for everything a time

Bryan Winters
Middle

"Maybe we should see a marriage counsellor."

"If you think so," says Robyn.
What does she mean by 'if you think so?'
Asking discreetly around I find one called Eileen. I arrange an
appointment.
Eileen doesn’t mess around.
"What do you think is wrong with Tom?" Eileen asks Robyn.
"He has an anger problem," Robyn bursts out, almost in tears.
Eileen turns to me, "Do you have an anger problem?"
Good grief, is this how counsellors operate, parroting off texts
from manuals?
"I guess if Robyn thinks I have one, then that is what matters."
"What do you mean by that?" responds Eileen.
"I mean if Robyn thinks I have an anger problem, then that is
her perception. That is what is important. Whether I have one
or not is not the issue. She thinks I do."
Then I turn to Robyn, "that’s one problem with me, got any
more?"
Eileen gets off her bike. "What sort of answer is that? Why
don't you just address the question? Do you think you have an
anger problem?"
Cripes, why am I here? I could read this stuff at home.

2
Eileen again. "How long have you been like this?"
"All my life I hope. We are trying to find out what Robyn thinks
is wrong with me. Doesn’t matter whether I think it's true or
not. Keep going, Robyn."
Robyn is now weeping openly. "See how he acts? I'm not going
on while he talks like this!"
Eileen calms her down, then starts to work on me. "This isn't
going to work you know, unless you commit yourself to it."
Robyn adds. "All I'm asking is that you agree to stick to this
period of counseling for six weeks, that you are committed."
"Sure," I say, taken aback by their joint resolve.
The trip home in the car is silent.

Next week Eileen gets us drawing pictures. "How do you

visualise your life?" she asks me. "Draw a picture."
For crying out loud, I'm thinking. Then, okay baby, I'll show you.
You want pictures, you'll get pictures. I draw this tropical
island. There is a cabin full of books, with a perfect right hand
wave peeling off in the distance, and a bikini clad girl watching
me surf.
"This is my life," I tell her. "The ocean is sitting there, but I
retreat into the world of my mind from time to time."
I warm to the theme. "I've spent a lot of time practicing how to
get into people's minds. Ask them questions. People love
3
talking about themselves, and they will invite you into their
brains. Once you're in there, take a look around. Chances are,
there's not much. Pretty sparse pickings. So you can withdraw,
close the door, thank them very much, and wander off. Now
and again you find an interesting person. You may want to stay,
make friends with them. You may want to come back another
time."
Eileen smiles a silly sort of grin at me. I read it as, 'who is this
guy fooling?'
Robyn meanwhile, can't draw pictures. She has to write hers
down. Fine. I listen as she explains to Eileen. She opens up
some. About how she views herself as the intermediary, as the
glue holding the family together.
My heart starts to melt. She's right you know. Bastard.
Eileen closes. "I want to see the two of you separately for a
while. Then later on, we can come back together."
Two weeks later Eileen tells me Robyn has stopped coming.
What, I'm thinking? She asks me to commit to six weeks of it,
then pulls out and hasn't got the guts to tell me herself. I get
worried about this. What on earth is going on here?

So Eileen and me continue together. I draw pictures. Very Zen.

We get a good drawing one day. Robyn is inside this house, and
she won't let me in. I am knocking on the door.
"Why won't she let you in?" asks Eileen.
4
"Because she is afraid," I venture.
"Exactly. But who is she afraid of?"
"Of me?" Couldn't be, I think. I'm the world's nicest guy.
"Yes, she probably is afraid of you."
"But that's ridiculous. I don’t want to hurt her. I just want to
help, to find out what's going on with her."
"Yes, I know you do, but all you do is knock louder on the door,
and she holds it shut tighter."
"But why?"
"Because she is afraid of you."
I am bewildered. Afraid of me?
Silence ensues for some time. Then, Eileen asks, "make an
analogy, why is she afraid of you?"
I ponder awhile. "Because I look terrifying to her, bigger than
her."
"Yes," says Eileen, "yes. Perhaps she is wounded, and you look
too strong for her."
What the hell does she mean by that? "Maybe," I reply.
"How could you get in the door?" she comes back.
More silence, while I think for a while. Finally, "If I appear
wounded too, then she would realise I am not to be feared."
Eileen homes in, especially as our time is up. "Precisely. That is
precisely what you need to know. You need to display that you
too are vulnerable."
5
I stagger home.

In the house I wander around more. I stare at Robyn as she

retires to sleep. Standing in the doorway, I simply look at her.
Why am I losing her? How could this happen now? Just when
we've got our lives together. Just when I've got my dream boat
in the marina.
She is out of the house one day, and I put pen to paper. I leave
the letter on our bed for her to find.

I love you
When I look back on our lives together, I can see many times
and places where I have not given you the support you needed.
That seems a trite statement, now that we are in the middle of
what we are in the middle of. Maybe it takes such
circumstances for a person to see the things that should have
been obvious to him all along. It probably also takes a long time
for that same person to change his behaviour.
Probably, you have allowed me to do the things that you didn’t
want to. You let me, maybe because you knew I had to get it
out of my system. Or prove something that didn’t need proving.
This too is past. Here we are with a history now, that is
checkered, but it is still our history. Only thing is I don’t know
how to express this. I cannot pick the right moment, or correct
atmosphere, or your timing. I am stumbling along. All I want to

6
say, right now, is that I do love you. Actually I'm crazy about
you. Today, honestly , I value you more than I ever did. But I'm
also afraid of losing you.
So I wrote this. Because I wanted to say it somehow. You are
my most important person. I love you.

Went surfing for the afternoon, so she could find it, and have
time to digest it. I day dream about how she might receive me
when I get back home. She will be waiting at the door, wide
smile, arms outstretched, kiss waiting. But when I return there
is no reaction. Nothing. Wait till Julia's asleep, I tell myself.
Just before we turn out the lights, she says, "thank you for your
letter. But you don't understand what is going on."
Dagger thrust. Deep. Shit, I write a letter like that from the
bottom of my soul, and she tells me I have no idea what is
going on. Shee-it. That hurt. That really hurt.

Fred and Hazel visit and stay for a few days. Long awaited trip.
How marvelous to see them. I spend time with Fred, talking
about life, and joking about everything. Drinking beer and
cooking sausages, and driving my boat wherever it is purposed
that we should drive the boat.
One day we are strolling down the street talking about women,
and Fred veers the conversation away as only a cultured
pommie like he could. After a few disclaimers apologising in

7
case he's got the wrong end of the stick, he says, "look old boy,
I want to mention something. As a friend."
Bad news coming.
"Pay more attention to Robyn. Don’t ignore her like you do in
public. Sometimes it's frightfully obvious to Hazel and I."
In one awful moment, a veil is lifted from my eyes. A skin is
torn from me. Oh, hell, am I like that? Am I really like that?
Running around, analysing this, investigating that, pulling this
deal, riding that wave, catching that fish, and I ignore my wife
so obviously that it is a public fact. Does she sit there silently,
going downhill, not knowing who to share with, because I'm up
front running the party?
I am falling. Further into an emotional morass. I am losing her
because of my fault.
But there are two sides to a story aren't there? People tell me
that.

I wake up in the middle of the night. Cannot get back to sleep. I

roll around in bed until I realise I'd better go for a walk. A 2
a.m. stroll along our deserted street, the stars out, so clear
from the uncluttered sky of New Zealand. Looking up,
watching.
Rejection. Who am I to complain? As many as the stars are up
above, so that's how many have been rejected. But I recall Ally
McBeal's statement. Her friend asked why Ally's problems were

8
so important, compared to anyone else's. 'Because they're
mine,' she said.

"When the school holidays are over, we are going to work on

the marriage Tom, we really are."
"Yes, for sure we are Robyn, I know."
"I've organised to see Eileen on Thursday you know."
"Good, good, that’s a good start."
Thursday arrives. I start the day as well as I know how in my
emotional state. Cup of tea in bed. We get up and do some
work around the house. On the way home from somewhere, I
buy flowers for her. She smiles as I arrive home, and we work
on putting them in a vase together. She is getting ready to see
Eileen. I watch her drive out, then do some work on the
computer. I dream of how she will return. She will put her car
away, I will rise to meet her, she will come over to me and kiss
me on the lips, telling me she loves me.
Finally her car pulls in. She walks in, with a reddened smile. I
stand up from my chair to greet her but she walks straight into
the bedroom. I wonder what is going on. She comes back out
carrying her pillow and night gear, and walks up to the spare
bedroom with them.
The meaning is obvious.
The adrenalin surges. I rush up after her. "What are you
doing?" I cry.
9
"Moving into the spare room, Tom."
"But why, we are meant to be working on repairing the
marriage, not separating it further!"
"I can't handle the pressure Tom."
"What are you talking about? What pressure? What do you
want?" I am beside myself.
Calm down Tom, I try to think. But I stumble back into our
bedroom and break into uncontrollable tears. You bitch, you
bitch, you bitch, the dark side of my mind is yelling at me. I told
you, I told you, I told you, it says. She was withdrawing, you
have seen it coming for months now, she refuses your
affections, she turns away from your kisses, you can't listen to
what she says, because it's all a lie, and you know it, you know
it, you know it.
There must be a reason. I gather myself and walk back upstairs.
"What is this pressure, what do you mean by it? I can't
understand it."
"It's there all the time. I should have done this weeks ago. I
need the space."
"Space? Space from what?"
No answer. She draws herself up into her defensive look. I love
this look actually, but not today, not now, not now. It breaks
through to me as the lovely small girl she is, up against a tough
world that doesn’t understand her pains, and she is not going
to let them know, or to get the better of her. No damn it, she
will weep in her own time, not mine or yours or anyone else's.

10
The look and the stance say to me she doesn’t have much left
of herself, just her dignity and her personhood.
But I am distraught, and although the fleeting body language
slides into view, it is washed away by the tears of my own
rebuff. Crying out to God, to Robyn, to everyone, I'm not like
that. You don't need space from me. I'm okay. I'm really nice.
Why are you doing this to me?
I am back in my room, soundly crying into my pillow. Think boy,
think. Get an answer somehow. I go back up. "Surely you and
Eileen discussed this. You are intelligent people. Surely you
talked about the possible reaction this would have on me. You
can't have just decided to do this without thinking it through."
No answer. The walls are up. I hammer against them in vain.
I have to get out.
Phone Johnny. I can always stay at his place. I know I can. "My
marriage is falling apart mate, I need a place to stay."
"Sure, no problems."
I start to pack the car. Gather some clothes, my guitar, my
surfboard. My security blankets. Robyn is sitting out on the
deck watching me. I try a discussion again.
But she just says, "Talk to anyone you like Tom. Your problems
are so obvious, anyone can see them."
"I will then. But I still love you."
We have to speak to Julia. "What shall we tell her?" I ask her.
"Just tell her the truth."

11
"What is the truth? That you don’t love me?"
Anger. "That is not the truth. I love you Tom, and want to live
with you, but I need this space."
Contradiction in words. How can you love and not want to be
with me? Liar, liar, liar. But she's right too, another voice says.
It's too soft though. It's quietness is lost in my raging anguish.
And I drive off. With my symbols of youth in the back seat and
on the roof.

On my way to Johnny's I impulsively turn into Don's place.

"Go back home," he says to me. "Separation never works."
"Well, it did for a mate of mine," I counter. "He was separated
for nearly a year, and now his marriage is stronger than ever."
I go on. "Look Don, all I've faced over the past several months is
a removal of affection. I don't ask for the world in a marriage,
but at least she could be affectionate. At least she could touch
me, and tell me that she wanted me. I haven't had sex with her
for four months."
I blurt this out, even though it is a thing that guys don't usually
talk about. At least I haven't, up till now. But I don't give a
damn anymore. I don't care who knows now. The dirty washing
is on the line. Let it flap.
"What kind of marriage is that?" I'm not weeping. I'm angry,
not weeping.

12
He wilts. "Sounds like you have the same problems as me. You
know, the other night was the first time I had sex for three
months."
What?
Shit, I don’t want this. I didn't come round here to act
counsellor for this guy. Why is he telling me this?
"I just need to be patient,” he says. “Jill's going through a
difficult time."
But I'm already seeing past interplays with these friends drop
into place. You know how one sentence can suddenly explain
everything with someone else's existence. All the pieces slot
into place, and previous conversations become significant.

I get back in the car and there's a text from Johnny. Tied up at
work. Give me an hour. Damn. I need company. I head over to
Jane and Phil's. Phil is out of town on business and the kids are
running around the back lawn. Jane pours some wine and we
start talking.
"Why the hell would she walk out of the bedroom like that?"
I'm nearly in tears again. "Doesn't she realise how emotionally
strained I am right now?"
"She needed the space, Tom."
"What space? What is this space? Why do you women all talk
about space? What do you mean?"
"She needs space."
13
"Space to do what?"
Jane sits there silently, her eyes red too.
I go on. "I would have done anything for her, I would have
given her whatever she wanted, but she wouldn’t say anything.
She wouldn't express it."
"Tom, you are so busy grappling with the world's problems, and
so interested in everything else, and then running off surfing,
that she simply felt left out. Robyn needs to find herself again."
"What do you mean find herself? She's not lost. We have
everything that any couple would want. What are you talking
about?"
Jane leans back, looks out the window, then forward again. She
starts to weep.
I'm thinking, what the hell? But I don’t touch her. I've read
these stories about emotional contact between two people
under stress and then they're in bed together. No boy, not that.
But I don't know what to say.
"It's just too hard Tom, too hard. I can't go on like this. He
doesn't support the children, he just wants to play soccer on
the weekends, and the kids need him so much."
It suddenly dawns on me that I've struck two in one evening.
My first night apart from Robyn in twenty years, and I end up
exposing the reefs threatening two other marriages. Talk about
domino theory.
Jane can't stop now. She is underway on a grief session. "I
wanted so much for our family life, why can't he understand
14
me? Why can't he see how tough it is bringing these children
up here at home? Why can't I get through?"
My tears start to dry up as I listen to her. I had no idea. Shucks,
Phil and I go bowling together. We have a great time. He is just
like me.
Yes, he is just like me.
No he's not.
I'm not like that. I listen to Robyn. Surely I do.
This is too fast. I have spent forty three years getting here.
Forty three years of growing up, experiencing so much of the
world, trying to do something worthwhile, getting my brain and
finances together, and now without warning, I have driven
clear into a brick wall. And I find two couples close behind me.

The surf is small but well shaped. Johnny lends me a long

board, and I spend most of the time in a spot by myself. Just
paddle out, catch the peak, ride the righthanders, get up the
front of this long board. Paddle out again. A cycle of life.
He comes over to me, and then we talk in between sets, and he
says something now and again. But a flurry of waves come, and
we are paddling and riding. At least it takes my mind away for a
while. Then we regroup, and sometimes I start off where I was.
I phone her later to wish her good luck teaching Sunday School
the next morning. She is surprised by the call, but thanks me.

15
She has bought a new puzzle for Julia, and they are working on
it. We are to meet with Eileen midday Monday.

The drive to Eileen's is nerve wracking.

We make some small talk, then Eileen starts to talk. But I
interrupt her. I get on my knees in front of Robyn. "Robyn
Williams, I want you to know that I love you more than any
other person, and I have done one of the stupidest things of my
life. I swear to you I will never do such a thing again."
Actually I had something more dramatic to say. But it didn't
come out. She laughs when I tell her this. It looks like a good
sign.
But she then tells us her conclusion. "The only chance we have
is to separate for a while."
My protests get nowhere. Eileen seems to support her. I plead
tearfully, with all my reasons and rationale. Eileen cuts in. "You
should have thought about that when you walked out."
In that brief statement, I know instantly she has thrown away
any chance of ever getting through to me. I know intuitively
that when one is walking out the door from one's wife of
twenty years, one does not think of anything. Pain shrieks out,
and thinking is far from you. Can she honestly believe I
calculated the ramifications of walking out of my own house?
That I weighed up the pros and cons? Is this counselling?

16
What the hell is going on in the world? Why can't anyone tell
me what or why Robyn thinks or acts as she does in clear
understandable tones? Why is this counsellor, who I pay sixty
dollars an hour, telling me I should have thought about things
before I walked out?
"Okay, okay," I give in.
"Six months," Robyn says. "I will need two months complete
space from you Tom, in which we do not talk about anything,
except essentials."
Six months! Shit, I just walked out for a night!
"I took ten thousand dollars out of the account when you left,"
she tells me fearfully, already half knowing what I may think. "I
didn't know what you would do after you walked out. But it's in
an interest bearing account." She adds this quickly.
Oh, that’s different then isn't it? You should have said so, I
mean it's expanding our fortune isn't it? Good grief, what does
she think I am? I'm her husband. I feel the anger of self
justification rise up. She is threatening my person. I said I was
sorry I walked out. It didn’t call for shifting money around. Hold
yourself together though. Weep on the way home.

Two days later I am hunting for a place to live. Phoning up

apartments. Reading the To Let columns on the net.
I phone one number looking for people over forty. Intrigued. A
woman answers. She sounds quiet and pleasant. I ask her why

17
she wants somebody older. She replies, "because I am over
forty. Don't want younger people."
Sounds fair enough to me. I go around. Call up to the
apartment on the intercom. She answers, and opens the door
remotely. I go up to her floor.
The door opens. She is standing there, a youngish face, younger
than I thought, with a nice figure. Blonde. She is not dressed to
kill, she is dressed casually. But her eyes are dreamy. In the first
second of eye contact there is chemistry. My emotional
neediness claims her. I know that if I move into the spare room
here, I will end up in bed with her shortly after.
The temptation to do it anyway is so strong, surprisingly strong.
Someone to hold. I look round the place, mulling over how nice
it would be to give way to this desire. She is trying to talk me
into taking it. I revel in the dream for a while, knowing that I
won't. Knowing that I will walk out, and deliberately lose her
phone number lest I be tempted to call her back one night for
coffee.

And I end up in this grotty flat. Alone. Has one of those

stainless steel legged formica topped tables that you see in
New Zealand comedy shows. With matching chairs. And a
shower curtain from the Middle Ages. It's enough to keep me
out seeing people or surfing at deserted beaches. Watching
single women. Driving my sports car and talking to myself.
Cooking meals for one.

18
Mostly my mates are slightly aloof. Uncomfortable. Like, Tom is
a nice guy, but there are always two sides to a marriage
conflict. Don’t take sides. And me, I don’t want them to take
sides either. Well, half of me says that, but the side that wants
everyone to like me surges up and takes over now and again.
I spend time defending Robyn to others, and punishing myself.
While I do this, people come to my rescue. The more I defend
her, the more their sympathies lie with me. Then this awful
penny drops. Am I subliminally doing this so they will support
me? At this point I am lost on the stepladder of all my secret
agendas.
I can't trust any decision I make. They're all questionable.
I don't know where I am.

This is my first counselling session with Peter. He is one of the

Pastors in our church. I have come to him of my own accord.
Do I need counselling? Who knows? It is one of those catch 22s
I reckon. If you think you don’t need counselling, then you
probably do. In a way it is a modern inquisition. If someone
suggests you need counseling, what do you say? If you say, 'I
guess so,' then you have admitted guilt, and must bow to
whatever psychological or mental gauntlet the process
presents you with.

19
But if you say, 'no I don’t think so,' then obviously you do. Your
denial simply confirms it. Furthermore you cannot outwit a
counsellor because they can always revert to asking you why
you say such and such a thing. You will answer one thing, and
then they can ask why you said that. Until you get tired of
these lines, blow your cool, and then it is obvious you have an
anger problem and need counselling.
It is almost like a commodity fix. I see these TV programs about
cops in the community, and now and again you see a scene
where a youth has been traumatised. The officer says
something like '…and she needed six months of counselling.'
How does he know she needed six months? Did she have a
problem, kind of like a car has a problem with the brakes and
you take it in and the mechanic gives you a cost estimate, and
says, 'looks like three hours work.'
But Peter has also been counselling Robyn. For four months.
Behind my back. Typical ignorant male, I don’t even know when
my wife is off seeing a shrink. Too busy surfing. Or talking about
where the world is going wrong.
Anyway, we start. I can't stop talking about Robyn. Peter
doesn’t want to, tells me I am wasting my time, and that we
need to talk about me. But I persist.
"Can't tell you," he says for the third time.
"Why not?"
"Because it would breach client privilege."
"Yes, but, if I know what her problems are, then I will know
how I should relate to her. What I should do, how I should act."
20
"Sorry, can't tell you."
"But if she doesn't tell me, and you won't tell me, then how will
I know?"
"That is unfair to ask me."
I try another tack. "Anything I say to you about myself, you can
tell her. Anything at all. I have no secrets here. In fact I want
you to tell her."
"Can't do that."
"Why not?"
"It would breach my privileges with you."
"But I exonerate you from those privileges. I, myself, tell you,
you can tell her everything I talk about with you."
"Let's get back to talking about you, Tom."
I think, better let this lie low until next time.

A week later, we have another session.

"How are things going with Robyn?" I ask Peter.
"Okay," he says warily.
I start to get incensed at this point. "Is she seeing you
regularly? Like I am seeing you regularly?"
He hesitates, then comes out with his answer. "Sure, I see her."
Doesn’t elaborate how often.

21
Immediately I see that my probing is simply causing him to be
cautious, and that he will learn cleverly how to deflect
questions about my wife.
But I get mad, and throw caution to the wind. "Look, say she
suddenly falls ill, has to be taken to hospital. I rush in, she is
unconscious, they put her in emergency. The doctors are
running to and fro. Finally one comes out, and I ask, 'what is
wrong with her?' And he says, 'can't tell you. Client privilege.'
Good grief, there is something wrong with my wife, she is lying
on the hospital bed, and they won't tell me."
Peter laughs. The laugh of a professional. "Actually these days
the doctors might not tell you. Could be prosecuted under the
privacy act."
I lose it. "Why won't anyone tell me what is wrong with my
wife? For crying out loud, she is my wife!"
Then he asks me an absolute stunner of a question. One that I
never thought possible. "Why do you need to know, Tom?"
I am caught in my tracks. Why do I need to know? Why do I
need to know what has gone wrong with my relationship, or
my wife, or me? If she has problems that she spills to this guy,
why won't she share them with me, the one she stood next to
in a church long ago and promised to love, cherish and obey as
long as we both shall live? Why do I need to know?
Is this modern counseling? Isn't marriage about
communication? She can't tell me what is going on inside her,
so she tells this other guy, and he can't pass on anything.

22
I come to a decision, and tell him so. "If this is modern
counselling, then this model of keeping people ignorant of each
other will one day be found invalid. I cannot believe that
counselling would actually go down the path of keeping
enlightening information from each side of a marriage."
I am hot by now. Going for the throat. "You know I go out to all
these friends of mine, and we talk through little items that you
drop in the middle of conversations about Robyn. We discuss
these things endlessly. Then I decide to do something, I make
some move. I write some kind of letter to her or something.
Next time I see you, you say, 'Wrong move!' and then drop
another titbit of data into my lap. I work it around, same thing,
and again one week later from you, 'Wrong!'"
Out of my tree by now. "Give me strength! Isn't counselling
about opening up? Telling the truth? Exposing things?"
He pauses. "Of course it is, Tom. We simply need to sit down
and be honest with each other."
Silence.
Am I hearing right? I start to think I'm going nuts.
Hang on to yourself boy. You're okay. Back off. Take all that
away with you and have a good ponder at home.

So we start talking about me.

"Robyn told me I am manipulative," I concede to him.
"Do you think this is true?"
23
At first I would have rejected this ridiculous line, but now I am a
little shell shocked. After all I have no right to know what is
wrong with my wife.
"Well, I guess so."
"Can you go back into your life and think of examples where
you might have been manipulative?"
I sit and recall. Something comes back. "Yeah, sure. When I was
about ten I realised that you couldn’t rebel against the world
on your own. You would be crushed. The way to do it was to
organise rebellion. So I got all the boys to wear jeans to school
one day. Just as a statement against the fact we were meant to
wear shorts every day."
"What happened?"
"The headmaster called me in to his room. He asked me if I was
behind this little move. Not sure what I said. But he knew."
"What is the point of what you are telling me?"
Actually it starts to feel good to tell these stories, to open up.
Maybe this isn't so bad after all. "The point is that from an early
age I didn't like the system. So I worked against it. Organised
others against it."
"Why did you do that?"
"Because the system was wrong, and it could be beaten. I
didn’t want it to beat me."
"Do you think this has turned you into a manipulative person?"
A hundred thoughts run through my brain. All those years I
prided myself on my disgust with the way things were, with
24
incompetent people telling me what to do. I recalled an army
badge on my cap that would never polish. I used to work on it
hard every night before the school army parades, but it never
came up polished. One day in front of the whole platoon of us
thirteen year olds, this major lectured me, ridiculing me
because I said the badge wouldn’t polish. I felt like throwing it
at him, and asking him to polish it. But my fear kept me in line.
Sure I hated the system. And I had beaten it. I had gone out and
made my own way, provided for my family above and beyond
the norm. Taken them around the world. Worked smart instead
of hard. Now my wife is leaving me because I have turned
manipulative.
"Tom, you can't take the skills of the business world and apply
them to a marriage. It doesn’t work."
I wasn’t aware of doing that. But maybe I did anyway.
I protest. "But if I did, it was part of the package. Earning
wealth, and beating the system requires determination,
persistence, and perseverance. She has had a marvelous life
with me. Thirty countries visited, holidays everywhere,
experiences."
"Perhaps she didn't want that."
"Come on, her life would be the envy of hundreds of women."
"She doesn't think so."

A further week passes.

25
"I want you to try something for me, Tom."
"Sure."
"Close your eyes, and envisage that you are walking through a
forest."
His voice softens. I can easily do this. Left brain, right brain
stuff. I can see the forest. It is a pine forest, like the one I
walked through once in Sweden. Walked down to the bubbling
stream, through the endless brown timber trees, along the
needle strewn tracks.
"You are walking through this forest, with tall trees, and you
come into a clearing."
I see this clearing in the midst of this quiet forest.
"There is a small boy crouching near the base of a tree. As you
get closer to him, you see it is you."
My eyes are closed. But I can see this young boy, with his little
arms and legs. It is me. He is small, like I was, a nice boy.
Looking up at me. With his smooth child's skin, and his
innocence. Not knowing what to do or say. He is crouching back
on his feet, his hands leaning forward over his knees balancing
his stance.
My tears are already appearing as I am guided by the voice.
"Ask him what he feels like. Ask him how it feels to be a small
boy, and when he gets hurt."
"He thinks it hurts."
"What hurt him?"

26
Suddenly a childhood incident flashes up. I am biking home
with Allan and Kenny from school. We are all nine years old. As
we go by the orchards, we see some of the older boys playing
near a fruit packing shed. One of them is called Owen, and his
family are close friends of Allan's. They all laugh, and we pull
our bikes over to see what is going on. They are throwing
things into the pool beside the shed. Owen talks with Allan as
we sit on our bikes by the fence. Then he says, 'leave your bike
there and come over.'
Allan and I drop our bikes, and start to climb the fence.
Owen, this older boy, with wisdom and power on his side due
to his age, calls out, 'not you, Williams.'
Kenny has not moved. In front of everyone, I have to climb
down the fence and retreat to my bike. I sit reddened for a
while. Not watching what is going on. Not comprehending my
rejection.
But now I am forty three again. The nine year old is sitting on
the forest floor, and he doesn't know why he was rejected, and
why he had to climb down the fence, embarrassed. But I do. It
wasn't the nine year old's fault. But it had affected the man. He
would seek to avenge himself against the Owens of this world,
against the system that said, 'not you, Williams.'
The tears are still streaming.
Peter talks now. "Just hold that little boy in your arms now, and
tell him he is okay. Tell him there is nothing wrong with him,
that it wasn't him who was rejected that day. Tell him that he
doesn't need to feel hurt. Comfort him. When he feels like

27
crying with the pain, you just soothe him. Tell him you love
him."
I have to sleep in the afternoon to get over the emotional
exhaustion of this time warp.

Is it important for us to recognise these things in our past?

These things that became part of what we are? It is too
confusing. I am Western man now, complete with a separated
wife and a shrink. Mankind has existed for sixty five million
years, since the dinosaurs. Well, I don't know what the correct
timeframe is these days, but he has been around a long time.
And only in the last twenty years, and only in very few
societies, do we have counsellors. Did those poor blighters in
the previous sixty four million odd years live nasty lives
burdened with baggage because they didn't have counsellors
to unload on?
How did those boys in Africa get on? How did they manage to
live in peace with their wives amidst the carnage of war,
disease and famine without shrinks calming them down? 'Good
grief, it was tough out there today honey, I was looting this
store when the owners son came at me with an axe. Lucky I
had that spare magazine in the Uzi.'
We are further up Maslow's pyramid of needs, that's all I can
figure out. Done with the survival problems, so we are on to
self actualization or some other zany concept. No wonder there

28
are so many people running around with aromatherapy, or
bath salts, or new age margarine.
Yeah, well, all very deep and meaningful, or D&M as my
nephew says, but I am sick to death of being the bad guy. I was
reading some stuff on the internet the other night, and there
was this preacher going on about marriage. Sure enough, he
gets down a bit, and it turns out that nine times out of ten
when he interviews couples with dissensions, it's the husband's
fault. Politically incorrect to suggest otherwise. Husbands are
all too macho, and they only think about the world series, or
who will win the cricket. It's only if you get really deep, way
down beneath the surface, that you discover guys really think
about the world series or who will win the cricket.

Our first meeting together with Peter. He talks about what

Robyn and I should do.
"Marriage is all about communication, blah, blah, blah…."
I sit there thinking, just be patient Tom. They have to get all this
out. They deal with the great unwashed, who need to be told
this sort of thing. Like, tell each other your feelings. The brain in
me is shouting out, of course you need to communicate, of
course you need to say what's on your mind, why haven't you
said this all these years, woman?
He finishes the intro, then moves onto the main piece.
"I want you to write down what you would like the other
person to do for you. You will each make a list, and then read
29
out to the other person, one item at a time. Then the other
person will repeat back to you what you have said."
We write away for some time silently.
"Okay, who is going to start?"
"Let Robyn start. I would like to hear her items."
Trembling a little, she starts reading. "Firstly, I would like you to
respect the boundaries I have now put up in my life. For too
long now, you have not respected any boundaries, and trod all
over me. I have given in to you when I didn’t want to, you have
moved me all over the world without asking my opinion."
"Now Tom, you just repeat back to Robyn what she has asked
you to do."
I get really graphic. Proud of myself really. I read the book on
boundaries the other day in a single sitting when Robyn gave it
to me. "I agree with Robyn. There have been many times when
I have trod over those boundaries. I can remember times I
went surfing for hours and hours on end, and left her with Julia.
I should have returned and done some things together with
her. But I didn’t."
Cripes, even as I say it, I'm thinking, is this enough to ditch a
marriage over? I've seen these domestic violence films, where
the hubby is beating up the wife, and throwing pots around.
And I'm confessing to sneaking off surfing? But I keep these
thoughts to myself. Not now boyo, not now.
"Your turn now Tom."

30
"I would like Robyn to treat me kinder, to simply be more
affectionate to me. And there is a physical dimension to that."
She repeats back, "he wants more affection."
She starts to make excuses. "It was the only way I could make
myself heard, Tom."
I nearly die before Peter steps in to stop her. "Now, now, we
don’t want to start pointing blame here, we are simply telling
each other what we want."
But the damage is done. The die is cast. She cuts off affection,
and it turns out to be my fault. I know it's my bloody fault. But
I'm confessing here, and can't we just move on. The tears start
to come. This won't work. My inner self warns me fleetingly. It
passes through me quickly, but I lean on these gut feels, these
flashes of insight.
Why can't people face each other and say sorry? There is
nothing like an apology on one side to generate an apology
from the other. People respond to the word sorry. It melts
them. But people will carry their grievance for years. In that
poem of Robbie Burns, talking of the housewife at home
waiting for her husband to stagger back from the tavern, she
was, 'nursing her wrath, keeping it warm.'
"Okay, moving on," says Peter. "What is your next point
Robyn?"
"Tom has to get rid of his anger problem."
Anger problem. Do I have an anger problem? Yes, of course you
do. All men have anger problems. Ask any wife. Men all shout

31
and scream to get their own way. Women evidently don’t have
anger problems. They are exempt.
I repeat back, "I must work on my anger problem."
Peter prods me. "Is that all?"
I dig deeper. "Well, I guess Robyn is referring to episodes
where I blew my stack with Julia, and it is true that I did that.
Can't deny. So, yes, I should learn to get control of my anger
problem."
Finally after a few rounds of this he gives us a both a sheet of
paper. Called a feelings contract. On it we both commit to
share our feelings with one another. Not to dump our feelings,
but to share them. Looks okay to me. I agree with it.
One week later, I phone her up and try to share some feelings
with her. Tell her how lonely I feel without her. She cuts me
short, and tells me she doesn’t want to listen. Hangs up on me.
Takes me two whole days to recover.

I'm talking to Jeff. Pouring myself all over the table at George's
cafe. The people next to us are probably getting enough
material for a months gossip, but what the hell.
He starts laughing when I tell him about the boundaries thing.
"What's wrong? I read the whole book. I can follow it. It's
okay." I'm bewildered.
Finally he stops. "Samantha did that course at the church too."

32
I didn’t know there was a course on it. Good grief, there's a
course on boundaries.
"Anyway," he starts chuckling again. "They ran the course in
the middle of the day, so it was about ninety percent women
there. Every last one of them went home and hit their
husbands over the head about boundaries that night."

"I just wish she would apologise to me Peter. I have said sorry
so many times, I have wept in front of her. Why can't she do
the same? It's healthy for people to do that to each other. An
apology from one opens the door for an apology from the
other."
He leans back. "You know, there is this counsellor downtown
who uses that technique. He says something to a couple he's
working with, then they come back in a weeks time. He asks if
they have progressed any further on the issue he raised last
time. If they haven't, he switches to an apology. This guy gets
really graphic. He says, 'oh, I'm sorry, I can see now I didn't
explain that very well at all. No, I don't blame you for not
getting to it, the way I set that up.' And that gets the couple
jointly telling him it wasn't his fault. Jointly. Together.”
Why, you bastard, I'm thinking. You bastard. You think I
apologise as some sort of manipulative trick to draw something
out of Robyn.
Peter is standing, a sign for me to go. I look at him, and then
decide I have been on the wrong tack. Think things through,
33
Tom. Robyn spills the beans to him on whatever she wants. He
is the power broker. And he's not going to tell you anything
directly about what is going on. Focus on what he says. Use
your brains. Pick the words apart.
I come back at him as I get ready to leave. "It seems all unjust
Peter. I'm simply trying to find out what's going on, to get
things on the table."
He turns, almost glaring back at me. "If you want justice, you'll
get it real quick."
And I'm gone.

What does he mean, I'll get justice real quick if I want it? He is
talking about God now. He is saying that if we want God to act
justly, he will, but it will bring the axe crashing down on
ourselves. I reckon that's what he means.
Why do people view God like this? The Hindus don't have a
problem of course. Kali, Shiva and those gods all have good and
bad faces, at least two personalities. They visit good and evil
upon men. The Greeks, they were always loath to ask the gods
for things, because they would get their exact specifications,
plus some unwanted extras. If you requested a blonde, shapely,
good looking, nymphomaniac, you would get one. But she
would also be a scheming bitch of a woman.
So here is a Pastor with this view of God. It is true we are all
fallible, and guilty of lots of things. Therefore, yes, risky thing to

34
ask God for justice - on the basis of our own goodness. We
would receive the unexpected. If God was like that.
But I can't handle that. I cannot believe that God sits there
waiting for people to be so importunate as to ask for justice,
then throws them the spear they have been fashioning for
themselves all their lives. I want to believe in a God of mercy.
Okay, I'll tell you the truth then. I'll re-word it. I want to be let
off.

I wake up, flap the dreadful curtain aside, have a shower,

shave, and dress. Wander through, open up the laptop, check
the incoming email. Google the surf report, looks like Raglan is
firing. Board on the roof, one and a half hours later, paddling
out into one of the worlds great left handers, only six guys out.
This is New Zealand, the last great unpopulated beauty spot in
the world that has decent roads and kerbside tea shops where
you can buy coffee and large slices of bananna cake without
fighting through a crowd.
Here comes a set wave. Nobody else near. Sectioning a bit, but
a good takeoff spot. Stroking into it, feeling the power as it lifts
you and the board is moving, standing up, that risky jump
where you can blow it, balancing for the bottom turn, up and
around the face, kicking off the top. The wall starts to pick up
as the wave stretches out, that stage where you are looking for
all the speed you can get, forcing your backhand turn through
the bottom, seeking the lip where the maximum slope is.

35
Focused on this intense experience, one of the world’s best, in
tune with the ocean. Oh, I love surfing.
Then a comfortable ride through a predictable part of the
wave, and I'm off the top near the breakwater. Turn around,
paddle back for another.
The drive back from the coast is good. Racing through the hills,
kicking down from fifth, fourth to third, quick signal, out past
this truck, one hundred meters later at 7000 rpm, pulling in
again, back into fourth. Ah, I love driving. This little Lotus, sure
it’s only a two litre, but it revs like a motorbike, power band
between five and eight thousand rpm’s. Really feel the surge
when you sweep past a Saab. But they catch you on the
straights. You’ve got the hill climb for sure, but they have the
top end. So throttle back to 100 k’s, obey the limit, and let him
go. You’ve made your point, won your little tussle with this
other guy who is just as macho as you when he gets into his
bundle of high tech road power, eager to prove himself
through his vehicle.

Jack is out. Ruth is there though. She laughs and cries with me
over coffee.
“Have you ever known Robyn to really share something deep
with you?” I ask.
She hesitates. I see it. She knows I have seen it. Immediately
we both know she is committed to tell.

36
She finally says it. With decisiveness. The kind of firmness
where somebody does something that is overdue.
“Yes, I have. When Robby died.”
Oh, it would have to be, wouldn’t it? The hospital emergency
room looms up again. Baby with an unidentified bug. Doctor on
hand, organising the incubator. Robyn so worried. Me not
knowing what was going on.
His small body, wired and taped together in this glass cage,
watched around the clock by the nurses stationed there.
We named him Robert. Robyn, beside herself with worry and
joy. Holding his little hand when they let her, watching him
struggle, praying and hoping for him. Me, looking on at my
offspring, awkward, wondering why I didn't care as much as
she did. Feeling inferior because I hadn't bonded with this little
life, not knowing why.
“I think I might go back out to the beach, love.”
“Sure, you go.”
“I'll come back later on. There are others coming to see you.”
“Sure.”
Wandering along the beach. Kicking a ball around with the lads.
Did I want to be a father? How come I even questioned it?
Bastard.
His rapid decline, the jerky movements, the dying hopes of the
nurses. Everyone knew, even before the doctor told us.
The burial, the small casket, Robyn weeping desperately.

37
I didn’t cry once.

Ruth is still speaking. “I've never told you before. Maybe I was
wrong. I'm sorry. I am sorry. It's just, well, all those years, Tom.
All those years. I thought it was gone. But if it must be told, it
has to be told now.”
She pauses. Is it for effect, or emphasis? “She was beside
herself. 'Why isn’t he here? He’s the father! Did you see his
little hands and feet? Isn’t he beautiful?'”
Enough. Enough.

I surf for a couple of days. The water is so blue, the waves small
but well shaped. Sun comes out and beams down. Magic.
I must visit the graveyard. I know I must. As I get closer to the
place, I know there is a reckoning coming. I can feel it as I turn
the car into the drive. Walking along beside all the small plots, I
finally find it. He would have been fifteen years old.
The tears. I was expecting them, and my life is so torn asunder,
I don’t give a shit anymore. But an older couple is slowly
walking this way. Although they haven’t seen me yet, I still
calculate how long I can sit here doing this. Even in the midst of
this trauma. Looking back at the car with the surfboard on the
roof, I visualise what might have been. We could have been
driving home after a surf. There might have been two boards
38
on top. My surfing son. Dead these fifteen years, after thirty six
hours of life.
The sorrowful words of Job come to me as I walk back to the
car avoiding the elderly pair.
“Why did I not perish at birth,
and die as I came from the womb?
Why were there knees to receive me
and breasts that I might be nursed?
For now I would be lying down in peace;
I would be asleep and at rest.”

It stays with me for the whole trip home. Driving is a great time
to think and weep. There is no-one else to watch you, and you
can still move along, mingling with the other traffic, taking your
time. You can even talk to yourself these days, because if
people look at you, they will think you are using a hands free
phone. Maybe it is a guy thing. You think you are going
somewhere, so you have solved the male issue of progress, and
your mind relaxes.
Fifteen years. A long time. Did I think it was over after the little
coffin was buried? Was I that stupid?
Turn the CD on, listen to some music.

I knock on Robs door. Dog barks inside. Nicki answers.

39
"Hi there! You just missed him. Gone to Rotorua."
"All timing you know."
"Come on in for some coffee though."
We sit, and I tell her about the split.
"Shit, that's happening to everyone isn't it?"
"Yeah, seems to be common for some reason, for sure."
We chat about it for a while. Nicki also split from her husband
Dave after sixteen years of marriage. "You know, when I found
out he was having it off with the office lady, I got worried about
Aids. Wasn't him, but then you don’t know about the other
woman do you? Had myself tested, but it can lie dormant for
ten years."
She goes on. "Sure I had turned off the sex tap for him about
six weeks before he moved out, but he had been into her well
before that anyway."
Prompts me to mention I haven't had sex for months. Nicki
looks at me in amazement. "But you're a male. You guys need
it. Just the physiological thing." And further. "Have this friend
over the way there. Anyway two months before she delivers
her child, she doesn't want sex anymore with her man. So of
course, he ends up at the pub, and you know what happens.
She calls me, she's all teary eyed, explains everything. I tell her,
well even if you didn’t want to have it, you could have satisfied
him with your hands. I mean, what do these women expect?
Don't they understand men?"

40
I'm rolling about the couch, laughing away. "You sure are
refreshing to listen to, you know, just so, so.., well blatant and
honest. Never get this stuff from a Christian counsellor."
"I call a spade a spade, Tom, that’s all I do. When Rob goes
away on business, I give him sex the night before he goes
whether I feel like it or not, and he knows he gets it the night
he comes back. Of course I trust him, but that foreknowledge
sure helps him.
"Twice a week after that, and all's well. Why do people make
such a big deal out of this?"
She is warming up. "Comes down to three things, Tom, that can
ruin a relationship; sex, money or religion. Me and Dave, we
were always arguing over the dough ray me. He would come
home, toss me the pay cheque, and I would pay all the bills.
Now and then he would blow up and ask where all the money
was going. Once I threw the chequebook back at him, and told
him to fucking well look after it himself. That lasted about six
weeks, then all was back to normal."
She turns on me, with options. "Tom, if you have to satisfy
yourself with another woman meanwhile, then you need to be
honest with her, and don’t mess with her emotionally. It's not
fair on her if you are intending to get back with Robyn. Just let
her know that it's only a lust thing. Or maybe you could pay for
it? Bet you hadn't thought of that."
Man, am I really laughing now. This woman is spectacular. "Pay
for it? Oh come on, Nicki, what do you think I am. Good grief,
I'm not picking up a ruddy call girl!"

41
"No, no, you don’t get it. That way, the thing is purely kept as a
relief mechanism, business only, no emotion at all. No
commitment implied. You can focus on your marriage then. Or
you can just masturbate. Now that doesn't worry me, honestly,
these days the discussion is open on that one."
My sides are aching. I wish I had taped this.
"It's bloody tough out there Tom, let me tell you. People not
making ends meet, relationships going sour. Typical kiwi male
syndrome. He and the wife get up in the morning, she makes
breakfast, puts the kids lunches together, sends them to
school. He is off to work, then she is as well. Kids arrive home
to let themselves in. Hubby and wife arrive home about the
same time. She starts work on the meal, he gets a beer out of
the fridge and watches TV. They eat the meal, she starts the
kids on homework, he watches TV again. Everything into the
dishwasher, then about 10pm the kids are off to bed. She is
whacked from a 7am to 10pm days work, and he's about ready
to climb into her pants. That's the last thing she wants."
"There's something else you don’t know about. I never talked
with you about it. Happened before I got to know you guys."
Seems a good time for me to share it.
Nicki leans back, curious now.
"Our first child died. After thirty six hours of life."
"Oh, shit."
"He came out fine. But then got some sickness they couldn't
nail. He went downhill, and eventually there was no point
keeping the incubator on."
42
I start to go into tears again. I cannot even relate this story now
without weeping. Took me fifteen years to start crying over it
and now I can't stop. Nicki can see it. She doesn't know
whether to touch me or to just sit there. "I left her in the
hospital and wandered out to the beach. Great support partner
wasn’t I? His name was Robert. Robby. He would've been
fifteen years old now. Never had a chance."
Her toughness comes back. "But that's just how you coped with
it, Tom."
"What do you mean? I didn’t cope with it at all. I just ran off to
the ocean."
Even as I say it, I know her reply.
"Exactly. You went off to be near the waves. Your peace zone,
surfer boy. You needed to be near something that brought you
calm, and it was the sea. That was how you dealt with it. That
was what happened, those were the facts, and given the
circumstances, that was how you reacted. Nobody can hold
blame against you for how you reacted. It was simply you."
I have no answer. It is an insight.
It doesn’t remove the pain. Doesn’t alter anything. Just
provides me a little mirror into my inner workings.
You find out things about yourself too late in life don’t you?

It is three days later and I am driving around in a second hand

BMW with the car salesman sitting beside telling me what a
43
great car it is. And how much I can get from trading in my
sports car, and that a second hand BMW is just about the best
thing that anyone can buy. I love being sold things by good
sales guys, listening to their conversation, their earnest belief in
what they are saying.
Somehow we drift onto my separation.
"Happened to me twelve months ago," he says laconically.
Then silence.
I am curious, and want to hear someone else's story anyway. I
prompt him and he continues.
"Came home one day and the missus says maybe I should
leave, it wasn't working out. Twenty years married you know."
"So what did you say?" I ask.
"Told her to fuck off."
I'm thinking, shit.
"Told her I would look after the kids. Get out."
He needs pushing to tell out the story, so I realise I must say
things to keep it flowing. "Did she go?"
"Yeah. Then after a couple of weeks she phones back and says
can I sign these papers, and then she could get welfare support
and rental money for her own place to live."
"Yes."
"So I told her to get fucked. I'm not going to sign anything. You
see Tom, if you sign then you have to pay. If you leave the

44
house, you can't get back in. You lose your leverage. So I
stayed."
Good grief, this guy has it together.
"Called her bluff," he summarises.
"So what happened?" I can't wait to hear.
"Well, she came back home, and we started going to
counselling. We had both got stale and complacent and the
relationship needed working on, that was a fact."
He glances out the car window, then back at me before adding
something else.
"You know what, the marriage is better than ever now."

My cousin Pauline is listening to me and her husband try and

sort out what is going on. It seems like I am always lying on a
virtual couch somewhere getting grilled by my relatives or
friends. Everyone wants to be a therapist really, and think they
are contributing to someone's wellbeing.
I turn to Pauline. "Well, you're a woman Pauline, what do you
think about how Robyn might be thinking?"
She ponders this, looking out the window. Then turns back.
"Oh, I don’t really know Tom. Tell you the truth I have enough
trouble figuring myself out half the time, let alone another
woman."
Dave and I crack up.
45
I show her something I wrote to Robyn recently. Pauline reads
it through. Silently.
She stares at me. There is patience in her eyes. There is a
mixture of patience and understanding of suffering, and trying
to see both sides of an issue at the same time, and love and
concern all mixed up together. All that is in her gaze.
"Tom, you have a line here that might be disturbing."
Disturbing? Actually the whole note is disturbing. I wrote it
when I was emotionally nearly around the bend.
"Go on," I say.
She pauses. The pause contains the look of, alright I am going
to tell you, but there is a risk in me telling you because I don't
know your reaction. "You have written a phrase here, 'I am
going to tell you the truth in love.'"
"Yes, I did write that."
"I feel it is a manipulative phrase. You have used a phrase that
sounds religious to get across a point you want to deliver. It is
your point, not God's or anyone else's. Whether it is the truth,
who knows? Don't justify yourself by using the word love."
It is like a hammer at me. Shit. Shit, she is right. Absolutely
right. You bastard Tom. The tears rise. You bastard, using the
word love like a lever, trying to force your opinions and way
into something.
Gee, even my language is changing. I'm swearing more than I
used to. I'm going downhill. I am a mess.

46
Nicki's conversation about Robby is still fresh in my mind.
Seems a good time to tell Pauline. Well, I'm already weeping
aren't I?
Pauline listens, she is so involved in hearing. Her whole body
listens. I love the way she hears things, more than what was
said even. Her face is grim with the hurt, focused on me. I think
she actually feels something about what I'm saying. Somehow
she seems to take on the pain as well.
She pauses, and there is no comment for a while. Then, "did
you know that ninety percent of couples going through the
death of their firstborn end up separating?"
Ninety percent!
We became statistics fifteen years ago.
I sit there, unable to say anything more. This learning curve, it's
like, shit, how much more is there? This is like a war movie,
chaos, random conversations, each one touching me, entering
my online databank. Never to be removed. In the middle of my
reverie I find myself marveling at the human brain and its
ability to absorb so much. All the lessons, all the words, all the
feelings.
But I feel detached from it all in this moment, like I am
suspended in this drama now. My cousins are sitting there
watching me, thinking I am completely absorbed in my grief,
and what we are talking about. But actually I am sitting above
everyone, including myself, looking down at them, thinking
about the fact my cousins are there looking at me, and
wondering what I will say next to them. I am slipping in

47
between seriousness and observation. Maybe this is how
people cope.
I remember reading about when Captain Cook sailed his ship
into Botany Bay. Some aboriginals were there, and their entire
history had never had a sailing boat, let alone a ship, or white
men. Cook's men waved at these guys, but they didn't notice
them. The shock was so great that none of the aboriginals saw
what was there. It was beyond their comprehension, so it
didn’t fit anywhere in their brains. They took a break from
reality, as it were.

Robyn and I are back at Peter's for another joint counseling

session. I have been brooding for days. Forgetting all that stuff
about patience, and hoping, and trusting. Forgetting even
about the insights over Robby's death. Instead I think I am at
the end of my tether. This is mixed with my growing distrust of
Peter. All I want is kindness. We are a married couple. Why
can't she just speak kindly? Why can't we move on, get past all
this. Why can't Peter see this?
Peter starts to talk, but I step in. "I guess I better begin this one
myself, since I asked for this meeting."
Robyn looks surprised. Well, I did ask for the meeting. I
arranged it, so we could meet together. What's her problem?
I look at her. "I can't take this rejection any more. Whenever I
try and speak to you, I get cut off. It's getting too much. I just
want to ask you one question - are you a serious player in this
marriage or not?"

48
She looks straight at me. Doesn't answer. Silent.
In this awkwardness I blunder on. "Lately whenever I call you,
all I get is rejection. I can feel the bitterness there, and I just
want to know either way. You don't seem serious about fixing
this relationship."
Her eyes flash. A gun is about to be fired.
"You've got a nerve Tom, coming in here with that sort of stuff.
You spend your time phoning me and hassling me, when all I
asked for was space. You go running around the country to surf
beaches, while I'm home looking after Julia, and she's in her
prime years now, what sort of a father do you think you are,
maybe Katrina was right all along, so don't think you can come
in here and play this sort of tune."
What?
Somehow I'm on the defensive already. Without an answer to
my question. Women. Give me strength.
"I'm not trying to annoy you Robyn, it is just that it is very hard
to take these vibes all the time from you. A month ago, I was
saying I was one hundred percent behind fixing this marriage.
You've worn me down. Now I'm only about seventy per cent.
How much more crap are you going to throw at me?"
Wrong thing to say, buddy. Even as I say it, I know.
"Crap? Thrown at you?"
"Well, yes. Crap."
"I don’t know why I bother with this." She swings round on
Peter.
49
He calms us both down. Talks and jokes for a while, then tells
us he is going inside to get a cup of tea.
I start talking again. "Last month I was saying that I wanted to
come back home again. But now, I know it's the wrong thing to
do. I wouldn’t be able to handle it. I wouldn’t be able to stand
your cutting comments all the time. Why can't you just be
friendly? What do you gain by aggression? Maybe you have a
self esteem problem, but hiding behind your walls isn't going to
solve that problem."
Oh, that is a really smart thing to say, boyo. Sure to win you
some ground.
"Maybe we have gone too far Tom. Maybe this marriage is
over. You just don't seem able to recognise your problems,
coming up with all these feeble excuses, why don't you ask Phil
or Jeff or someone what you look like, instead of running away
from everything the minute something hard turns up, it's the
same old story. You keep running away from them. Who do
you think you're fooling?"
Whoa. Whoa there boy. What is she saying? Is this for real? Is it
possible to have a discussion with your wife of twenty years,
and neither of you knows what the other is speaking about?
Peter comes back. Drinking his tea.
"I think Robyn and I should talk some more tomorrow," I tell
him.

Next day I turn up at the house. Robyn is waiting. We have

coffee together. I have thought out another approach.
50
"Look," I tell her, "why don’t we just look at a couple of
different alternatives here, and be real honest to each other.
Why don't we draw up two pictures. Firstly if we stay together,
what we want, what are the situations we move towards.
Secondly, if we split up, what are the ramifications."
I start to tell her some things that I would like to see if we stay
together. She butts in.
"I want you to write something for me today. I'm afraid you are
going to sell this house, you and all your property deals, and I
can't have that. If you go off and marry someone else, then
maybe we will get into disputes over the ownership of this
home, and look at all the work I put into the vegetable garden,
besides Julia needs this time of stability in her life right now."
I can't believe this. Has my world gone mad? Is this some
hidden agenda? Is she serious about me selling the house
underneath her and Julia?
"Can you write me a letter giving me this house please,” she
demands. “You can have the other properties."
Despite myself, my pecuniary nature rises up. I am both
relieved and disgusted. "But this house is worth much more
than the other properties all together."
"I realise that. But Julia needs to stay in one place now."
I give up. Okay, she wants the house, damn it, I will give her the
house. I refuse to let financial arguments stand in the way of
fixing this dispute. I get out the laptop and type up what she
wants. I print off two copies, and we both sign them, giving
property to each other. I immediately toss my page away.
51
Deliberately. In front of her, so she will see that I don’t give a
tinkers damn about wealth and property.
She is hard now, unflinching. Like a woman guarding her young
from the aggressor. Nothing will threaten her offspring. Not
even the father.
I am nearly weeping. "Why do you want this Robyn? Why?"
"I didn't want this Tom, you did."
"What do you mean? I don’t want this to end. It's cutting me to
pieces."
"At the start it was doing that to me as well."
"What do you mean, at the start?"
Silence.
I wander around, looking at the possessions in my house that
used to be mine, but are now slipping away from me. I walk
round it like a stranger. "It's just tough, that's all. Twenty years
you know."
She sits there with her favourite tight lipped look.
I say something very stupid. "Nicki thinks I should see other
women."
Immediately I think, you dumb shit, Tom. Why on earth did you
say that? But I know. I said it to hurt her.
She looks up, genuinely surprised. "I never thought of that,"
she breathes out.
Then regathering her composure. "You do whatever you like,
whatever you think is right."
52
But her first statement has hit me. 'I never thought of that.'
She never thought of it.
I have gone months without companionship, without sex,
without someone to hold at night. And she has never thought
about it.
But then, have I thought about her, have I thought about how
she might feel? Have I wondered how lonely she is? Not really.
So why should she think about me?
My logical side tries to hold sway in my mind.
But it loses against the emotive side. My innermost person, the
young boy in the forest, is hurt once more by rejection. Not you
Williams, I don’t want you in my life. I don’t want to play with
you any more.
I don’t like you.
Go away.

I look at a young couple sitting on a park bench. Holding hands,

leaning on each other. Not saying anything. I would trade it all,
I would trade it all.
What an irony. Being a Christian. Any idle cynic could pigeon
hole me; some person, or persons, or institution, or historic
cultural relic, or psychological baggage, or whatever, is to
blame; and some person, or persons, or children, or
nuclear/extended family, is the victim and/or victims.
Well, I don’t know, I just know aloneness. I walk down the
street looking at the passersby. Firstly the girls. The girls
53
running in the morning, keeping their bodies shapely so that
separated men like me can look at them. Man, do I feel like
picking up a blonde tonight. Not even so much the sex. Just
someone to hold, to lie in their arms for a while. To reach out in
the night to.
Secondly the couples. From afar, as they walk along the street
or the park or the beach, they look so relaxed, so together.
They look like they have met love. Some are old, some are
young. They have a friend, a companion, someone to sit with.
Not necessarily to fill their time with chatter. Just someone
being there. Perhaps they don’t look into each others eyes like
Brad and Angelina used to, and whisper sweet things. Maybe
they argue, and are only filling in a morning ritual of walking to
the coffee shop. But it is nice to think they are together, and
have touched each other in a way I cannot. I am jealous of the
image I have. I am loath to accept a reality of dissension. Not
now. I want to believe in connection.
Paul Simon was right. 'Losing love is like a window in your
heart. Everyone can see you're blown apart.' My walls are gone
now. I didn’t realise how close they stuck to me. They were
more like a skin. Maybe all our walls are. We spend so much
energy raising them, to protect ourselves.
Now you can see me, and my inner workings, my guts, my
stomach, and my heart. Especially my heart. It's stuck on my
sleeve now. You can see it pulse. Don’t come near me or you
are likely to be sprayed by my emotions. Don’t listen to me,
you'll end up telling me your own marriage is crumbling. Don’t
ask me for advice, I'm just envious of your life now.

54
I have arranged a final meeting with Peter at George's. I know
we have reached a standoff, one that cannot be verbalised. He
in his turn believes he cannot be too direct with me. He feels
that if he asks me penetrating questions, I will react badly, and
he will lose my confidence. Well, that's what I reckon he thinks
anyway.
For my turn, I believe he has cocked up in the counseling
process. It is murky of course, and only an aggrieved husband
would try and blame the counsellor. He, for his part, would
probably gladly take on blame to effect a reconciliation. Gee,
that would be a small ask. You want me to be guilty? No
worries, if it gets the two of you back together.
They say the worst couples to deal with are the intelligent
ones. Too many persona running around. Too much motive
upturning and concealment. Too many side issues, which
peripherally speak to the central problems. Peter inherits
Robyn and I, without any warning. Poor blighter.
So we meet and talk. Half of me is in watching mode, unable to
get a clear grasp on anyone's motives, certainly not mine, and
probably not Peters. But I watch him anyway. We chat away, he
relaxes, and I go for subterfuge.
“Well, the loss of Robby as a baby was pretty significant”, I say
to him. This is a variant that marketing people call the
assumptive close. You let out your question more as a
statement of fact that you yourself know about. In reality you
don't know, but you are sounding like you do.

55
Without a pause he comes back. “Yes, that was a big one. That
took a lot of working through, for sure.”
Gotcha. Should've worked like this months ago.
We talk on, and I bleed on the table, exposing myself.
Deliberately. Seeing if it will draw him out more, seeing if I can
learn something else. “You know, it's very tough picking up all
these things from my background that affect my decision
making. At least I can say it is a learning process. Not one I
would suggest anyone go through. But you learn so much
about yourself.”
Come on. Open up. Drop the counsellor façade. We're in a
coffee shop.
He hesitates, then starts to talk. “I don’t know Tom. These
things are systemic. One thing just seems to feed on another,
and before you know it, there are two nice people whose
marriage is falling apart.”
Systemic? What does that word mean? But I don’t interrupt.
Look it up later.
He goes on. “I don’t know the answers. I really don't. You two
are so talented, and yet you haven't managed to sort it out. It's
beyond me really. I feel helpless.”
He pauses. I remain silent.
“Seems to me both you and Robyn approached this with a set
of personalities, and backgrounds. And that you both worked at
it to the best of your abilities. With the tools you had available,
you did the best job you could.”

56
Somehow his words don't incense me until later. Perhaps I
didn’t hear them correctly. Or perhaps he is right. Perhaps the
words are too penetrating for my soul. Is he correct after all in
his assessment of my defensiveness?
I did the best I could.
Reminds me of a pupil ranked at the bottom of a class I used to
teach long ago. On his school report another teacher had
written three simple words, telling it all. 'Did his best.'
I face myself with that judgement. Did his best. Shit, what a
thing to say. It is all you can ask of anyone. It is all that an
Olympic bronze medalist can do. Their best. But when you
apply it to mending your marriage, or your life, it sounds
different. It points out your inadequacy. It suggests somebody
else would have pulled through.
Okay, that's my pride talking. That's just me protecting myself
again.

I hardly ever go to church now. I never felt at ease, I mean that

much was obvious, but that feeling has altered. It now feels
detached to be sitting inside one. Listening to a guy who
probably, make that hopefully, doesn’t want to be talking like
he does, but knows he has got to meet the average person in
his congregation. Preachers offer us answers from God, as if
the issue was that we seek solutions. In contrast, I heard it once
said the Bible is a book of questions that God asks us.
Might be a good point. I knew all the answers at twenty five.
Now I am mired in uncertainty. Perhaps I may yet discover that
57
God has always been positing issues to me instead, to see how I
react. What is God really interested in? Does He/She just want
my heart? What a hell of a way to get it.

I have received the final dismissal from Robyn. The marriage is

over. She tells me she felt imprisoned by our relationship. Upon
reflection, I can believe it, I can understand it. Furthermore I
have evidently not grown up, and remain an adolescent,
seeking the next adventure and thrill. I told her I took that as a
compliment. And finally that I have been psychologically and
emotionally abusive in my ignoring of her over the years. She is
right of course, to add insult to injury. She is absolutely right.
She emails this information to me. Divorce by email. I feel like a
true information society man.
I communicate with Peter over this, hoping for some sort of
support. He tells me, well, the Bible is silent on romantic love.
Robyn has apparently fallen out of love with me, and that is
that. She is very involved in volunteer work at his church.
Women's and children's groups. Rebuilding her life I suppose.
I think about Peter often. An ordinary man, trying to be
modern, attempting to adapt his Bible to the nowadays world.
Trying to be relevant, not to condemn. He realises he cannot
reject divorce these days because it is so common, even within
the church. Therefore he too is struggling with his
understanding of how God works. I wonder about telling him
that he too, did his best. But I don't, if only because of how I
view the phrase myself. I know it would simply be vindictive.

58
It gives me a sense of history though, listening to him. Us
Christians, we are too smart for our own good. We can look
back one hundred years and be horrified at how the church
acted then, how they rallied against women voting and
encouraged men to fight in wars for God, King and Country. But
we don’t realise that in one hundred years time, other
Christians will be looking back, equally distraught at our actions
today, explaining them away as aberrations, apologising to
their own generation for our blunders.

Why am I suffering? Shucks, people have asked themselves this

for millenia. There are many passages in the Bible on pain. A
lot of them talk about suffering righteously, you know, this is
the kind of thing where you are a humanitarian worker and
terrorists put you in a wooden box for three years, and you
emerge a stronger person having forgiven your persecutors.
But mine doesn't fit that category.
I find a verse in the story of Job I can relate to though. Oh, it
would feel so righteous to identify myself with that sorrowful
man. To be attacked by the devil because I was the best
around. That would help. Knowing I would get famous and
have my own book. Anything would help. Any encouraging
word, or strategy. Anything. But the verse doesn’t say things
like that. I echo Jobs words back to God;
"For thou dost write bitter things against me, and thou dost
make me to inherit the iniquities of my youth."
It occurs to me that the last view people had of Jesus, after his
resurrection, was of a pierced body. The nail holes were in his
59
hands. And his feet. His side was still split open from the
soldiers spear. He was a walking wound.
Why do so many of us end up walking wounded?

I send my last email to Peter. Thinking I better thank him for all
his efforts, even if they have ended up the way they are.

Dear Peter
Here I am bombarding you with email again. Hope you don’t
mind being a recipient of all this stuff. Firstly I want to say again
that I really appreciate the difficult situation you are in with our
predicament. I can see that the Counsellor role can often be a
whipping boy for anything that goes wrong, and ignored when
it goes right. So I have come to appreciate your role more over
the past months. Tough job.
As I walked this Sunday morning, I watched families get out of
their cars in an autumn leaved street, and walk over to the
church. There was a hum of friendly conversation, of people
meeting each other, probably superficially really. But even so I
knew I could not go into that building. I would have been in
tears within minutes and had to leave in embarrassment.
I walked on around the block and felt my life was an utter
waste. I am forty three years old, and have many talents, but
they lie there, in a sack, buried, waiting for the Master to come
back and I am accused of not using them. If I had been able at
the age of twenty five to look forward to where I am now, I
would have been horrified. The enormity of personal failure. I
60
wanted to change the world for Jesus, but it has knocked me
into its own image.
Tom

61