The world on a silver platter

Why are all cab drivers here so nuts? First I wanted to believe it was all just a coincidence, but no..I can’t keep justifying.. they are way crazy...
We just came back from a mall – me and colleague – and took a cab. So the driver decides to share his vision of the country with us.

“You see, I tell you, this country, is all upside down. Here women are like bosses.... I am telling you now, I see many things here in these years… Everything is about women here! A man cheats, she will smack his head to break it now and its ok. But if a woman cheats, he may kiss her on the knees to beg her to forgive him that he found out! I am telling you..”
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Me and my colleague are cracking up on the back seat

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“It is true. Whenever women become bosses the country goes upside down. You see it here. Man has to wash the dishes while woman goes out with her friends! I see them here in the night. They are all wasted on the backseat. They shove the beer down their throat worse than men..”

Crazy…

Anyway; I am travelling for work now. It’s been an interesting time so far. From a professional perspective it’s been really good, and this has been the first trip for me without any of my local colleagues. I met the international ones here, but was basically by myself. Which I prefer because it gives more opportunity to be alone. Otherwise there are always too many social activities for which you kind of need to show up..

Now I met one of these international colleagues already on one of my previous trips. I did remember meeting him but didn’t know his name anymore. I guess during the last trip we just exchanged a few words, nothing special. Se here, he came up to me to say hi and still knew my name..( I thought that was really impressive, since you tend to meet so many people in these trips). We chatted a bit and that was that. I mean it was pleasant but really quite short.

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One of the evenings, I came back to my room after a dinner with some customers and then saw a small bag there with my name on it. In it was just a souvenir from this guy’s home country (about 20 hours by plane from where I live!) and a simple note stating something like ‘a small gift from my country, enjoy” signed with his name.

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So I sat on the bed thinking, now what does this gesture mean? I figured the best thing would be to send a message thanking for the gift, to be polite. It has happened before that some guy showed interest but always in such annoying ways. I really dislike it when you notice that a guy always walks up to talk to you when he spots you. At a certain point you just look for ways to stay out of sight. And then they try to make jokes and somehow ask questions to understand 1) if you are in a relationship and then 2) if its serious. It’s all always too obvious even when it’s meant to be hidden, and it’s just generally really annoying.

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But this was different. This guy had always kept a professional, but kind attitude, and this gesture was not too intruding either. It was actually polite and respectful and that was nice.
I received a nice reply to my message, saying he hoped I liked it. I saw him during the day again and thanked him again for the souvenir. We chatted about some work-related things. I asked him at the end if he bought that souvenir here or if it was really from his home country, so he said ‘no really I brought it in my country’.

Now, that puzzled me. I am thinking that he had someone else in mind when he bought it, but that for some reason it didn’t work out and then he decided to give it to me. The other scenario could be that he really bought it with the intention to give it to me, but that just seems so unlikely.

We had dinner with a group of colleagues later in the week and he was there as well. It was a really nice evening, one of the more relaxed ones I have had so far. Usually you have to work quite hard to keep the conversation alive, but this evening was actually nice by itself. And during this dinner this colleague shared that he has a wife and kids and that then puzzled me even more.

I shared all of this with Mr.Hubby and he said that a lot of people cheat on these trips, with each other – this is true, I know a few colleagues who indeed did this. So Mr.Hubby says that he probably wanted to see if he had a chance with me. Mr.Hubby was by the way really relaxed about it. He said ‘Look at it this way, you’re still hot’.
LOL

But this whole thing made me think and gave me this feeling..a feeling that in front of me lies the option to chose a life of luxury and ease. A husband which you can present to the world, a life without hiding, without difficult sisterwives, a life with stability. And it’s there, for me to just chose and take. Such an odd feeling- like a sense of gravity that’s pulling my heart in that direction.

I sat in silence for a bit visualizing the real life in front of me. The life after this life, its endlessness and the choice which I am making for that life. And slowly the sense of gravitation towards all of this started to fade away.

Polygyny is a conscious choice. I guess like any marriage is a conscious choice sometimes. And maybe it would be better if it were a conscious choice every day. I will be going back home soon. New rounds of arguments, distrust and problems await, I am sure. But all of them give the opportunity for submission, humility, goodness, love, reconciliation. In all of them lie hidden gems. If I were only able to see these things while in the middle of things..

Blue Skies and Sunshine

Mr.Hubby got us all away for the weekend.. and then he bailed just before we were about to leave.. lol.. so it ended up being a sisterwives weekend in a city a few hours away from where we live. I figured this was the time to mend everything and decided that whatever whoever said, it would not upset me and that I would be happy go merry for the whole weekend!

And I managed!

And it was a good trip!

Everyone just relaxed..

I kept babbling about nonsense stuff

Little Rebel was not making any trouble

And now all tension seems to have left

And Mr.Hubby has been issue-free for some days

Mr.Hubby wants to use the good energy to have a family talk in which we lay issues on the table and try to come up with some ideas for how to make things easier in the future. That will probably happen somewhere in the coming days, and I will try to update you all.

Besides this there is nothing very exciting to write. You know it seems that when everything goes smoothly, it doesn't even feel like I am in polygyny. Then its just life and there is nothing strange or difficult about it. So now I am thinking 'what should I write on this blog'? And it seems there is not much to say.

Maybe if things go really well that would mean I'd stop writing completely...?

Bygones attack

You know the memories that keep popping up? Even when you agreed with yourself that you should just let bygones be bygones?
I get them sometimes, and they upset my mood. I am about to get to that week of the month in which my mood is not optimal anyway, and now some memories knock on my door, and before I can even really decide whether to let them in, they are already there in my face…staring at me...forcing me to stare back.

Like this one time; 4th invited to me over to her home, with Mr.Hubby. Her home back then was kinda small with the bedroom attached to the living room without a door, just a doorway. The atmosphere was fine, I sat on the floor, facing her bedroom, we were drinking tea. They were discussing something, I wasn’t part of the conversation, so I looked around the home and noticed next to her bed a bottle of massage oil, a hand wash bottle, folded underneath it a bedspread. And then I remembered Mr.Hubby telling me to buy a hand wash bottle to put olive oil in it to use during lovemaking, and me telling him no since it would just be odd to have such a thing in my bedroom with sisterwives and kids in my home regularly.
And then I felt my heart sink in, and I was thinking to myself what response to this situation would God be most pleased with. The folded bedspread was to prevent stains I figured.. and I sat there thinking why she left that in plain sight when she knew I was coming over?

And this other time when we were visiting her again, and she left the stuff out there more than once, anyway, Mr.Hubby kissed her goodbye in front of me, which not one of us ever does, and she just gave me this big smile and said goodbye as if it was our regular routine, I was a bit perplexed and silent and before we got into the car Mr.Hubby told me he had to go to 1st there was an emergency, and he left, without any kiss, and I am till this day quite sure that was a lie and that he eventually went back to 4th that day.

And there are other things that linger in the back of my head, pop up, I say I want to move on, and then they leave, just to come back some time later. Some of them are related to 4th others to the rest. They affect my mood. Bring some kind of dark cloud over me. Mr.Hubby always tells us we should leave the past in the past. I respect that because I see that he really does that. He never brings old things up, even if it really bothered him when it happened. I am not sure what would really make me let I rest for real.. any thoughts?

Overcoming the lows

I was feeling low last week.. sometimes, anything can be too much. When I feel like that I am not walking around ranting or screaming or anything of the kind. I just feel very tired, very quiet and lonely. Lonely in the sense that I wish to be alone, because the cheery mood of others hurts, and yet I long for warmth of people at the same time. It’s a mixed emotion - I don’t even know what to make of it let alone explain it well to Mr.Hubby.

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Sometimes I wonder what the root is, since I have been having such mood swings forever. They have become much less frequent and less intense in the last years, still they do come back occasionally.

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When I was younger I would lock myself up in my room and cry for a full day, now I just get silent, reflective. I always end up looking forward and thinking ‘there’s still so many years ahead’. I think that with a sense of heaviness. I start to wonder what the use is of life, of all the things we go through. We end up in the soil anyway, and life continues and we get forgotten, our deeds are so small, futile in comparison to the creation, so why aren’t we already in our final destination? I start thinking of all the people that enjoy themselves in this life, that are so happy with all the material things, all the achievements they are striving after, and it’s as if someone turns on the light when you are having a migraine. It so turns me off, I just want to crawl in a small hut in the middle of the desert and stay there, alone.

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I don’t really know what it is, why I get these feelings, what I should do with them. I can write them down now, but I can’t when I am actually feeling them. So Mr.Hubby makes the effort to talk with me, tries to understand what’s wrong. And all I can do is sob and utter one or two words. He holds me, says he is sorry for whatever he does wrong, for everything which I am carrying due to his ignorance.

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I asked him what God intends with marriage, with sharing a life together. The movie “Hancock” kind of describes what I was trying to say. The way I see it is that God creates a mutual attraction, liking and love between two people, but He doesn’t want us to lose ourselves in that love and thus forget about Him. So He creates distances through polygyny. In the movie Hancock they were so powerful when apart, and so weak when near.

Mr.Hubby said that God makes us be together to find solace, comfort and companionship in one another. “If a group of people goes to a movie, they might all like it. But out of ten people maybe there will be just one other person who will like the exact same scenes that you did, or will see the same message that you did. You will feel a connection with that person which you will not feel with the other nine. Still the main thing is the movie, not talking with each other. Watching the movie may merely be more enjoyable when together..”

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“Our lives are about gaining nearness to God. We draw nearer to one another through this mutual goal. That makes us to have a special and deep bond. The reason I liked you when we met is that I recognized your yearning for faith, your questions.. that made me want you in my life – as a companion. People with no faith say we use our faith to make ourselves believe we should do all these things for God. As if we are brainwashing ourselves. But for us it’s the other way around - without faith there is no reason for being together – life, relationships are empty, dead.”

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And all of a sudden life seemed so full of possibilities. It might be that I will not have to wait until I pass away for nearness, for the taste of true spirituality, for that liberation from this material heaviness. I have had small appetizers in the past, who knows what God might bring on my path. And Mr.Hubby would be there to experience these things with... and share the adventures.
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I felt so relieved and cried all the previous heaviness away on his shoulder. I needed that talk.

The longing

I have been feeling low in the past days. Now it’s better mainly because I have managed to re-schedule my appointments and work from home today. It gives me peace of mind; I feel less submerged in some insane rat race and more of a normal person.

Mr.Hubby has been very busy the past weeks, he’s still having arguments with 1st, I have been busy with work, he forgot about me a bit which I didn’t mind till I noticed he did call 4th, that hurt me, and I got offended, decided that I wouldn’t contact him and let him call me instead, he noticed my distance, and didn’t like it, and now he doesn’t call me either. Nonsense, all stupid childish nonsense. But still I won’t pick up the phone and call him. It’s mental power play.. It’s stupid. I shouldn’t complicate my own life this way. Some people have real problems out there, and I am creating my own here. Maybe at the end of this “working day”, after I have thought it all through, it will all be better and I will find a way to overcome myself.

I read once that people stand in front of paradise and then turn away. I know God is watching me and He waits for me to go against my childishness and my arrogance and pride, and be humble in front of His Gaze.
That actually changes everything.. If I were in front of paradise now, how important could it all be actually? I would run through fire to get closer to Him then, so what’s a phone call?

I wish I had a direct line to God and He could answer my questions directly. Sometimes I feel like life is a huge puzzle, and the pieces just won’t fall into place. I wish I was a better believer. Someone who would give all of themselves to God, and accept His Will always, regardless of what it was. I wish I was someone who only wished good to others, wouldn’t feel jealous or offended, wasn’t stubborn, and arrogant, didn’t have stupid pride, and was always reminding of God and never objecting anything God ordained to happen. I wish God would take all my bad characteristics away and make me clean, spotless, and for me to be submerged in love of Him and His love of me, endlessly, forever.

Why does it have to take so long to progress?

A test of trustworthiness

I have been trying to deepen my understanding of what it means to be trustworthy, since I made the intention to try and be with others the way I wish for them to be with me.
Now some small thing happened and I still haven’t quite figured out what a true trustworthy person would do.. I had an appointment with Mr.Hubby for a cup of coffee not too far from 4th’s home - since it was her day and he was going to go there afterwards for dinner.

My talk with him is not the subject of this post but just to share: Mr.Hubby said that he was feeling very tired since it seems that when everything is fine with one wife he gets into a quarrel with the other, and then the cycle starts all over again with the four of us. He said that he felt like he was constantly busy extinguishing small fires instead of reaching certain long term goals, and he expressed the hope that we would finally commit to a life together as a true family, instead of our continuous small bickering... It was a tough conversation as I felt that lot of our problems have to do with his insensitivity in our affairs, but in general I do agree with him and do understand where he’s coming from. He just wants a loving and true family and some time to look forward..

After an hour we said goodbye and I went home and when I looked at my cell I saw two missed calls from 4th. So I called back and found her very cold and annoyed on the phone. She said that she just called to fix an appointment for the weekend – so we did – and then she asked if I left work just now, so I told her I was almost at home. Then we hung up. The words exchanged were little but to me they said a lot... She had tried to reach Mr.Hubby and found no answer, then she tried to reach me just to see if I would answer the phone. When I didn’t, she knew I was with him and got pissed. Then he called back to tell he was on his way and no doubt soon after I returned her call as well. And just to be sure she asked if I was leaving work… She did not share this with me, but I knew it.

I knew all of this already when I saw the two missed calls. I knew all of this in my heart and it made me pissed off to hear her annoyed and cold tone of voice. I was so busy with work these last weeks that he spent ample time with her on my days..so why bother if I sit for an hour and have a cup of coffee with him? Why not just be generous and be happy that I finally could?

While I was walking home I wondered what would a trustworthy person do? To honor my intention, what should I have done?

The tricks of the accursed

Sometimes, when I am hurt, this weird negativity creeps up in my head. You know.. you start thinking the other person doesn’t care. You see images in your head of you being caring, and the other one leaving you out in the cold by yourself - drama.
So you decide to shut yourself off, go your own way... That is my built in mechanism anyway when things go wrong - taking distance.

And there is this thing which always helps me calm down and look at things from a different perspective, and that is the story of Adam and Eve. Weird? Let me explain. I just wanted to post my insights here and see what you guys think.

As you all know Adam and Eve were in Eden, blissful with absolute freedom and happiness – with just a very simple rule “do not touch that one tree”. Now paradise must have been awesome, vast, exciting, and great, so such a simple rule should have been a piece of cake. But still somehow they disobeyed…

They did that out of fear and out of a lack of trust. The devil convinced Eve that God hadn’t told them why they weren’t allowed to eat from the tree because by eating from it they would gain eternity. And without it they would be mortals and eventually die. To scare Eve further he showed her the horrors of their decaying bodies.

Such a simple and straightforward story, but just think about it: the devil convinced them that by listening to him they would attain exactly that which in reality they would lose.. and what they got instead is exactly that which he scared them with!

Isn’t that deep? Every time I get this urge to think negatively because I imagine other people being cruel I try to remember this – and remember that the devil is always out to trick us. I try my best to overcome myself and reach out and be honest about my feelings, instead of taking distance, as that way I definitely risk ending up alone and sad..

Any thoughts?

I am so right

I am so right.. she's so wrong.. that's what was going through my mind yesterday when I had a fight with one of the co-wives. I am right, because I was a friend to her and she let me down when I needed her and she is not even willing to apologize.. Friends left the building and friendly just made her entrance!

But I was talking to Mr.Hubby today about the whole situation and he got me thinking. He said: "Who would have ever thought you would be in this position? Becoming religious, becoming 3rd? Who would have thought you would chose that? It's a miracle in itself. And the Lord is happy when He sees you trying to struggle for His sake. He is commanding our environment, the people around us. He is controlling the other sister-wife. He is putting you in this situation to see whether you will let your ego resolve the situation or whether you will let you heart deal with it."

Hmm... hard ... still I am right - definitely!
What about justice? If I do not get angry with her now, will she not forget about me in the future as well? If she doesn't get the picture will there be any progress ever?

"Will she understand if you attack her and demand an apology? Or will she bow down and feel resentment instead?"

Sigh - my ego is looking out of the window stubbornly. I guess Mr.Hubby is right.