Art is Life

Everything Changes

by

Matthew T. Lipson

Aside 1.2 : Art is Life

I knew about the life drawing session at the Palo Alto Art Center since high school.  My art teacher tried to push us all to go, especially since most of us wanted to be comic book artists.  The session has been running since the late 1960s and a staple in the San Francisco Peninsula art scene.  Post college, upon my return to the SF Bay Area, a friend tried to get me to go.  I came up with all kinds of excuses not to go.  When my marriage started to fail, another friend at work finally convinced me to go to one of the quarterly drawing marathons.  This was the break through, which brought me to the weekly Tuesday night group.  A group that has helped me come back to myself.  Now I go every week and book the models.

Wish They All Could Be . . .

Everything Changes

by

Matthew T. Lipson

2.2 : Wish They All Could Be . . .

When a person starts dating they learn a lot about themselves.  For each of us it's different.  We are a synthesis of many things coupled with preconceived notions of how reality is supposed to be.  This leads us to a misguided way of  thinking dictating our motivations.  Our culture leads us to believe dating is primarily about sex.  For me, I quickly learned I was motivated by a deeper connection.  Connection includes many things which sex is just a part and not the most important.  I learned this from my first girlfriend where the connection was only sex.  My second girlfriend, we made an overly rational decision to work on the connection of personality, shared interests, looking at our differences.  Discussing who we were as individuals and how that influences us was most important.  By my fourth girlfriend I had learned how to compromise, but not in a healthy way.  My own interests became secondary to my partner.  By the end of my marriage this led to me becoming nonexistent and ultimately fearing and distrusting emotional intimacy.

The End ... ?

Everything Changes

by

Matthew T. Lipson

1.6 The End ... ?

Standing at the dining room window looking out at the parking lot being drenched in rain.  All I wanted to do was leave.  Being there in the now all but empty condo was a harsh reminder of the expectations of married life.  My two children had been born there.  Family life, seeing my kids daily, I now stood on the outside of that reality.  It was over.  I didn't want to walk out the door.  I needed to.  For the first time I truly knew.  As I stood there, taking in the detail of the wet surface of the street, the light of the single lamp, and the reflections of what was behind me in the window.  She was a ghost, still my wife.  When she reached out to me -- to comfort me or her, I don't know.  Instinctively I stepped out of reach.  I was done.

Friends

Everything Changes

by

Matthew T. Lipson

1.4 Friends

I don't have many friends, but I am rich in those I do have.  Those supported me in ways that still amaze and humble me.  All I had to do was call them.  They listened to my tail of woe, supplied a place for me to stay, helped me pack up my belongings.  They were there.  One lived on the opposite coast and would listen to me till our cell phone batteries ran out.  Another, who taught me the pleasure of cycling, let me take over his bedroom for a couple of months, as I started to enter into the deepest part of my depression.  He even put up with my children living there a few days a week.  A third, whom I worked with, watched me lose weight with increasing rapidity, as I lived on peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, carrots, and granola bars.  Another, who was going through the same thing, helped me find a Divorce Recovery group instrumental in the beginning of my healing process.  They say you don't know your true friends till you're in crisis.  I found this to be true.

The Decision

Everything Changes

by

Matthew T. Lipson

1.3 The Decision

The week had been ... awful.  Monday was her fortieth birthday, and the night of our worst argument.  The details, which are forever imprinted in my brain, are unimportant except the fact our eldest, who was seven, was in the room.  I exploded, as I had finally come to the end of my rope.  This scared my wife, and, once I came to my senses, me too.  We had come to an important crossroads, which could lead us either to heal our marriage or divorce.  The Multiple Sclerosis could no longer be a consideration, or even financial repercussions.  What was our relationship doing to our children?  to me?  By the end of the week, my anxiety attacks, depression, irrational anger had to be addressed.  I had to leave.  Friday, on my way home, I arranged to stay at a friend's house.   When she asked me when I was coming back, I answered, "I'm not."

The Past is Always Present

Everything Changes

by

Matthew T. Lipson

1.2 The Past is Always Present

A short time after she asked me for a divorce, my wife was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis.  This took us both by surprise.  Even after having children this was a lesson neither of us had learned.  Unknown to me, but not her friends, she had been having increasing mobility issues for a few weeks.  So, when her primary care physician scheduled her for an MRI, I did not take it as seriously as I probably should have.  In the wake of having been asked for a divorce, I really wasn't caring much about what she had to say, anyway.  The diagnosis changed that.  I insisted on going with her to the Neuroligist visits, which she eventually started to hide from me.  In the beginning it was a rallying call giving the illusion that we could mend fences and find what we had meant to each other.  I think, though, both of us knew the diagnosis couldn't hide the deeper damage.  The change on the horizon was getting closer and more inevitable.

The Beginning

Everything Changes

by

Matthew T. Lipson

1.1 The Beginning

Evenings are momentous times.  A lot things happen in the darkened hours.  Children are conceived.  Wars can be won or lost, and bombs of a more personal nature can start a significant change in a person's life.  On this particular evening in June, I was called into the bedroom by my wife.  To say I was surprised by what she said would be untrue.  I had been wondering when the subject of divorce was going to be brought up by either one of us.  To say I was prepared for it would also be untrue.  Commitment to me is sacred.  I flew into a defense mode proclaiming my love to her.  Was what I said untrue?  Not at the time.  Divorce was still not an option.  Now that it was out there, though, I was not ready to acknowledge its reality.  She was ... up to a point.  Even though she was the one asking for the divorce, she did not ask me to leave or was she prepared to leave herself.  Where was this to lead us?  Neither one of us knew.  Nor were we prepared for what was to come next.

Prologue

Everything Changes

by

Matthew T. Lipson

PROLOGUE

 Walking out the door in order to go to work, I didn't know the changes awaiting me at the end of the day.  All of us like to talk about how we know the fluidity of life, but until we are faced with change in times of crisis all this is just words.  We set up expectations for ourselves based on what we perceive as life's predictability.  Change is something we control in our private lives.  Or, so we all think.  I thought I knew about change.  After all I am a father of two girls, at the time very young girls.  I was married.  I had travelled and gone away to college.  I had faced change, right?  No.  The change facing me at the end of this day was more than I had faced in the past and almost more than I was prepared to face.