never can say goodbye

every once in a while i get misty blue over the demise of my relationship. i have a tendency to jump into a shame spiral and then i conciously grab my "self" from the ride and focus on what i've won over this summer. see, i never thought i'd fall in love. seemed beyond impossible that someone would want to be with me and treat me like a woman. show me how first love for two people is so intimate, unyielding and magical. there were moments where i wanted it to be like the way it was, forever. i felt empowered, more feminine, i felt incredibly loved. he was the first man i could completely trust to have my heart. immediately after the breakup i tried not to show too much bravado. i didn't want to display a false sense of bravery. a break up means your are broken, pieces of your irreplaceable but, they make more. i have to take a beat and thank him; im a stronger woman today than i ever thought i could be. if he claims i made him into a man, i can say without blinking, he made me in to a woman.

from last month's O Magazine -
"Mourning teaches us how to accept the end of love and helps us start the process of feeling whole again. True, the self you get back is never quite the same as the self you relinquished to your relationship; although wounds can heal, they leave scar tissue. But there's more to gain than just surviving the breakup; there's also the possibility of becoming more than you were, more able to undertake the experience of love in its moments of sadness as well as joy. As with any art or skill, the only way grieving can be learned is through practice -- whether we like it or not."

there's not one day that goes by that I dont think about that part of my life. deep impact. i was cleaning my kitchen and picture upon picture came tumbling out of a cabinet of "us". there's the pic from hawaii where we walked the shore just past midnight. sure, we look happy, content. that picture didn't know that just a week later we'd begin a hellish 6 months of unraveling what we'd become. photobooth photos. where there was a photo booth, we were immortalized and immortal. me always sitting on his lap, him pressing his head against my cheek, shoulder or chest, dazed, confused, in awe. my smiles - big wide and proud. we have pictures of us on vacation, hiking, kissing, laughing. pictures of us drunk, stumbling around, grasping towards each other. theres videos of us in mexico celebrating the New Year wildstyle, us in hawaii chasing after roosters, talking to strangers while lounging in the surf. hiking up in Santa Barbara, staring at deer, me on the back of his motorcycle going where ever he would take me. the photos, you line them up, one by one, organized by date. when you get to the end...that's what it looks like: the end.

everyone of those stupid cliches i held onto from the time i was a child, came about naturally in the course of us being together...the cooing, the sickening affection, the emotion, the arguments, the pain...we just did the whole 360. neither one of us wanted to do it again. i grew up in a family where you don't divorce, you dont' leave, you endure. i wouldn't want him to endure for me, and vice versa unless we both really wanted to. i had to step out of myself and realize, sometimes you dont need to win all the races.

i miss my friend.

i will never not miss my friend. no one will ever be able to replace that loss. many can try, surely many will. i've had my fun this summer, this blog testifies to that. but one always gets nervous when they desire love and affection. can it happen again? will it? should i lock myself in a fortress and pretend it doesn't exist? become queenbaby and eschew efforts to find it, receive it...

im not obsessive, but then i go - does he think about me? does he blame me for much? was it inconsequential? a girl could go crazy thinking these thoughts day in and day out.

which is why i try to limit that thinking and focus on what's gained. a new sense of self. if i want to be the great wife, the desired companion, the madonna AND the whore...i need to focus on being the best at being with just me.