We had been having unspoken beef for almost 10 years. I hated it. And I wasn’t doing a single thing to make it better. It was easier to show up in the same spaces and mostly ignore each other. He stayed in his corner. I stayed in mine. The tension was weird, and sad, and had been going on long enough that it just became the norm.
So a few months ago, I did something about it. I asked my ex-wife’s husband to meet me, man to man, face to face.
I was in the middle of what I was calling my “50 years old, dude” campaign, clearing the air and rebuilding bonds with the people in my life, if they were open to it of course. It started with in-laws. Spread to extended family. Then landed here, on this man. When I told people I was meeting my ex-wife’s husband, they looked at me like they’d just sniffed expired milk. Face all scrunched up. “Why would you do that? What’s the point?”
The point was simple.
This man helped raise my daughters. Both of them have told me, unprompted, that he was good to them, respectful, consistent. They speak of him with genuine admiration. That has never been lost on me. My babies trusted him. So I asked my oldest to work the channels, see if he was open, and get me his contact info. We jumped on a call and had a short conversation. I set the context, kept it real, and he agreed. I’m sure he was still a little weirded out by the whole thing. Fair. It is weird.
But no weirder than the thing we’d been doing for years.
We met where all men should meet: the playground at a nearby park. I showed up with pan dulce and lawn chairs. I think he was a little shocked. We got into it from the jump. We talked for about two hours. I learned a lot about him. He learned more about me. I apologized for being distant and explained my perspective. He admitted some things too. And at some point, we both arrived at the same realization at the same time. We had each been creating stories in our heads about what the other person was thinking.
That’s it. That was the whole thing.
It had felt like a heavy conversation all the way up until we were actually having it. Then, about fifteen minutes in, once the initial anxiety wore off and the pan dulce worked its magic, it just became a simple conversation between two hombres.
He’s a good man with a good heart.
But afterwards, I had to ask myself: was this real, or were we both just performing? We’d get our answer a week later. My bonus daughter’s kids were getting baptized. All the families would be converging and overlapping like a living Venn diagram. I was nervous. Honestly, this baptism was the big reason I’d finally pulled the trigger on the whole idea in the first place. These events where our lives keep crossing, for the kids, and for our kids’ kids. We needed to stop being weird.
The party started like these things always do. Each family in their own corner, staying in their lane, being cordial. You know how it goes.
Then music started.
My new friend is a singer. My son-in-law is a musician. And I can yes-and the f*ck out of anything. The music started and was sung with the passion of truly drunk and heartbroken Mexicans, and just like that, the whole energy of the room shifted. The corners dissolved. We weren’t separate families anymore.
We were in one room, celebrating one moment together.
Later, I wondered if our conversation was the catalyst for that. Does that happen if we never come clean? I don’t think so. I would have stayed in my corner. He would have stayed in his. We would have kept performing the same tired lines in the sitcom we’d turned our family into, because it’s safe. Because it’s expected. Because nobody ever told us it could be different. Was it worth being weird and sharing my pan dulce with my ex-wife’s husband?
Pues si, guey.
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