Swing Your Partner Round and Round

I pause mid-day for this short expression, knowing (hoping) it will be brief and probably murky in content. I often get images in my mind of movie scenes ripped from context but apt in adaptation of absurdity, and more. I often come up with phrases of words at the end of a string of ruminations.

“Swing your partner round and round…do-ci-do…” came to mind just now…and then…a scene from a great film called Big Fish.

Divorce is a death.

It is the death of dreams, and the death of the normal functioning that most people desire in life that comes through partnership.

I think of middle school dances and college square dances.

I think of awkwardly looking around for a partner, and sitting along a wall.

I think of commentary some man made concerning my appearance in braids and jeans at an Inter-Varsity square dance I invited him to, with the partial purpose of converting him to the Christian Faith back around 1982 or 1983.

I think of how marriages devolve, and two people who intend to be life partners and best friends start swinging and jerking the other around, so-to-speak, and before too long such damage is done that it is beyond repair. They are partners out of tempo with one another, and out of step with God’s design for marriage.

A person who isn’t in step with God cannot be in step with one’s life partner. And even those who seek God may find themselves unequally yoked in essential ways that are required for a good, loving, quality partnership.

I think of middle aged women and men who dare hope for a second chance at love, hope and dreams, and how very difficult that is, because it is true: God hates divorce. And with divorce, comes unavoidable baggage. It takes even more hard work to swing your partner round and round (in the best way that phrase means) when there are various things in one’s hands and new weights on one’s feet.

But, God hates many things and the death of marriages happen. Some call “time of death” while others remain in the condition of deadness in the relationship that God intended to be the most life-giving, intimate human connection.

Round and round and round go we all–whether married, single, divorced or in some “other” condition (I leave space here for the variety of “other” relational conditions that likely fall quite short of keeping step with God’s intentions for humankind…)

I’m not quite sure I can articulate what I’ve thought during the last 20 minutes here, or the past year, or three, or ten, or twenty, or thirty…or forty for that matter…

This expression lies somewhere between “Swing your partner round and round…” and “Woe to the one who falls when there is no one to help them up…” (Ecclesiastes 4:10)

Thanks for reading. I hope the video makes some reader smile, pause, eyeroll…remember the film if they’ve seen it…or…maybe look it up, if not. It’s a great film, with a variety of engaging scenes and potential takeaways.

Now, back to work, anxiety, and whatever it is that I’m doing here.