on unemployment.
We were both not working, just married and making money, though admittedly it was a meager amount. But back then we were living on love anyways.
Didn't have much money any dang way. And so we were trying to figure out what to do.
(17:36):
And I think somehow in the process of trying to come up with what to do, we decided to move back to Virginia where I was.
I had enough connections in mental health and at the university that I had gone to and worked at there that we thought, oh, we will we can make it there.
And I had been offered a scholarship to the University of Delaware's Family Studies Program.
(17:58):
I was going to do a Ph.D. there. And we actually took a deferment.
I think we just sort of did not feel capable of making the jump as quick as they were wanting us to or something.
I don't really remember. But like so we end up saying, can we have a year?
(18:19):
And they said, yes, that the scholarship and so forth would remain intact.
And then. While living in Virginia, as a matter of fact, we had just so this is like the following January, so we're married July of 08, following January.
And then in January of 09, we're visiting here, San Diego, visiting your family and we're doing a photo shoot.
(18:46):
And so we have these really lovely photos to commemorate this sort of memory.
We discover, oops, Lily is on the way. She has been conceived and our surprise baby.
Something about that, we started reconsidering the wisdom of the Delaware thing at all. Right. Which is crazy.
(19:08):
I mean, it would have totally been a different trajectory for us.
Yeah, I would have been in academics. We would have lived in Delaware of all places.
The cold, the boring state. No offense if you're from Delaware. Love you.
Thanks for listening. And so we ended up turning that down. Yeah.
(19:32):
And I ended up starting a mental health practice there. My first one.
With a mentor of mine and.
Nikki really, you know, part of I think the deal was that we wanted you to be able to be home. Right.
And we just sort of realized, like, if we go to Delaware and I'm doing, I mean, not only am I going to be busy 24 7 with Ph.D.
(19:57):
Plus, you know, assistantship and all that was involved in that, that also we would not have enough money. Right.
With just that to live. And so you were going to have to work as well.
And then it was like, oh, gosh, what are we going to do? Oh, hey, this sort of like doesn't work.
Yeah. Moving to a new city where we had no friends, no support, no family.
Like that. It didn't make sense. And no money. Yeah.
(20:21):
And I and I'm going to work, but I'm not going to work like there was no guarantee of a job.
Yeah. And that that your job would produce enough return to do anything but offset child care.
And it was like, oh, my gosh, just very quickly. I mean, when we talked with them about it, we I remember when I talked with like the committee,
they were kind of just like, oh, you'll figure it out sort of thing. And we were like, oh, I don't think we will.
(20:46):
We don't want to figure it out. We don't want to figure it out that way.
And so we ended up staying there in Virginia, of all places, which is, you know, such an interesting decision, because I when when I moved to Nashville to be with you,
I mean, part of the motivation on the level of things not having to do with you and I was just I really did not love that area of Virginia.
(21:08):
So we decided to say, yeah, we did. This was in 2009.
And so we ended up staying in Virginia all the way until 2013, at which point we moved back to St. Louis.
But all that to say that is the sort of capstone of the story is the proposal married six months later in Virginia six months after that,
(21:35):
and that then sets the next decade plus of our lives.
So what stood out to you about the telling of the story this time?
There were certainly some ways in which it was the same.
(21:58):
I think I heard some differences in the way that you told it. And what did you notice both, you know, about the telling of the story and then and what came up for you?
Yeah. Or me, I suppose. But yeah, I think I have a couple.
I think you were right with I did tell a story slightly different than you historically and I have historically told it.
(22:24):
And I think the reflection I had over the weekend when just sort of thinking about how I told it, what I left out or what I explained more or whatever was influenced by the fact that I.
Well, one, I haven't had to tell the story in a really long time.
I think I said that in the other podcast and origins one. We haven't had a reason to share that story in a long time.
(22:51):
And so like my connection to the story feels slightly different than it did when we used to tell that to people all the time when we were first meeting them and we were young.
How?
I think early on that story, our origin story was so important to the identity of our relationship.
(23:16):
And that's really all we had, because if you hear our story, we met each other, got married and had babies in a very quick period of time.
And.
That was that was all there was to the story.
And now we have 17 more years between that time period is so much more of our relationship is made up by those things during that time so that the origin part doesn't or hadn't felt as relevant, except for then telling it and listening back to it.
(23:49):
I'm like, oh, I'm noticing some things that I tell differently.
Why did I tell them differently?
And then also noticing what feels most important to me.
And then there was which I will go into depth about that a little bit more.
But there is also a reflection I had about hearing you tell the story and watching the things that sort of happened for you telling the story, which were very new.
(24:15):
So can we talk about those for just a second?
Let's let's maybe do like one of each or something like what?
Can you give an example of like something that you told differently this time?
And then if you have it, if it's in there to give, like, why do you suppose that you told it differently?
I mean, I realize some of this is probably just it's just what came out.
(24:36):
Yeah. But if you had to assign meaning to it or or even speculate like, yeah.
Why did you tell that thing differently?
Do you suppose?
One thing that I told differently was maybe it wasn't even so much told it differently, but the inflection or the enthusiasm behind the way I said it was different.
(24:57):
When we first would tell the story all the time, I put a lot of like gusto behind the breaking up with me part and like really drawing out each individual thing that happened.
Because in this version, we just sort of said, yeah, you broke up with me.
Cinematic kiss in the rain. Bye. Right.
(25:19):
But, you know, it was a it was a several hour experience.
It took several hours for us to have that break up that night.
And I think I used to tell more detailed experience of what that was like.
You alluded to something, I think, about like it took a while for that break up.
And I sort of wondered what you meant by that is you're saying literally the process of breaking up as a discussion the day that it happened took several hours.
(25:48):
Yeah. Several hours.
You know, like I skipped the time in the car listening to whoever that guy was that you really liked and you kept playing the song over and over and over again.
And I remember like months from months afterwards, I couldn't stand hearing that guy's voice.
I think that's why that guy's voice is so great.
No, no, no, not Scott Matthew, not that guy, though, that that guy's voice still.
(26:12):
It was it was like another like kind of bubblegum me guy's voice, which is not on par with most of your music taste.
But it was like some song that honest God had blocked it out.
I can't I didn't like it that much.
But whatever it was, it played on a loop in your car.
And I was like, oh, my gosh, I'm going to while we were breaking.
Yes. And it was like so annoying.
(26:35):
Wow. I'm just thinking like because remember, this was before smartphones and stuff.
So it was a CD. I'm pretty sure it was a CD that had a single track or that I was like a CD single.
Yeah, it might have been. Yeah.
Or you just had it on repeat because you tend to like listen to songs over and over and over again.
I just know that it was saying I'm I'm a habit forming. Yes.
(27:00):
But like little things like that, things that felt relevant for me to paint a picture.
But why was it not relevant this time to be labor that point as much as you once did?
I think it's sort of like what I was alluding to is like I have less wrapped up in the identity of that story as what it what it means for the two of us to be together.
(27:21):
How we are together, who we are individually.
Like I didn't have many stories to tell about us.
Now I've got almost two decades worth of stories.
And I mean, yes, I'm sorry. I'm being annoying.
Why was that so relevant the first time? Why was it?
Oh, because it was so painful.
Like the breakup was so painful.
And I wanted people to know that, like, you really just put me through the wringer, you know, like and not like in a oh, I hope everyone knows.
(27:50):
What a jerk face he is and that kind of stuff.
But no, it actually in in an odd way, it's it spoke to at least for me, it spoke to like the dynamic dynamics of our relationship and that like this really long hurtful breakup happened.
And yet sneak peek here we are together some, you know, almost two decades.
(28:16):
It sounds like you told it for dramatic flair.
Yeah, probably, though I don't know that I had that in.
I don't think I had that awareness when I was telling it.
This is like hindsight awareness.
Yeah. Yeah.
You mean sort of like what I said that you told it in this particular way that seemed to.
Yes, but I think even the telling of it this time still sort of gives a very story like format.
(28:39):
I just downplayed some of the other pieces that historically, which you know what?
If we sit down with some new friends at some point and we tell the story to them again, I might tell that version.
There was this is one of the things I said a certain amount that I don't know that I was intentionally holding it back, but I just was like, well, this is the story.
(29:03):
Some friends might get even closer versions of the story, depending on how I'm feeling that day and what feels relevant.
Yeah, but it was a modified version.
It did not.
It wasn't the same that I used to tell, which was almost like wrote.
I mean, I could have like someone could have thought I rehearsed it, but I did not.
(29:26):
Yeah, I just really saw it that way.
Yes, and in a way that I don't that I'm not really at all meaning critically. That was how I tended to experience it.
You're putting names on my sort of original experience back in the day in a way that apparently I said we laughed about this and I found it annoying or something like.
And I think I think a lot of it was just about how you were orienting to the request at the time for the story to be told.
(29:54):
Yeah, you know, it's just it was like it makes maybe a larger sense.
Maybe they got a larger statement about how you tended to orient to people period or something.
Yeah, and now I see you as being much more genuine.
Yeah, and much more.
That wasn't a bad you back then.
Yeah, and it wasn't wrong to tell it that way.
It's not annoying, but.
(30:18):
But but it was just like, yeah, yeah, this is it because I've never been able to articulate this for it was like,
why aren't you giving people like the real version of you?
What is with this rehearsed thing that you're doing?
Like people like you just as you actually are.
And maybe what you would say, and I think you have said to me in the past is, well, no, that is me too.
(30:40):
But that I am a person who right?
Well, and I think I actually was that way when I was telling it that way.
I mean, I would say I've done a lot of self development in the last 17 years.
Yeah, so the person who's telling the story now has all of those insights and all of that.
But you see, I'm giving you a compliment.
Yes, thank you for this was something that I saw in you already back then.
(31:05):
And I often would find that like the telling in that way.
And that's just one example.
There are other things in a relationship that were sometimes I'm like, who are you and what have you done with my wife?
Yeah, like.
And it's a you that comes out in a certain context and and there are many sides to you in that way.
And so I'm sometimes confused.
(31:29):
Or something, because I think I see the like spontaneous you who just doesn't tell it the same way every time or something.
Right. Yeah.
I want the one thing that I noticed that you didn't say this time was and it was sort of hard
because we already seemingly got into the weeds a little bit about the harmony process.
(31:51):
Yeah. You know, it's hard to tell.
But it was such an extensive process in spite of the fact that we rolled through it relatively quickly.
And, you know, you always used to talk about the questions that I asked you.
Yeah. And but it sounds like based on your reaction, even just now, it was just sort of something you omitted.
It wasn't something that you necessarily think there's any meaning there.
(32:14):
No, I mean, those questions aren't necessarily relevant for without the larger story.
And right. So there was just some questions that I asked you that was part of what caught your attention.
What you did say was that these other guys asked you these sort of lazy goofball questions.
Yeah. Yeah. Your questions.
I actually am, you know, like it's it surprises me that I didn't say those because I that was one of my most favorite things.
(32:40):
I mean, obviously, it's the thing that drew me to you.
I don't know why I didn't say it other than I think I was just sort of like going through the story.
Yes. And again, to be fair, there's a lot of context around the questions that I did ask.
You have to tell a larger story. Yes.
But OK, so that doesn't sound like that was terribly meaningful.
Other stuff.
The other thing that I thought about what stood out to me was listening to you tell the story.
(33:07):
There were things that you you shared that were new insights for me.
It seems like some new ones for you that when you've told the story before, obviously, maybe because you didn't have access to those things at the time.
But even in the parts that you have told before, there was a different, I guess, softness towards yourself.
(33:33):
That then what I historically remember you being when you would tell the story.
I mean, most of the time when I would tell the story, you would just sit there and be like, yeah, yeah, yeah.
OK. And you would maybe throw in a bit here or two, but you wouldn't say much.
I don't know that I've ever really heard you tell the full story or even with the same kind of detail that you gave.
No, I don't think you have.
(33:54):
But, yeah, there was a lot of new data for me there.
And you're right. I when you used to tell the story, I would just sort of abstain.
And I'm trying to even understand sort of in real time here, like what was going on for me.
The only thing I can point to is just that like sort of the nitty gritty details about who I was at that time are sort of like unavoidable in the in the telling of that story.
(34:30):
Meaning like you kind of have to see that.
Well, what I referred to last time was like I there's like a certain instability there and an inability to kind of make a decision or something relationally.
I don't really know. It's I'm intuiting all this right now because I don't have a good sense necessarily.
(34:52):
But I suspect that it is something about me kind of not wanting to be seen.
And then it's so interesting that in the telling of the story, what I said last time was that it was nice to be seen and nice to be noticed.
(35:16):
Yeah.
So maybe. And I think this has been a trend in other areas of my life.
There was a bunch of things about me that I was trying hard not to see myself.
And or some of them that I don't think I knew were as unique as they are.
(35:42):
I think a big detail of my life is sort of always feeling different and then not wanting to feel different.
Yeah. And in not wanting to feel different, I would ignore things about me that were or I would downplay them, refuse to see them as novel or different.
(36:04):
And I felt that somehow I was awarding off people noticing.
And that way I could just kind of blend in. And when you would tell the story like you would, for example, highlighting the questions I asked you that differentiated me, I would always sort of be like.
(36:28):
And again, as I'm saying this, like I'm putting words to this. Yeah. This is this thing that I know I said it last time and I probably said it multiple times throughout our first almost 10 episodes.
And I certainly am saying it a lot in our personal lives. Yeah.
I did not know that the body spoke.
(36:53):
Like. My body was relegated to silence very early on in my life. Yeah.
And I didn't even know that either, by the way, I knew that there was a part of my experience that I didn't speak from.
I did not understand how integrally said a word integrally.
(37:17):
I thought you're I did not know and what an integral way that.
Was tied to my body.
And so from the vantage point of my body, which is now actually having dialogue with the rest of us, us being me. Yeah.
(37:42):
I can say that I am aware of things such as I was really trying to not be visible.
And when you're telling of the story would make me visible, even though clearly like that's the that's like the right way to tell it.
If you're telling a story of how two people met and came to love one another and decided to spend their lives together.
(38:07):
And that's clearly the way that I mean, if you were looking for a sort of an ideal way to tell that story, that's how you would want to tell it.
I was sort of set from the jump at odds with that.
Because to be noticed.
(38:28):
And to attend to my differences.
Was to do a thing that I had decided I wasn't going to do. I would just try to like not stick out.
Which I mean, if you've ever known me, it's the most hopeless.
But like this is all new to me.
Like this is I'm hearing myself say this for the first time. Yeah, I mean.
(38:53):
Hearing it in the way that you're saying it.
I have all these years of context for that, right? So it makes some sense to me.
But if I if I just connect it to the origin story or telling of the origin story.
(39:14):
I don't I feel something weird. I don't know quite what the emotion is that in.
Pointing out the ways in which what you did differently than other men who could have potentially have been a partner to me.
I don't know it.
That that caused you to sort of like this is the thing that I don't want.
(39:41):
And like kind of go inward like that. I'm like, man, here I I thought all these years I was like telling the story about like.
One of the best things about you.
That to this day, I still think it's like one of the best things about you.
And that it was absolutely like.
(40:04):
One of the top reasons why I was drawn to you.
Yes, but the part the part that makes me.
Like I have tears in my eyes right now, the part of that, though, that actually makes me.
Feel some kind of way is not that you thought that because I think I've always known that it's that you're finally seeing the other part too.
(40:30):
The part where it was like, yeah, but you were telling a thing.
That a really wounded part of me did not want to told.
And like that actually makes me feel seen.
That you do see that now.
Yeah, and the truth is.
(40:51):
I don't know that you could see it until I saw it right.
Yeah.
I certainly think I saw.
Because for some time now we've talked about the ways in which you feel feel different.
People scribe difference to whatever and those have always made sense to me for the most part.
(41:12):
It is really new to think that to hear about a part where actually is the very beginning stages.
It didn't even know you yet.
Really, right.
It was in the getting to know you stage that just by you showing up the way that you do that it drew me to you.
And then by telling that story to people it like poked that area for you.
(41:37):
And I'm just like it.
I would have never put the two together.
Because while well what you asked me clearly was different enough from the other men in there.
What's your favorite color questions?
I would have never have used the word different like in the way that it feels like this has like a negative connotation to it.
(42:01):
Like you're so different.
You're an oddball or something.
No, I never thought that though.
It's not that.
It's just I don't want people to see me.
I just don't want people to see you.
And I'm out here like.
Yeah, and you can see that.
I mean it's actually enlightening for me that like you can see that this provides a backdrop for so much of my back and forth relationally.
(42:29):
Yeah.
Which I described and I was like that in a bunch of relationships.
Yeah.
At least by my own estimation where this is why I could only go so far and then I would double back again and then I could only go so far.
Then I would double back again and it's actually contextualizes why it was so monumental that my dad, my parents intervened when they did.
(42:56):
Yeah.
Because it's possible.
Given my what we are saying here.
Yeah.
That the level of retreat that I might have done had they not gone ahead and sort of advanced the timeline.
That I could have retreated again.
Yeah.
(43:19):
But again, I just want to say this to you.
I really need you to see these aspects of me.
And they're so
like such a long and windy corridor to get to them.
I don't even have access to them until we sort of have meaningful conversations.
(43:43):
And to our point, we haven't done this in years and years, let alone had a protracted discussion about it.
But like
I need you to see that there are a great many things about me
that like I don't really wish the world to see, but like one of the struggles of like having a personality like the one I do is that people see them anyways.
(44:13):
Yeah.
Whereas like if you live the world from my vantage point, dude, I have been, I think of myself actually as incredibly street smart on the one hand.
And then on the other hand, I have been duped relationally left and right and left and right.
And apparently people have this like ability to like show up in spaces as other things other than themselves.
(44:40):
And for me, apparently, even when I'm trying to do that, I kind of can't.
And so I end up walking around in the world feeling immensely vulnerable.
Remember the Kafka quote that we talked about, like life is a costume party and everybody dressed up as such.
And I showed up with my real face.
(45:02):
Yeah.
I don't know if that like really makes sense to you as I'm as I'm like applying it.
But what are you thinking about what I'm saying here?
I see your wheels turning.
Yeah, there's there's so many thoughts.
I think it also because the more we like go back in time, the more I'm like accessing like different conversations and moments that we had, especially when we were dating, like especially that year in Nashville.
(45:30):
And like my understanding of that version of you.
Right.
And I remember I remember you really like identifying a lot with rap music and like and you would make reference dark, darker rap music at that.
Yeah.
And you would reference like your younger self a lot.
And there was a lot of like back and forth.
(45:52):
And I remember always sort of being like, yeah, like that's not that's but that's not who you are.
That's not the version of you that I'm like interacting with.
So I don't know why you keep going and hanging out in that space.
Right.
And like, which was actually helpful.
Yeah.
That's another point about it.
But keep going.
(46:13):
Yeah.
And I think so, like, as I'm hearing you reflect on how how I would describe you to other people that even that like touched tender parts.
I'm like, I think that you did show up to some degree as a 27 year old guy who had some shit figured out, but a whole lot of shit not figured out.
(46:35):
And you did your best to always be honest and in that honesty.
I think that's where you got stuck a lot.
Like people hurt you a lot because you were you were very honest.
And like, I'm thinking about what you said to me about, like, why did I tell the story the way that I did and that you could see something in me, even back then that, you know, it's taken me time to get to now.
(47:10):
And I think I had to. It's not like I had a choice in some degree, but I was that person because that's who who I was, who I was.
And that person was a good compliment to you.
And I think in whatever way that I saw, I did see you even in the ways that it sort of like seems like it created some pain.
(47:37):
I don't know. There was something, something in our partnership.
You could see me for my future self. Maybe I could see you for your future self.
I don't know the best parts of each other because you've always beckoned that out in me.
You've always called forth that part of me to push myself harder and and try to do things that may scare me and to just trust.
(48:10):
And I think when I, you know, in the origins one story I talked about, there was only one other thing that in my gut I knew before I met you, you were number two.
And part of you being number two was because you showed up like you did.
And I knew there was no subtext. I didn't have to guess.
(48:36):
I knew like even the way you tell like the back and forth and how I said it was really nice.
And you're like, that's a really generous way. Right.
I'm just like, no, you're talking about whenever you were all.
And did you think that I was just like the way you saying the best thing ever.
(48:59):
And then I'm like, I'm all I heard that too.
I'm like, well, I know. I mean, I didn't feel that about anyone.
Like ever. I like. But yes, it's such a harsh like. Yeah. Right.
I just but it's the truth.
I know. Because for me, like.
(49:27):
Like. If I really, really, really love you, why would I say anything but the honest truth?
Because like, I guess, like at my core line, dude. Yeah.
Even like a dishonesty in presentation.
(49:51):
Bordering on, you know, even things that people might file under the heading of like being diplomatic.
Yeah. I still am sometimes like, gosh, we're so close to not saying what's really going on.
And there's no way that's loving. Yeah. It is not loving to tell you something that is.
(50:13):
But when I hear it, I'm like, well, I feel you.
Well, I think you what you I think that's a very true statement.
And I is that what you were driving at here?
Yeah. I mean, I assign myself to that same statement because of what I've learned from you.
But there is a difference between.
(50:34):
And this is where I think us and the world can get confused.
There is a difference between being honest and truthful.
And that's very loving and saying honest, true things in a hurtful way.
And you have always done your best to say them in non hurtful ways.
And so it still can produce hurt. Right.
(50:55):
But there is a difference between them. Right.
And I think a lot of us don't know how and I'm going to include myself.
I've had to learn how to do this, and I'm still really working on it.
How to say an honest, loving thing in a way that speaks right to the truth.
But and it may hurt you, but it will also wrap you up in love.
(51:20):
And yeah, that's so different than just cutting someone totally, totally.
And it's never an excuse to be cutting, though.
Sometimes I hear, you know, when I listen to myself talk, I'm like, oh, I thought I was dispensing that in a way.
But the difficulty is that sometimes there really isn't much way to put kid gloves on.
(51:44):
One of the proverbs of Solomon is wounds from a friend can be trusted, but an enemy multiplies kisses.
It's that sort of thinking. Yeah.
But there was a complementary fit there. And this is why this stuff is so freaking tricky.
(52:05):
It's so tricky at the beginning of a relationship, let alone when you extrapolate it.
Fifteen, twenty, forty, fifty years from the origin point.
Oh, my gosh, it becomes hopelessly complex. Yeah.
And what I mean by that is, yeah, you didn't see some of this at the beginning, partially because I didn't see it.
(52:31):
And also in order to come out from behind so much of the hiding that I was doing, I sort of like needed you to not see it.
Yeah. So that you could, A, just sort of proceed with the relationship on the basis of what you did see.
(52:53):
And then B, by continuing to point to me in the loving way that you did, I was able to step into finally seeing it.
Often, as you know, some of the later stories, there are a great deal of struggle and trial and error and not just between me and you, but all the relationships in my life.
(53:23):
But this is the weird complexity of complementarity and of intimacy is that I needed you to not see. And also, by the way, now I need you to see.
And think about it. How many times in our relationship have we discovered that we like made a contract with one another?
(53:44):
And then we examine the contents of the contract and we're like, oh, this doesn't work anymore.
Yeah. Remember when we first did that in marriage counseling with the boss?
Like we noticed at that time that there were things that we had apparently agreed to at the outset of our marriage.
Some of them were explicit. Most of them were totally implied, unsaid.
(54:07):
But we could look back and go, clearly, this is what we were saying to one another. Look at our actions. This is what.
And then we were like, we just don't think at this phase of our relationship that's working anymore.
Right.
And because we could see it, because we could be in agreement that it was no longer working, and because we loved one another and frankly, we had some luck and a lot of help, we could go, oh, let's just renegotiate then.
(54:32):
Right. If that wasn't what's working. Oh, and by the way, neither of us even want that anymore.
Yeah.
What do we want? And could we find new terms? And maybe this has been like the truest thing we could say about us from origin to now is that like iteratively, we keep rediscovering it again, just like we have done on an individual basis with ourselves.
(54:56):
It's like my friend Rob says, oh, that was like 17 Rob's ago.
Yeah.
Yeah. This is like 17 us's ago.
Yeah.
And you need to be able to have the freedom to come back and renegotiate.
Yes. And I think we both offer each other freedom to come back and renegotiate.
And some of us, one of us may see it before the other one or the need may arise for one of us before the other one, or sometimes it's at the same time, but there's always freedom to come back and renegotiate.
(55:24):
Yeah.
Yeah, and hope that that kind of renegotiation will right the ship again.
Yeah.
And between me and you, in a way that I think is somewhat atypical.
(55:45):
We just don't give a fuck what anybody else thinks, period.
Point blank.
Like, I don't care what you think about the fact that you may have known us in one setting and we were whatever.
And now it's like this, though the truth is, I don't think that's something people would even say about us.
I think people would say that we've always been us, but maybe that's it.
The key is that in the context of an intimate relationship, being us looks one way at one stage and another at another and so on and so on.
(56:16):
To where over the course of a lifetime together, we've been so many different things in so many different seasons.
As you should be.
As you should be.
Damn skippy.
Colin Robinson.
You know I had to say.
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