At the edge.

I don't know why I am writing this; at least, writing it here. But here goes.

I am in Phoenix. He lives here. We had a fight, over a week ago. I was supposed to come visit the weekend before this; he had to cancel because he had to work. The argument on the phone culminated in him hanging up on me, and I have not heard from him since. I have called, emailed, sent text messages. Not a lot - no more than once a day. But no response.

He had said, just a couple of days before that, he could see making a life with me. And one fight changed all of that? How? Especially at our age? One day you want to build a life - the next day, one argument, and it's completely over?

So...here I am. Staying in a hotel a few miles from his apartment. I will soon get dressed in the outfit I wore on the first day I met him, and I will show up at his apartment. He may refuse to see me. I'm prepared for that.

If he does refuse, I've got plenty to keep me busy. Books, movies, I can write. I've got the hotel until Sunday, and if nothing else, it's good to get out of town for something besides a funeral. It's good to get out of my house for a bit - my normal walls, my normal life. It's good to be away, and just...be.

I don't know what the next 48 hours will hold. Maybe nothing in my life will change. Maybe everything will.

You can't do it alone.

What Goes Around...

Karma is a fun thing to say. “That’s karma for you!” we say when someone who experiences what appears to be punishment for past crimes. “Isn’t my karma any good?” we say to ourselves when bad things happen and we think we’ve been mostly good people. We want there to be some sort of divine justice in our world. We want it to make sense.

The fact is, like many made-up religious things, karma is make believe. It makes us feel better to think when someone hurt us, they’ll get some sort of punishment from the universe at a later date. The problem with this is: it’s not always true.

Plenty of people do plenty of bad, hurtful things - and get away with it. It might even look like they are extra-blessed after their misconduct. And we also need to remember that even if they do go through something bad in their life further down the road, it doesn’t really fix what that person did to you.

Instead of believing the very fallible “what goes around, comes around” philosophy, we need to learn to practice something that is so easy to say, and so hard to do: let go.

It is so hard to let go. I get it. I am in the midst of trying to let go of a few painful things myself. It would help if I knew those who hurt me were hurting a little too. I admit I’d probably feel some satisfaction. But the thing is: those people are not in my life anymore (either by their decision, or mine). The only thing left for me to do is to let go.

Would it really take away the pain of being rejected and abandoned by him if I knew some other woman did the same thing to him? Would it really ease the sting of loneliness if I knew her new best friend dumped her, too? I suspect not as much as I think it might.

So instead of perpetuating the myth of karma, I am advising others - and myself! - to just…


Let.

It.

Go.

Breathe through the pain, remember to smile with gratitude at the good times, and when hurt lingers longer than it should: let it go.

Into the fire

Ok, maybe that title is a little dramatic. But, then again, maybe not.

I was thinking this evening how strange and sad it is that we can forget some really big, important life lessons. Last fall when I was first separated, I dated a guy who told me about this book called Daring Greatly. Things with him and me did not work out, but just that one thing was quite valuable.

I thought I could do it - be brave enough to be vulnerable. And here I am, on the edge of returning to a different man - I can't really call it a relationship, as I'm not sure that's what it ever was - but returning to a man I enjoyed immensely, and a situation that I am scared of entering for a number of reasons.

We didn't have a good start; we both acknowledge that. There are various reasons for that, valid reasons, but yes, it was painful for me.

I want to get past that, and I'm trying. I don't think he ever meant to, or wanted to, cause me pain. I was in a vulnerable place relationship-wise, and he was in a personally vulnerable place. Pain was on the menu and we didn't even know it, because we didn't really know one another and quite obviously didn't trust each other. It was just too new for that.

But I have learned a lot about me, in these last several months. About what I want and need, what I'm capable of.

And I believe in the possibility of love. I know it exists; I've seen it. The lifelong kind, I've yet to experience, but I've observed. I still don't know if it's possible for me: not because men I am attracted to or fall in love with are incapable, but maybe, because I am. I don't want to believe that about myself, but I fear sometimes that it may be true.

Nevertheless, he wants to take a chance with me. And while I need a lot more than what he seems willing or able to give, I'm risking it, for now. I am not leaping, and I'm not diving, but I do want to get past more than just dipping my toes in the water.

I want to really, truly be involved. And I don't know if he'll let me, really. He says he wants that, but I still feel like there are mixed signals. I think if you want her, you leave no doubt in her mind. But it's also really very possible those are my doubts; not anything he's done or not done.

I want to be brave enough to be vulnerable, and I am trying so hard. I hope he understands and appreciates my effort. I want to know, and to be known.

Never ever

If I believed in God, maybe this would all be easier. Maybe not - but, maybe so.

If I believed in him, I suppose I'd believe I would see her again. I'd see her, and my mother, and my dad. And all those people I miss so much.

But I don't. And I won't. The last time I saw my grandmother is probably the last time I'll ever see her. I'll never hold her, kiss her, watch her fall asleep in the big chair again. I'll never again see the look of delight in her eyes when she was happy or excited about something.

Does she know how much I love her? Does she know what I remember?

I remember when she came to babysit a chicken-pox-ridden Joey for a week so his dad and I wouldn't have to miss work. I remember her coming out here to New Mexico, from Illinois, on a day's notice to take care of Joey and Quent so I could honor my bedrest for Aaron to not be born too soon. I remember the year she bought us tires for our car, when we couldn't afford it. I remember the gift she gave me when I graduated college, something I didn't even know still existed: a photo of my mom and dad and sisters, all of us together. I remember all the times after my mom died when I sat and cried, and she found me and held me. I remember crawling into her bed when I was too scared to sleep alone. I remember taking her to Wendy's, to see Joey at work. I remember my 40th birthday, when she got me a cake for an impromptu party.

I remember her getting mad at me for making out with a boy in a car outside our house at 1 a.m. I remember the awful arguments we had when I was young and naive. I remember her canning and freezing and making pies and teaching me to bake and feeding my body and soul.

And I remember rushing home when she was first sick, fearing she wouldn't live through the weekend. I remember holding her hand for hours, certain she was leaving us. And I remember the grief she went through losing her second child, my favorite uncle.

And I know that her belief in seeing her beloved husband, her children, her family and friends who have already died, is bringing her comfort. And I am as glad of that as I am sad that it won't actually happen.

And I am so very, very said that she is nearly gone, and that I will never, ever see her again.

The best thing I've read in awhile

Courtesy of an Aussie friend of mine:

"I wouldn't cross the road to piss in your mouth if your teeth were on fire" followed by a chest poke and a breezy threat to bang their wife as I stroll of to whatever is next.

Now, if only I can remember to use it (or modify that last part to suit my circumstances).

Missed, or missing.

These things don't happen in real life...they happen in a movie. And yet, apparently, it happened to me.

He flew here, to my city, for the sole purpose of seeing me. I did not acknowledge him; I was seeing someone new, and honestly? He had hurt me. I wasn't interested in being hurt again.

But now he says he always wanted me.

And the other one? It turned out he wasn't kind at all.

Life is strange.

Intestinal Fortitude - or lack thereof

"Does it hurt more when I press on it, or more when I let go?" the doctor asks, probing his lower right belly. He winces.

"When you let go," he says quietly. She gently performs a few more diagnostic tests on his body, and he stays quiet the entire time.

The room we are in, a triage room, has a door to the outside. I can't quite figure out where we are in this labyrinth of medical facilities - rooms full of people and gurneys, tears and antiseptic, anxiety and immodest gowns. It's windy outside; the door keeps opening and closing slightly - a strange thing for a pediatric emergency exam room, I think. Later when the surgeons visit, even they comment on it. We all have a small laugh at the absurdity of a faulty door to the outside world in this seemingly private place.

Before long, we're told that yes, it's appendicitis, and surgery will happen very soon. Tonight or tomorrow. The surgeons appear to tell us exactly how they'll do the surgery - where the cuts will appear, and what the risks are. My son doesn't hear the "good parts." He hears that his body will be broken into, that there are some Very Important Organs near the Thing they want to remove, and all the things that can go wrong.

He sheds a tear when they leave. He is scared.

I've spent so much time in hospitals with his brother that it's hard to scare me anymore. I have a lot of trust and faith in these people who care for my babies, nearly always so, so well. But seeing him cry, well: that is another matter. That is my son, my tall-as-me, so independent and self-sufficient 14-year-old son, suddenly small again. And afraid.

That is what kills me. I put on a brave face and tell him it's ok to be scared. I promise he will be absolutely fine, but being afraid is normal. I tell him he'll be asleep, and how lucky we are that we caught it so early.

And the minute I step out into the waiting room, knowing he is in a room full of people who know exactly what they are doing - but do not know HIM - I start to cry.

When He touches her

“Come upstairs,” He said. He knew what she wanted, what she needed. She rose and followed him obediently. What precisely awaited, she was never quite sure. All that she knew was that it would fix her tonight, and somehow He knew the formula. He took care of things. He took care of her.

What would it be tonight? Would it be slow and gentle, melting into her curves, gentle licks on her nipples, stroking her hair? Would it be reaching between her legs to feel the hot wetness, slowly stroking her until she begged?

Would it be hard and fast, primal, animal, almost angry, filling her with life and drama and erasing the tangled mess in her mind of her fucked-up day? Would He enter her within minutes of access to the body He adored and desired?

Or would it be creative, taking His time with the ropes, slowly, limb by limb, one body part at a time, making her His beloved charge, and taking her as wholly as He wanted her, as she was unable to do anything but receive the pleasure He knew how to give perfectly, completely? 

Or would it just be…quiet? Touching. Stroking. Nothing sexual, but wholly intimate in a way that almost made her weep, recalling it later.

Any of those things, all of those things, were part of a life she was learning to enjoy, to feel she deserved. And it mattered that all of those things were with Him. Not with anyone else. Him.

Strange and funny, charming and weird, difficult and desirable: He was a different kind of thing, of relationship, of life, than she had ever known. And oh, she was scared. But hopeful and happy and strong enough to know that whatever the future held, and however long or short it lasted, this will have been worth it.

A weird envy.

In reading a book that I've been reading for far too long (it's a long book), I realized something: it's not uncommon for people in relationships to be jealous of their partner's wholly separate interests or passions.

I admit that when I was younger, I was guilty of this. I wanted to part of my significant other's life in every aspect. I didn't want him to have significant things that I wasn't a part of. And honestly, I think that feeling was mutual. But that relationship eventually ended, and in my next one, we had some wholly separate passions. And it was good. I did not envy the time he spent away from me on his interests, because it allowed space and time for me to either a) pursue my own or b) just be me. That relationship ended as well, but the space and discrete interests were one of the more successful elements of that coupling.

I understand a passion for something can become an exclusionary thing - and that it can be purposefully so. It can be a reason to be absent when you desire the absence instead of confronting difficulties. But it doesn't have to be that. It is just a thing your partner likes, and you do not share.

That doesn't mean you can't appreciate your partner's passions in some capacity; I think it's good to encourage them and to at least talk about it, if not experience it once in awhile, with them.

But jealousy? Nope, that's not for me, and hasn't been for a long time.