one time – probably about eight years ago – we had a giant argument under this vast ceiling. giant. there are not many places to go stew when you are at olgivie – it’s the terminal chicago station for the metra we take to the city and full of people. an uncomfortable time at best, it basically forced us to look at each other, invite in a little grace and figure it out.

one time – probably last week or so – we had a tiff on the trail under the bluest-blue sky. it’s not like one can go steaming through the woods, looking for a place to sit and sulk. one has to keep moseying on, down the path. and so, seething for those moments, we linked arms – as is our custom – kept walking, invited in a little grace, figured it out.

one time – ten years ago now – under the dropped ceiling of o’hare’s gate f8 – having both just flown in from different places in the country to meet there – david got down on one knee. never-minding the zillions of people walking by, pulling luggage, toting backpacks, crying children, coffee spilling, overhead flight announcements, we started the next part of our journey together – already in grace, already figuring it out.

when we go to chicago, we either drive the backroads or take the train down. we never drive the interstate there. it’s just too much – too frenetic, too rushed, too busy. we both feel that part of getting there IS the getting-there.

so that must translate to relationships as well. part of getting there IS the getting-there. and that includes the tough moments as well as the really easy ones. it includes the times when you are “ucky” (as the guy at the oyster bar said the other night) to each other and the times when you are generous. it includes the times you wonder what you’re doing and the times tears of gratitude rush to your eyes. it includes the times you know very well that your best-neighbors-to-the-west know you are arguing and the times that people-you-don’t-know stop you to tell you they love watching you wander the neighborhood arm in arm. all of it.

the architectural ceiling of ogilvie makes me smile. though we don’t live in chicago, the many times we have exited metra into the station have given us easy time downtown. the getting-there was simple – sit on the train and watch the outside woosh by. and each time we exit onto the platform and head into the atrium of the station, every moment we’ve spent there suspends from the high rafters. the good ones and the rare-but-admittedly-not-so-good ones.

and then we walk out into the day, under expansive sky, arm-in-arm, and get about getting to the next.

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this D.R. THURSDAY