Month: September 2019

Earlier this summer I realized just how much I’d been exhausting myself by holding onto relationships that were no longer any good for me. I was overworking myself for shit pay in a toxic work environment, and generally just doing the most for those that did the absolute least for me.

About a year and a half ago I wrote on this blog that I felt fearful of losing my instinct to fight and curse the world around me. I remember laughing as I typed this. It was posted on March 15th 2018- which means it was only a week or two before Jeremiah and I moved into our house in Auburn. I was in such a strange head space. Living with a guy who was constantly telling everyone I was someone who I wasn’t. It started out with small comments that seemingly had no origin. I felt like my character was constantly under attack. I used to tell him all the time, “make up those things about yourself- not me.” March 15th 2018 was just a week after my 27th birthday- which means I hadn’t yet found out the huge lie he had told his family about me.

I bring up the past only because it now has me slapping my knees with laughter. My instinct to fight and curse the world around me had never subsided, it had merely been suppressed while I instead focused and struggled just to remember who I am.

My instinct to swim was awoken the night he drunkenly destroyed our home. Broke in the master bedroom door, put out the cigarette he’d been smoking on our mattress. Poured a beer on me, then threw our mattress down the stairs. I left that night, laughing at myself. Laughing at myself for not having the left first time. “Yep, that’s it.” I muttered as I turned right at our mailbox, “I’m not doing this ever again.”

I returned the next morning while he was working, to pack up my things. He was always so proud of having been able to provide me a “craft room”- the same room I later used as my own storage room while I found a new place to live.

I responded to a rental ad on a Monday. I went to see it on a Wednesday, signed a 5 month lease on Friday, and then moved in on Saturday. Swimming. I returned to the same shit job on Monday. “Next up,” I told myself “new job.”

The Friday I was fired, I’d seen it coming since Tuesday. “This isn’t working anymore.” The owner’s cousin told me in the conference room on Friday morning. “Yeah, it never really has.” I laughed as I traded my office key for my final paycheck.

I responded to a job ad on a Monday, for something I wasn’t sure I was qualified for. I interviewed on Tuesday, and I laughed back down the stairs to my car, “nailed it,” I smiled as I turned my car key in the ignition. I was offered the job on Wednesday. I start on Monday. Swimming.

Next up, my dream home.

“I am the master of my fate and the captain of my soul.”
-William Ernest Henley

I’ve been putting off this topic because I haven’t been able to think of a less dramatic synonym for “heartbreak”. It sounds debilitating. Day darkening, life shattering, breath shortening. None of which I’ve experienced recently.

I made a choice this summer to end a meaningful relationship because I wasn’t able to grow within it. My time and energy began to shift, focusing only on how I could help (ultimately, force) him to become a better person for each of us.

Immediately afterwards, I found myself in a natural groove of laughs and affection and safety of essentially a stranger, whom I’d felt I known forever. A love I felt urgently and purely, yet again, a love I could never grow within.

Being deprived of something that I want, for reasons out of my control. It’s not a heartbreak; but it’s discomfort on a high scale.

I’d been made accustomed to lies and deceit. Fibs turned into stories, stories turned into an alternate reality. A web of lies I’m still separating myself from, months later. And I’m not mad; anymore. I cannot spend another minute being angry. I feel nothing but gratitude. Grateful that I can recognize who I am from who I’ve been. Grateful for the knowledge that none of my experiences there were honest- has been key to my ability to continue foward.

I’d never compare the two; it would be comparing beaches to mountains.

I was picked up and built up, repaired by the hands of a stranger. He restored my ability to love, and wiped away the weakness from my eyes. He set my crown on straight and reminded me the world is mine for the taking. A love so pure, and so honest, I cannot kick myself for wanting to live there.

“In the end, only three things matter: how much you loved, how gently you lived, and how gracefully you let go of things not meant for you.”

The first time I told a stranger the tale of you, was only weeks after it all ended. I kept the tears back with the crutch of a beer. I stood in his backyard just hours after meeting him, and avoided meeting his eye contact as I explained the beginning of my summer. I’d told the same story before, to my parents, and to my cousins, and to my bestfriends- but not yet to anyone that couldn’t guess the ending before I began. “So yeah,” I let my hair fall in my face before I quickly drank the remainder of my beer. “That’s what happened to my relationship.”
Without a word, he was on his feet, wrapping his arms around my shoulders. “Oh honey. That’s awful. I’m so sorry that happened to you.”

What happened between us, didn’t happen to me, it happened for me. I knew my solution, to your problem, very early on in our relationship, but I chose to love you instead.

The last time I told the tale of you, I was sitting on my feet, on the edge of my bed, with my bong between my knees. I was in pajama shorts and a flannel. It was 3am, and all the windows and doors were open. I was facing the boy I’d just brought home from the bar. “So that’s my deal,” he sat up briefly to pass me the lighter. “How’d you end up all the way out here?” He leaned back, adjusting the pillows on my bed.
“Well,” I began as I pressed my finger into the half burned bowl and flicked the lighter.

Now it feels just like explaining the plot line of a Netflix series I’d been binge watching. You could guess the disgusting ending, but the beginning was so beautiful, you’d think there’s no way it could end so terribly- I told myself for 3 years.

“Wow.” he raised his eyebrows. “That’s awful.”
“Fuck, right?” I laughed, as I passed the bong back across the bed. “But now it’s all over, and now I get to be here!” I sat back and spread my arms out as I looked across my new place. “My little house on the prairie.”