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I have been laying an adobe block ring around the Pomegranate tree today, which has placed me in an area of my yard working closest to the Ballerina Rose that is planted at the center of my walkway circle nearest what will hopefully be the door to my some-day adobe chapel.  Perhaps by spending this time today so nearby the roses, I have learned something new so that I can think about myself in a different way.

The Ballerina Rose grows on its OWN root.  It is not a rose that is grafted onto some other rose’s root not its own.  This means, as I’ve mentioned before, that unlike the grafted roses, the Ballerina can be reproduced from cuttings of itself.

As I pondered this difference between the roses I realized that all four of the ‘major’ love relationships I have had with men in my life were doomed to failure all for the same, single reason.  In relationship with each of these men I tried to graft myself onto THEIR root stock because I had no idea how to grow from my own root.

The first man I fell in love with when I was 18, the father of my firstborn child, was a California golden boy.  He was four years older than I was, brilliant, gorgeous  (beautiful tanned skin, sun-bleached blond hair, tall, well built), a popular playboy who knew how to party and enjoy himself, interact with other people, and came from a family with money.

The second man I met around age 20, the father of my second child, was also popular and well-liked.  He was calm and kind and gentle, dependable and a hard worker.  He had ‘roots’ around Fargo, North Dakota and I was convinced of two things:  He would be a wonderful father and I could stabilize my life by tying myself to him and his family as if he was my personal Rock of Gibraltar.

The third important man in my life I met when I was about 35.  He was Native American, and I thought he was ‘spiritual’.  I believed he was anchored into a heritage on this continent and with the earth that meant we could relate to one another from our souls.  He was ‘psychic’ and gifted in many ways, a Vietnam PTSD war veteran, but seemed to me wise and gifted.

The fourth man I met at the end of my 40s.  He is 17 years older than I am, has worked his same job for 55 years and has never left this small town area where he was born.  He seemed solid, wise and also stable and I counted on his perspective and insights on everything I ever chose to talk with him about.  I am still in love with this man though this relationship was obviously always doomed in terms of lack of commitment.

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I married and divorced the first two men.  None of these men are healthy and happy.  With the exception of the second man, the other three all came from very wounding childhoods.

But the lesson I am paying attention to today from the rose plants is that it wasn’t what I might have shared in common with any of these men that led to failed relationship.  I was looking in each case for a root I could attach and graft myself onto that represented what I felt I lacked within myself.  I was not growing from my own root as does the Ballerina Rose.

In my adult life I’ve never been able to ‘get away with’ anything or very long.  I don’t seem to have any kind of ‘luxury’ to fool myself, or wander very far down a ‘wrong road’.  It has been very difficult for me to realize that the abuse of my childhood meant that not only could I not grow my own branches out into the world, but I also had great difficulty growing my own healthy roots – MY OWN roots so that I would not have been misled into thinking I could ‘borrow’ from these men some part of THEIR life and being because I could not find what I needed in any other way.

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