The forest creature told me about relationships.

I don’t know if it’s true. But a forest animal came to my room at night this weekend—I don’t know how forest animals are getting into my house, but they are, and they speak to me—and told me how relationships work.

The way that the raccoon explained it was this.

There are two ways of being in a relationship—whether it’s a marriage, or long-term partnership, or whatever it is. Maybe it’s like what Tim Robbins and Susan Sarandon have.

The raccoon didn’t know those two broke up. I was not about to tell him about it. I didn’t want to have that mess on my hands.

But in a relationship, you can be an Ernie, or you can be a Bert.

The distinction is based on the popular Muppets, also known as “puppets,” who are named Bert and Ernie. They appeared on the television show Sesame Street.

Ernie and Bert, the raccoon explained—as if I did not grow up watching those puppets—are something like polar opposites. Bert is rigid and prefers order. Ernie is a loose, perpetual source of disorder.

Take this clip from YouTube, in which Ernie and Bert go fishing:

[This is where I would put a YouTube link to the video, but I don’t know how to make that work on SquareSpace. They say this is an easy service to use, but that’s a lie. It’s really confusing. I looked up instructions for embedding video, but what they told me to do didn’t work, and I don’t have time to pursue it further.]

Ernie is causing a gentle sort of havoc, and Bert has to deal with it. It’s what they’re all about.

And, said Raccoon Meredith Jones, this is what relationships are like. When you’re in a partnership of some kind, you’re either an Ernie or you’re a Bert. You either wander around your home and have thoughts and say things that challenge the people around you, usually in a fun way, like Ernie does, or you’re the one who stands by and tries to manage everything, the way Bert does.

Needless to say, at the moment I heard this, I thought it was ridiculous.

But the more I thought about it, the more I saw wisdom in what was whispered into my ear that night. R.M. Jones, as he insisted I call him, implored me to think of all the people I have known, and try to figure out which of them are Berts and which are Ernies in the relationships they have.

And I’m pretty convinced, now, that he was right. In this life, you’re either a Bert or an Ernie.

Every two-person relationship doesn’t need to have both one and the other. You can thrive in a relationship if you’re both Berts or you’re both Ernies. Of course you can. But it might help you get through this life to understand that that’s what’s going on. That you don’t have the option of being Dr. Teeth, or the Joni Mitchell Muppet he hangs out with. You can’t be a different kind of puppet.

As for me, I am the Ernie of my marriage. I may not have a rubber duckie, but I do have this computer.

I use to write blog posts.