Second Self

Last night I went to a pub with a friend to hear a local band. It’s hard to get bands to travel to our side of town and gas prices have curtailed our outings, so we dropped hints to management that we’d come ONLY for the band. But we like this place, recently opened. Joe the Bartender makes good dirty martinis, or so Stacy tells me, and they are a buck less than the ones we get across town.

My friend and I discussed our day, and she told me about a guy who tried to pick her up in traffic by leaning out of his truck window and holding his phone against his ear.

“Phone sex?” I wondered. She laughed and we dismissed the incident. Stacy told me she’d be seeing her boyfriend tomorrow.

“That’s cause for celebration,” I said honestly. Sam lives a few towns away and is a patrolman with horrible hours. While the two of them are dating, scheduling time together has been… challenging. I think this is the forth time she’s been to his house this year.

It’s June.

I mention this and she sobers. “What’s the alternative? The guy who thinks hitting on a stranger in traffic is classy?”

“I don’t know. He’s not a bad person. I just know the relationship isn’t giving you what you want. He doesn’t have to be a bad man to be the wrong man.” I say this because I’ve known Stacy for a while, I’ve seen her second self and I know it’s not happy.

Single women all have a second self. While we live a complete life in singlehood, we’re always feeding that second self – the person we’d be if we were dating. Make no mistake; this isn’t a fake person. It’s just one we keep stashed away to bring out when the need serves. And while we may have a full singlehood, this second self often sneaks out.

It’s like the person who’s remodeling their house. Wherever they go, they notice something they’d like in their own home. “I love that travertine tile! That would like great in my kitchen. Did you put it down yourself?”

The second self sees aspects of people’s character or qualities in a relationship that we’d like in a man, which we’d like in a relationship of our own. Let me be clear. We don’t want your boyfriend. We don’t want your husband. But we do want ours.

And different women want different things. I know for Stacy, while I’m one of her best friends, she’d much rather go to Charleston next month with Sam than with me. Destination with Sam? Any Town, USA. And I remember recently we were returning home from a night out. We were laughing because we’d shared the evening with the table of people next to us, three or four couples. They were obviously old and comfortable friends. They’d joked with us and we’d enjoyed their company. And later Stacy said, “You know, that’s something I want. Spending the evening with friends, having fun and sharing it with my guy.” The wistful tone in her voice turned us both quiet for several minutes. That’s the key. She wants his time.

The rest of her second self I’ll leave to her. I have my own.

My second self emerges in flashes, like memories I haven’t had yet. And the meaningful stuff is what takes places around the house. I want us to be quietly in the house, each doing our own thing. But whenever we pass each other in the hall or the kitchen, we manage to touch, a quiet and affectionate acknowledgement. I imagine him bringing a friend home after work and I invite him to have dinner with us, and we all pitch in for an impromptu cookout.

In the winter, the seed catalogues arrive. We plan the spring garden together. What about cantaloupe? How about an experiment growing Russian black tomatoes? In the spring, we work outside, getting sunburned as we prepare the garden. We share chores during the week. I get a phone call during the workday from him, asking if there’s something he can pick up on the way home. Backyard cookouts. Learning how to do new things together, or better still, him teaching me something he knows while I teach him something I know. Turning the stereo up loud and dancing some crazy dance in the livingroom, laughing the whole time. I want to sing to him. Get lost with him. Walk around the neighborhood with him in the cool of the evening.

There’s bigger stuff too. Holidays, discovering traditions we’d like to share. Being there for each other when something is difficult. Learning to trust each other. Discovering he is my protector and my safe haven. Finding a creative way to tell him that I took a test that morning, and it was positive. Discovering that sometimes he cries when he holds the infant who looks just a little like him and just a little like me. Falling asleep next to him each night.

These things belong on a road I can’t travel by myself. I have friends I plan my garden with. I have friends I share my holiday with. I have friends I go on vacation with. It’s just not the same and it never will be. I don’t like to focus on my second self too much because I think she takes energy away from my present, and I'm seriously proud of who I am and what I’m about. I’m proud of the way I handle myself at work, I’m proud of the way I keep my house and I know I make a contribution to my community.

But my second self is always there, waiting.

Mary Chapin Carpenter, "Only a Dream"
The song isn't really related, but I love it.
--Laura