KNOWING

I’ve always been an avid ABBA fan. Even during the ’80s and ’90s when disco supposedly sucked and a Swedish pop group was deemed too sugarcoated compared to Morrissey and, later, grunge, I had ABBA tunes bopping about in my brain. While songs like “Mamma Mia” and “Take a Chance on Me” were happiness injections, “Knowing Me, Knowing You” had a jarring sadness, a reminder that sometimes a crash follows a sugar rush. The song is especially melancholic for me because, in 1977, I heard a Toronto radio station play it immediately after breaking the news that Canada’s Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau and Margaret Trudeau were separating.

 

Knowing me, knowing you,
There is nothing we can do;
Knowing me, knowing you,
We just have to face it, this time we're through.
Breaking up is never easy, I know, but I have to go.
Knowing me, knowing you, it's the best I can do.

 

For me, there’s something that gets lost in translation regarding the lyrics. Based on my many trips to Sweden, it’s clear the Swedes are remarkably proficient in English, but Duolingo has also led me to believe they’re also big on melancholy. When introducing vocabulary for feelings such as happiness (lycka), anger (ilska) and sorrow (sorg), the language app makes sure a beginning language learner knows “det svenska vemodet” (the Swedish melancholy). I’ve practiced the phrase so many times online but, fortunately, not during visits. If it’s truly a Swedish thing, I suppose that explains why knowing one another can be construed as a sad endpoint.

 

Not being truly Swedish (despite my wishes), I quibble with the sentiment. 

 

Yesterday I woke up, got dressed and grabbed lattes for Evan and me at the café on the corner. The barista was cheery, her tone giving me a lift equal to the anticipated double shot of espresso. I returned to Evan’s home and joined him on the bed, the two of us grabbing our phones to check news, messages and pics of acquaintances posing by Trevi Fountain, smiling while having a pint at a pub or showing the carnage remaining from a chew toy a beloved pooch destroyed in record time. 

 

Monday, Schmonday. It would be a good day.

 

Then I saw the subject line of an email from a family member and I knew the good in the day was gone. I read the email aloud and Evan knew this too. He hugged me, he helped me take regular breaths. Deep breathing wasn’t possible, but the goal was to guide me past an anxiety attack when air seemed entirely unavailable, when crashing to the floor and flailing would scare us both. 

 

It doesn’t matter what was in that email. What matters is Evan knew why it would be so significant. He knew his steadiness would help see me through. He knew what to say, what not to say. He knew me.

 

The previous morning, he’d awakened to his own uncertainties, his mind stuck in the clutter. I listened as he unpacked many topics. I listened and waited for my moment. I empathized. I related my own connections. I offered what I could in terms of hope, encouragement and maybe a small step or two forward. It helped him recall one of his favorite expressions: “You eat a whale one bite at a time.” (Never mind that I’m a staunch vegetarian and the image can be rather frightful; I imagine an extra-large bowl of fettuccini with marinara sauce. Yes, then, one bite at a time.) He startled me later that day when he thanked me for being there and being a support. It had all felt so natural. I guess I just knew what he needed.

 

After twenty months together, we’ve reached a state of knowing one another. We’ve experienced challenges as a couple and as individuals who can lean on and learn from one another. 

 

Once I’d tackled the initial drama from the email, Evan listened to a phone conversation while in another room. When it ended, he was by my side again, listening, validating, just checking in. I’m an exercise fanatic and Monday is the day I allow my body to recover, but he said, “You need to go for a run.” My mind might have spun more on the email, on the subsequent conversation, on the possible future dramas that could play out in the coming days, weeks and maybe—dear god—years. He knew that sort of “spin class” could wait.

 

Just run. 

 

One of his favorite observations: “You’re always happier after a run.” (No carnivorous reference in that statement, whew.) 

 

I ran; he did yoga. Then he made a gourmet lunch—shakshuka, his plate with an egg on top, mine without, everything flavored with the right spices and the perfect heat level. It was another form of knowing, our sit-down meal as intimate as anything we’ve experienced together.

 

Sorry...I can't explain it.

It was clear the day was a write-off in terms of my writing goals. I packed up my car and made the three-hour drive back to Vancouver which always takes me between five and six due to fuel stops (gas and caffeine) and grocery searches for items I can’t get in Canada. (Bean dip is a guilty pleasure dating back to days of watching televised football games in Texas. (Everything about the preceding sentence sounds so foreign!)) 

 

When I walked in my condo, there was a message from Evan, checking in, and then a FaceTime call so he could see me and confirm I was all right. Yes, the guy knows my fake smile, knows when my voice inflections are off and knows how the slightest diversion of the eyes belies any indication of thumbs up. I’ve always known I have no poker face but, damn, that guy has a way of going beyond calling my bluff.

 

Yes, he knows me. I know a thing or two about him, too.

 

When I hear that ABBA line, “Knowing me, knowing you, it’s the best I can do,” I feel that’s the ultimate. 

 

Melancholy, schmelancholy.