I have a couple friends who like projects. You know the kind. The car that awaits loving restoration, one that has perhaps seen its better days, but with a little love and tender care, can be like new.
It’s a labor of love I suppose. I have never had a project like that, my love affair with those of the vehicular ilk being virtually non-existent.
It’s not that I haven’t been involved in projects. Unfortunately though, I’ve usually been on the receiving end, being the project, not spearheading the project.
Yes, I admit to having some dent and scrapes from the many years I’ve been on this big, blue marble. I could even be considered a classic these days. Thankfully, I have not yet become an antique.
Even so, I don’t even think that I need any major repairs. Others seemed to have disagreed over the years, determining on their own that I would make a good project.
I never asked to be one. But being a bit of a pleaser, I would go along with it, only to find that the person didn’t really want to restore me, but remake me anew.
I accept my share of the blame in all this. Over the years I have allowed others to go to work on me, often in the name of “love.” I add the quotes with purpose, for I have only recently come to understand that “love” in its purest, finest and most fulfilling form comes with an unconditional warranty. You’re accepted just the way you are, with no need to add after-market parts to your exterior or interior, the party of interest seeing you as perfectly imperfect, just the way you are.
Certainly, my past few relationships have been of the project car variety. My Florida days have been well chronicled here, so I don’t need to bore you with rehashing those strange years where I bounced from owner to owner, getting multiple makeovers that left me wondering who I even was.
I will tell you a little about my last project car moment. On the surface, I seemed to be good just the way I was, only to come to find out that I was in need of some maintenance. Actually, it was referred to as “hygiene,” a cleansing of the relationship that really was more about fixing what was wrong with me and not the relationship itself.
The project car moment started innocently enough. Like being offered a shiny new coat of paint, the modification didn’t seem too severe. I was told over dinner about some things I could improve upon. Odd things that at the time didn’t seem so big, but over time, became foreboding peeks into a possible future where I would be laden with after-market additions to “make me a better, more complete person.”
I think I deserve some pats on the back for taking this all in with aplomb. They were highly personal maintenance issues and really began to play some mind games on me. Yes, I said they were no problem to do at the time, but really, they were big things, largely because they demonstrated that someone who claimed to accept me as I was really thought I was missing some parts.
Don’t get me wrong. I don’t mind a little direction here and there. To have a great relationship I think you have to be open to an open dialogue about how it can be even better. It’s only when someone wants to get under your hood and tinker with who you really are that the whole thing goes off track. In your desire to improve things, you readily accept new ideas, only to find that it’s not a buff and polish kind of improvement, but a take it down to the chassis and rebuild it from ground up kind of project.
Such was “hygiene.” Once there was an opening, the floodgates of desired improvements opened up. At times I felt like an actor, waiting for my morning notes from the director to arrive in my dressing room, telling me all the things I did wrong in the previous scenes.
That, my friends, is not a relationship. It’s a project. Something to play with and perfect, a project that is never done as there is always something to new to do to make it even “better.” Perfection is unattainable, even though perfection in a relationship is never required or even desired.
This is what I get for breaking yet another rule and dating a buddy psychologist. You’d think I would have learned by now that these people usually have more issues and problems than their patients and are likely to analyze and over analyze everything you say or do. Thankfully, this lesson-learned was relatively brief, as I knew that there just had to be someone out there who would appreciate me as I am, someone who wouldn’t want didn’t like projects any more than I did.
After all, isn’t that what it’s really about? Finding someone out there who you like just as they are, with all the dents and rust, with all the false starts, extended mileage, soft spots in the upholstery and scrapes and scars. Someone who doesn’t want to change you constantly and who isn’t interested in making you over in their own image.
Thankfully, my days of maintenance, or to use the shrink-to-be’s vernacular, “hygiene,” are over. I don’t have to constantly be in the shop awaiting my next appointment for a tune up. I just get to be me, loved unconditionally for who and what I am.
Who would have ever guessed that it would be so freeing having an unconditional warranty? Strangely, it makes me want to be a better person on my own. I guess in some respects I’ve finally become my own project car, deciding to add a little luster to this old classic on my own volition. Unconditional love can do that to a person. We want to become better because we are inspired to be, not told to be. Yes, there seems to be a lot of miles left on this 1958 hotrod after all.
In the Emerald City, maintenance-free,
– Robb