A friend shot a deer during hunting season this week and came by to show it to me. And I put it up because it is real life, and the real world of real animals, and not just appealing photos of animals, which I mostly show, and also because it illustrates what I am writing about in many ways. I live in the real world, and am grateful for it. I would not want to live in any other world.
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Maria and I cherish our time together and for many reasons, but we also have separate and independent lives, as any healthy couple does. Sunday she was invited to a Tarot Card reading conducted by a group of friends she has been spending time with and enjoying very much. Being a sweet soul, she asked me if I was sorry I had not been invited, and if I wanted to come. I said no, I was not expecting to be invited and didn’t wish to come. This was one of those friendship things that women tend to develop more than men. In my life, women prize friendship more than men, and find time for it. And forge very powerful connections, often stronger than family.
The men I have known seem to value friendship in a sort of reflexive way, but only if it doesn’t interfere with work, sports, chores around the house, and reading the news. Maria and her friends have already had a riotous time at a nearby Thrift Shop and are looking for things to do together and I not only think that is a beautiful thing but understand viscerally that I don’t really belong there. A man would throw it off. And I can’t say I really want to go.
I am not sad that Maria is doing a fun thing with friends – some of them are my good friends too – but I suspect I will never find such a group of men, who will take time out from their lives week after week and make sure we spent time together, talk to one another, share in the kind of bond I see many women have.
I have had many friends in my life and am in touch with few of them. I know some men who have powerful friendships and have kept them, but they seem rare to me.. I think I have always been easier in the company of women than men. And I often tell people that the only men I really am comfortable with were either tortured as children or humiliated as adults. Somehow, I don’t see that changing. And I am happy it is different for Maria.
A neighbor said I could go hunting with him if I wished. Another invited me to watch a football game Sunday. I can’t say I want to do either of those things either. Perhaps I am just not really good at doing manly things. I suspect I will be at home, walking with Simon or reading “The Art Of Fielding” by Chad Harbach. And then, heading out into the woods if the hunters are gone to take some photos of November Light. I will love that. Sometimes I do wish I could sit down with a group of men and have fun and talk openly about our lives. Once or twice in my life, that has happened.