Saturday, January 1, 2011

Don't carve me out

don't let your silly dreams...
fall in between
the cracks of the bed and the walls"- My Morning Jacket

I have tried not to acknowledge the sentiment of another year closing, because the holidays felt as if they belonged to everyone else this year. My chorus of another year down, resolutions, all of that jazz would be drowned out. And lately, I like the feel of being drowned out, laying low, sitting and watching the wheels go by. I dont have as much to say to those around me because if 2010 taught me anything, it is that I have so much to learn, and that is a neverending process. I still have too many overwhelming, unanswered questions in my heart. I'd rather read and look and listen.

Christmas this year was almost surreal. I watched it happen around me and I never jumped in to feel any of it. I did however find myself utterly heartbroken on Christmas Eve that I do not have the happy home that I have wanted to refind for the last five years. The home that finds me settled, and making plans without fear the bottom is about to drop out. The home where I can mother my children the way that I want to, hang pictures, and paint walls, and host parties and see a future ahead. I cant see clearly past the smoke of everything that has burned down around me...still. My home is packed in boxes, waiting for me to find my way out. I remember that optimistic, fearless woman I was. I did love like I have never been hurt, brazenly infact, and now that five years have passed I wonder where exactly I became so fearful and dyfunct. A fragile balance of fear and fearlessness to try, to put myself out there, to hope, to trust. Lonely and grieving somedays that I am going to bed, and waking up alone. I am not grounded without a partner. And then other days I find power and joy in being my own person, making my own happiness, and drinking in the goodness that is my life, thankful that I dont have to touch the ground if I dont want to.

This weakness in my resolve makes me literally nauseous and disgusted. I dont know many people living a love dream. I see realitites full of mistrust, boredom, you name it..but they stay where I have chosen, and continue to choose, to leave. I could have just stayed with Bill and worked through the death and aftermath of his cheating...and we would be in a large beautiful house, with nicer cars, vacations, retirement...I would have built on my signature holiday dishes, and hosted dinner parties the last five years instead of being wasted in bars, dating to no avail. Free. But had I stayed I would have been silently dying a million little deaths and replaying internal dialogues with myself about having the balls to get out. I got out, and jumped from the frying pan into the flames. Mom warned me, and I didnt listen.

I chose freedom over safety, and it has been a hellish storm all the while. I still choose the sometimes excrutiating path of freedom over committing to mistakes that would eventually lead to those million little deaths of an unhappy marriage. To be alive is to feel it all, and I do. Every moment that stole my heart deep in love, and every moment that broke it.

I dont know if I have it all wrong, and that I just dont try hard enough to make things work...or if I am going to find something really great on the other side of this someday and all the hurt will be worth it...because I did not settle. I used to believe fervently in love.

I dont know what I believe now. I just know that I am in the middle place, bored with the novelty of being hot, bored with going out, stunted by single and all the gratuitous social bullshit I fill my voids with trying to find what I want.

If I lived in a world free of spirituality, and beautiful music, and words strung together in a masterpiece...I might forget that I ever believed, and never be taunted by it again. I could move on and let go, and just settle and settle down. But I'm not built that way. My heart waxes to the point of discomfort in the saturation of a pure love song, and in a first kiss, and I am trapped again in my hopelessly hopeful search. And its so silly, and it's more of a ridiculous dream at this point than a reality, but I dont want to be logical and let love fall between the cracks of the bed and the walls. If I did, what the fuck have I gone through all of this for?