Saturday, July 28, 2007

Week One of The Padded Cell


Great Skellig Island, Ireland 1977



I told you I would love you forever.

People keep telling me to date, but the thought makes me physically ill. Being with someone other than Andy makes me want to curl up in bed and cry. I realize that everyone will say this is because its only been a week, but it has been a week. I've always been able to get over things fairly quickly, moreso than most. And yet I feel no better than I did on Monday, only with less tears and thats only because my tear ducts are basically dry. There's a space in me that he used to occupy that is now empty.

I miss sleeping in his bed, I miss his smell. I wear his shoes just so that there's some part of him around me. I miss his laugh. He calls it companionship that he misses most. I just miss being that comfortable with someone. I miss being able to reach over and brush his hair off his forehead......or play with it when it was wet. To lay on his chest and hear his heart beat. To fall asleep next to him and know that I was completely and totally safe. Is that just companionship? I don't know.

Meg

Thursday, July 26, 2007

The Inner Workings Of A Crazy Girl


Olympic National Park, Washington, 1984


Stop telling me I'll be okay. What if I won't be? What if I will? The advice of others is appreciated but there is such a thing as overkill. So whether I'll be okay or not is up to me, and I will decide when I've reached that point. But for right now, I'm not. I'm sad, I'm upset.

God, there are times when I understand completely, it makes perfect sense to me. Everything falls into place, I see the light at the end of the tunnel. And then there are those times when I shake my head and say "This makes absolutely no sense at all! What happened? In what universe did I agree to this? How are either one of us happier with things put this way?" We sat in the floor holding each other, crying. You kept saying you should go and yet neither one of us could stand for you to get up and walk out the door. What part of that says "Yes this was the right decision."? "There are things that need to be worked out." "You need space, time to think apart." is what keeps being said. But that doesn't really make sense either. We were more comfortable and at home with each other than most people who have been together for years.

There is a piece of me missing now. Dramatic? Yes. And I am not a dramatic person, I tend to keep my distance from the dramatic. But I feel as though something has been taken from me and I can't find it. Something will happen during my day, and I'll want to tell him. Oh wait, but I can't. I'll think of a memory we made together and it feels like someone hit me in the stomach. I thought it was getting better, really I did. But instead I was just becoming numb to certain thoughts and so now I'm coming up with new ones and they hurt just as much. I'll hear a song he sang and it hurts. I'll see a motorcycle and it hurts. I'll drive down a certain street, or pass a certain restaurant, or I'll think of something he said or did.

I keep trying to control forces that are not mine to control. I keep thinking if I say or do something then maybe it'll change something. But then I have nasty little thoughts like "Has he stopped loving me? Oh God, what if he has? What if we're really over, what if we're really never going to be together again." And I know I can't change it, I know there's nothing I can do. I'm not trusting him. Which might have been part of my problem all along, not trusting him as much as I should have, as much as he deserved.

And so, if all I'm left with is the memories of what we had and the promise of what could be a great friendship then I should count myself lucky. I should count myself lucky for a lot of things. But right now, I'm sad. I miss him. I miss him so much it hurts like a constant toothache. I can't sleep yet, there's a big empty spot in my bed where he should be. And so I miss him, and I'll keep missing him for a while.

Stop telling me I'll be okay.

Meg

Monday, July 16, 2007

Complacency Is Not The Answer


Ilan, Taiwan 1993

This is mainly directed at you. Yes you. I know you don't understand why I am the way I am most of the time and believe me that is completely.....well.....understandable. And so because it is so hard for me to explain in person, let me explain in words.

Growing up in the family I did, you learn very quickly we are not the type of people who share feelings very well. So instead we just smile and say "Nothings wrong" because its much easier than getting involved with a bunch of messy emotions. We usually think out our problems ourselves. I never remember my parents talking about their problems, nor do I remember my brother or sisters doing it, therefore I don't do it, and when I do I feel awkward and stupid. I feel like a whiny girl who is weighing you down with my problems. A lot of the time I feel as though the things that are bothering me don't make any sense and so I just don't talk about them and I wait until they go away.

Being raised by Becky didn't make things much easier seeing as her personal slogan was "Suck it up." She taught me that a strong person doesn't whine about the petty things in life, they get over them quickly and worry about more important things, like bills and college. And so there is another reason as to why I don't talk about things that are bothering me.

You said that things are perfect for me. That is absolutely not true. I just don't let things get to me very often, and if something does I have a tendency to get over it within a matter of moments. Its years of training that you've just happened to witness right now.

If there is ever something seriously wrong I do tell you, most of the time its just me being me, and its nothing. But I will try harder, when you ask me why I have a "look" I'll try to find out why and answer. Sometimes I really won't know and if I say nothing is wrong is not because I don't trust you. I do, more than I've ever trusted anyone, its probably because I can't find the words or because I don't know whats wrong. Please don't get frustrated. Don't lose hope, I will try. There will be bad days, there will be awful days. But the good days will be worth all of it.

Just wait.

Me.

Thursday, July 12, 2007

Sailboats and Paper hats


Crystal Lake, Vermont 1997

I'm sitting in the kitchen of a person I feel more at home with than my own roommates.

What is home? How do you know you're home? Is it just a place where you keep all of your possessions, or is it somewhere you know you belong? Because in that case why can't home be a person? These are all questions I've been asking myself as of late and I still haven't been able to answer any of them. Possibly because I don't want to know the answers.

Mistakes are something everyone makes, they're inevitable. You get in a rush to see what comes next in life and before you know it you've stumbled and spilled you're glass of Kool-aid. Oops! So how do you clean up something like that? There's no paper towels in life, no napkins, no mom to wipe up the tears. You have to be a grown up and do it all yourself. Ahh, there's the problem kids. The G-word. The one word we all hate hearing, the undeniable dirty word of adulthood. When you're a kid making a mistake is forgivable, but when you're a grown up making a mistake is something you're supposed to know better than to do. So what do you do? You own up, say you're sorry, clean it up as best as you can and walk on. Remember to keep that head up though. Can't let them see that smile faulter.

Meg