Posted on by She Never Sleeps

the heaviness

I started smoking again. Not like the pack I buy when I’m drunk just to have one cigarette and then toss out the other 19 several months later, after I find them sitting at the bottom of a switched out purse. No. It’s been 3 days and I’m down to 6 left.

My 10 yo told me I smelled like my chain-smoking grandmother’s house today. I should probably stop. But I also lied. I told he and his younger brother that it was just one cigarette and that I was only smoking because –

9: Because of him.

I stopped midsentence, unprepared for the straightforward comment from my baby. He wasn’t wrong. Lost in the graveness of that moment, I closed my eyes and concentrated on my breathing. I felt myself breaking. I couldn’t. Not in front of my boys. Especially not over someone they had only known maybe a month or so. It was too late. My heart had sped up, my cheeks felt flush and heated, slowly water creased my lids yet somehow fell with a quickness and often.

“Yes”, I barely muttered. “Because of him.”

As I wept, I explained the way of adults. Of how love is not always enough. Sometimes people have problems they need to sort through before they can be with someone else. I told them how you weren’t a bad person, you were smart, funny – Jesus, I was all of a sudden your PR rep. I told them that we loved each other, yes. We did. We loved each other and it made us both sad to not be together but that now was not a good time.

Then I saw my youngest boy, sitting next to me, silent but bothered, face pained, his own eyes welling up. Listening, nodding his head to indicate he understood, even if maybe he didn’t completely. Too young to understand the intricacies of addiction, but not too young to know his mother was heartbroken.

“Oh, no. No, love. Don’t cry.” I pulled him to me, still small enough to curl himself as close as he could without it being awkward, he did just that. “Oh baby, momma loves you so much. Don’t you worry about me, I’m okay. I’m only crying right now because love is sad sometimes. But that’s okay. I’m gonna be okay. This is just one sad day. And it had to happen, my love. I want to be the best momma I can be and I can’t do that if I’m with someone who has extra big problems. It’s okay. I’m okay.”

It’s okay. I’m okay.

It’s okay. I’m okay.

I know that this pain is temporary. All lost love is temporary. In some rare cases, it may linger. A faint echo of a familiar lullaby yet the name still cannot be placed. I also know that you will join a handful of names which the wind will whisper to me, like clockwork as it usually does, right before a storm. I know I’ll be nostalgic, maybe even a sharp stab of bittersweet sentimentality to cause me to flinch. I know that it hurts to let you go, but holding on will do so much more harm. I have been so afraid to walk away for fear of the loss, but to keep you has already proved much more detrimental.

I have been weighted and sunken, a cheap facsimile on autopilot has taken my place. No one knows where to find me, not even myself.

So, I’ve chosen to go searching for where I may have gone. Unfortunately, this is a rescue mission of One. I only hope one day that maybe you come looking for me, too.

After you have found yourself.

Posted on by She Never Sleeps

Lunch With You

We met for lunch.

I couldn't handle sitting in my apartment for one more second, piles of everything needing to be done, staring me down, sternly requiring my attention. I couldn't move. In a moment of desperation and loneliness, I asked if you were free.

You were.

I wasted no time, stripping my night clothes, jumping in the shower, attempting to wash away the hurt, the heartache, the heaving sobs. If I could have scrubbed the skin from my flesh, maybe that would help? 

   No. Morbid thought, though. And morbid thoughts always seemed to help me feel better with their absurdity.

I made short work of getting dressed and being on my way. I still had a schedule of sorts to keep. Time was a privilege, not a luxury. I arrived not too long after. You followed shortly, sat facing me. I felt calm.

There you were, my lifelong love. Everyone in our circle knew this. Relationships sometimes suffered because of it. The insecure ones demanded we cut contact, and we would. Every so often sneaking a message, an email, or phone call until a break-up would occur. The enlightened ones, very few and far between, understood albeit not without some reservations. Which was understandable. But through the years, with every old person out and new person in, there we were. Unfailingly available to the other if needed.

   And I needed you. Sometimes, I wondered if I would always need you. If there would come a point in my life when I'd hit an all too familiar low and I'd be able to traverse it all on my own. Sure, I had friends. Beautiful, amazing, strong, brilliant, and supportive friends. But they weren't you. They didn't know me the way you knew me. The way I knew you. We could bullshit everyone but never each other.

The dirty blond streaks in your hair were now dusty gray, Crows feet, laugh lines, age on both our ends. When did this happen to us? Older, more tired, not really any wiser, kindred spirits in our own fucked up, too smart for our own good, too blind to see the forest for the trees, kind of way. We didn't even talk too much, more eating and bitching about work than anything. But you were sitting across from me and it provided some comfort in an otherwise bleak and not so comfortable time.

We didn't stay long. Again... Time. You walked me to my car, gave a hug, and I broke down. I don't really remember when you last held me close like that. Yes, hello and goodbye hugs, sure. But this wasn't that. My world was crumbling and I didn't have one steady place to find footing. Vulnerable and broken, I sobbed into your chest as you held me tight. You gave me credit for never allowing cynicism to enter my soul, for continuing to keep my heart open to the possibility of love. My face, still pressed against you, didn't allow for much room when I spoke. Words, muffled and sad, "I really wish I was cynical. You broke me."

   You were the first person I ever genuinely fell in love with. That connection, that invisible tether never truly disappeared. This exchange was proof. I briefly recalled putting the last sturdy nail into the coffin of my already dead marriage by visiting you in the hospital years back. Or the fact that you once (or twice) claimed that you would drop everything to be there for me, if possible. You said it made you a dumbass. Yeah, well. Me, too. 

Eventually, I pulled away. You pulled me back. I cried some more. It was sunny and bright out, mid-afternoon, strangers going about their business pretending they didn't see the short woman bawling into the tall man. And as the tears set into your sweatshirt, as I gasped and exhaled short breaths, wishing I had never loved to begin with, I knew you were right.

   I had asked you earlier to tell me what to do. I have always done as I've pleased, regardless of consequence. This was a rare exception. I was so lost in the fog of my lovesick trauma I couldn't see what was right in front of my face. 

I finally left. We each had things to accomplish. Even if your to-do list was of the more mundane variety, the pursuit of all things Adult never stops. I thanked you for meeting me, all too aware that my weakly stated gratitude in no way expressed how appreciative I actually was.

Then I faced truth.

I knew that this break was actually a break-up. I had done enough crying and aching during the interim because of the Not Knowing. But now I knew. The man I let myself fall for, the man whom seemed to be at the epicenter of all the unrest, confusion, and my heart's disruption - I love him and I know I will always love him the way I have continued to love you. From afar and with the knowledge that they love me too. It's just not the right time and never will be. 

If I'm lucky, he will one day be just as an amazing friend as you have been, after we have let the years heal what it can. But I doubt it.

There is only One You.
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A Letter I’ll Never Send

Everything here is a reminder and I can’t get away. Your art is on my walls. The necklace you gifted stares at me from where it dangles. Your mug is in the cupboard. Your toothbrush lays exactly where you left it. Your flannel, the odds and ends, the mix cd of music which I cannot bring myself to listen to… all needle pricks to the still bleeding bits of me which mourn your absence.

I changed the bed linen, tears trickling slow, my soul weighted with the memories of the last time we slept together. But I cannot erase you just by switching out old sheets for new. You still take up residency in my fractured heart and I just do not have the strength to boot you out.

I wish So Hard that it didn’t have to be this way. But I am the 24/7 train, going and going and going. Making stops here and there, picking up, dropping off, brief moments of respite for maintenance and diagnostic checks.

And you… were a passenger. Who rightfully grew tired of the long never-ending hours.

I lean on my friends who hold me steady. Reminding me of all the work I’ve done on myself, the progress I’ve made. Refreshing my memory in the knowledge that I am not responsible for someone else’s journey, only my own.

I sit in the silence and the image of your smiling eyes pops into my head and pierces me… it’s okay. I’m used to it. I cry off and on in between moments of keeping busy so that I don’t think of you. Still. You manage to appear. Sometimes, I let myself be slightly angry. You said you loved me. You said you didn’t want to change anything about me.

But after a while, it was those things which you supposedly did not want to change that drove you crazy.

The outrage is minimal and short-lived because I know that in your heart of hearts, you are just a wounded man who needed more than I could offer. A man who hasn’t recognized his true worth and value as of yet. And I’m not the one who can give it to you. You equate someone’s need for you as love. Your usefulness as worth. Your people-pleasing as value. But you are so much more and God, how I wish you could see and accept that. That I loved and still love the man you managed to become despite the fact that Life tried to tear you apart from the get go. You are so many things… and maybe one day I’ll have the chance to be with you again to celebrate them all. But if I’m not the one, I truly hope that someone else can and will be. That thought is it’s own special kind of heart-breaking.

I miss you. Terribly. Though I will not say so to you. That would be cruel. So I will cradle this pain and hold it tight to my chest. I will keep myself busy. I will cry in between making the kids lunch and washing dishes. Because … I am capable. It’s what I do. You loved and loathed that, though. Didn’t you.

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The Hope

It’s uncomfortable. This place I’m in.

It’s new and not necessarily good or wanted. But it’s a place I chose because I knew in my heart that it was the right thing to do, even if it broke me to do so.

Leaving someone out of love is not easy and yes, that is an exceptionally large understatement. I’ve left before out of resentment and anger. Out of hurt. Out of indifference. And people have left me for similar varying reasons. It’s always been a negative and bitter departure no matter who was walking out the door. Yet never in my life have I loved a person so much yet knew deep in my heart that Now Is Not The Time. Never have I had to force myself to walk away before it turned down the road of complete chaos.

Leaving out of love for myself. Out of love for him. Realizing that if I stayed, the problems would not recede, they would only accumulate. Understanding that he needed the time for himself to truly figure out and heal the things necessary in order for him to thrive in any future relationship, whether it’s with or without me.

And there’s the rub. I hold out the slimmest sliver of hope that we find our way back to each other. I am not an idealist. I know the chances of that are ridiculously low. I may as well buy a lottery ticket. But I am an optimist, though a pained one currently. I have the improbable dream that he and I will come together again down the road, with the same amount of love and want as we did when we first found each other. Yet, there’s always the chance that with time, he eventually comes to the conclusion that perhaps I really wasn’t The One. Just because I was the First doesn’t mean I am the Only. I know this because I’ve been there. Not every love is the same. And maybe that’s why I had the foresight to remove myself. Learning from my experiences, not wanting to make the same mistakes, not wanting to tarnish something which was truly beautiful with the things we couldn’t quite manage to see eye to eye. I wanted to keep that love intact. Hoping that at some point, we would once again fall asleep in each other’s arms.

A girl can dream.

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Rebirth

It’s been a good long while since I’ve published anything to this journal. Not long after my last post, there was a pandemic followed by the very real separation from my ex husband. And to be honest, a year ago this time, I was NOT doing well.

A year ago this time, I was depressed, heart-broken, apathetic. I wasn’t eating, drinking a bit too much to escape the long hours of the night, knowing full well The Dread would still be there when I awoke, sober and unwell. I cried a lot, face splotched, eyes red and swollen, stopping only to start again. Screamed into the gaping maw of the abyss, wishing I could vanish into The Aether, disintegrate into the culminated quintessence of the outer realms.

And then there were the moments of passivity. The lethargy keeping me in bed, unbathed and indifferent to the outside world.

At those junctures, I sat with the grief. It was uncomfortable. It was loathsome. It broke me in new ways which I had not before encountered. Were it not for the care and compassion of my roommate, I probably would have made some decisions of the Not-So-Great variety.

Time trudged. Wounds bled. Sleep rarely came.

Currently, I write this feeling quite disconnected from that place I was in a year ago. Though it didn’t originally feel like it, it didn’t take too long for the clock to pick up the pace. Hours turned into days, days into weeks, etc., etc. I eventually came to accept that what I was mourning was The Potential of What Could Have Been, not What Was. And that no matter what I did, no matter how much work I put in, no matter what I would sacrifice – it would simply never Be. We were two diametrically opposed people when it came to what was necessary for us to thrive in a relationship, let alone a marriage. And I could only be responsible for my part, not his.

I threw myself into work, art, pool. Finding things to fill the empty spaces in my schedule. Soon, solitude seemed like this girl’s new best friend. I could not and would not be emotionally available for anyone. I was an island. A Remote, smack dab in the middle of treacherous waters, guarded by jagged rocks, full of poisonous fruit and wildly violent animals, Island.

To say I was at peace with this would be a marked understatement.

****************************************************************************************

Over the summer, I slowly dipped my toes back into the dating pool. I went out for dinners. Multiples were duds. I questioned my worth. I considered a nunnery. I did manage to find a couple people I liked and were all around decent humans, but there still seemed to be an emptiness within. I was content with this, though. My Island approach was perfect in keeping myself a safe distance from any usurpers to my Peace.

During this time, I reconnected with an old acquaintance whom I hadn’t really spoken to in years. We always had a mutual respect for each other and genuinely found one another pleasant to be around in group settings, but nothing truly out of the ordinary. I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t always felt drawn to his energy and person, but I knew nothing would ever come of that. A harmless personality crush of which I shoved to the back of my mind. And I knew nothing would come of it now as I was enjoying my life with zero romantic commitments or things of that nature. Bit by bit, we began to a build a real friendship which never had a chance to get off the ground because of life in general. There was an immediate comfortability, an unabashed openness in conversation, an exchange of the ups and downs we had both gone through in our lives.

A mutual understanding, empathy, and compassion for the traumas we suffered but survived. Devoid of pity or condescension. It was refreshing and ultimately freeing. No pretense, no facades, just two adults being straightforwardly earnest.

One day I woke up realizing… I had been usurped.

****************************************************************************************

It’s been a couple months now. I feel things with him that I never thought possible. A warmth, a genuine understanding of why I am who I am. We share knowledge of each other which has not been outwardly exchanged. Simply an unspoken comprehension of where we’ve been, what we’ve gone through, who we are at this very moment. I have never been as emotionally available and vulnerable as I am with him. Communication is constant and key. Neither one us has ever had the idealistic idiocy to believe in the romantic notion of “Love of My Life” but we cannot shake the kismet of our being together, considering the impressions we have made upon one another and all the ways we have come in and out of each other’s lives over the past decade.

“It was never the right time” is a phrase which comes and goes. We joke about the Universe and how we had to experience the things we did in order to find our way to This Place, where we both reside. We talk for hours and hours, late into the night, fighting through the bleary eyed arrival of sleepiness just to get in one last sentence. We are happy together, sad and “homesick” when we are apart.

It is all so vomit-inducing sappy.

I am okay with this. I am not who I was a year ago. I am new, I am open, I am reborn with all the enthusiasm and faith of someone who believes in Santa Clause and making wishes upon falling stars. I look forward to the future and whatever it may hold. I am in love with a person who loves Me. The Real Me, not the idea of or a projection of what they think I should be.

And it’s fucking beautiful.

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A banner year… Not really

I don’t even know where to begin. All of it seems almost surreal.

I’ve had friends die. Almost die. Find out they could die.
Hearts broken, relationships gone to shit, marriages end.

People I never thought I’d give a hundred and second chance, I’ve opened myself to again – hesitantly. Wearily. But with hope. Because I am a soft soul at my core and can’t help but think that there is a speck of good in everyone. That a tiny particle has the ability to grow and blossom if given the opportunity.

I’ve taken stock of the absurd, the unfortunate, the blind ignorance (and arrogance) of so many. I lose myself in contemplation often. I think too much. I always have, lately has not been any different.

I’ve finally come to accept that even if you’re direct and straighforward, others don’t necessarily feel the need to do the same.

Even if you give of yourself completely, that is not usually how another person operates.

That your own truth may not match the truth of someone else.

Sadly, I’ve also come to find that sometimes the best option is simply walking away. Not every battle is a war. That there will be moments in life when conceding defeat is a victory, even if it doesn’t seem that way at the time.

And right now, I really need to take that last part to heart.

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Splashes of People

Again, ruminating.

TLP – Transitional Living Program.

That’s what they called it. Before we could be trusted to be let out on our own (but still under the state’s supervision), before we could be even considered for an Independent Living Program, we had to prove that we were capable of being self-sufficient, functional, upstanding(ish) members of society.

We were in Wilson* House. Essentially a 4 unit apartment complex (each unit with 2 bedrooms, each bedroom had a bunkbed) which DCFS had given permission to rent out (i.e agreed to pay for) as a TLP for girls between the ages of 16-18. One unit was set aside for staff members to occupy, because after all, these girls were not yet trustworthy enough to be on their own. Anyway, the idea was to give the aforementioned wards a taste of adulthood and the accompanying accountability with which it came.

What it actually was… A 4 unit apartment complex with 12 teenage girls who gave zero fucks for rules and accountability.  A myriad of backgrounds, attitudes, gang affiliations, abuses, and overall baggage, not to mention raging fucking teenage female hormones – I carry the memories of that place with both hesitance and fondness. I could recount the numerous in-house rebellions, fights, and all the other related drama, but today I’m thinking of Aiesha.

Or “A” as she liked to be called. Understandably.  A couple years previous, the song, Iesha had been a huge hit and there’s only so many times a person can handle people rapping the same song again and again involving your name right at your face. In any case, A was the sweetest and funniest girl in that volatile environment. Such was her aura of genuine affability, not one person, staff or resident, ever had any ill thought or feeling against her.

I remember her tiny little body bouncing in, “Hey C!!!”, Backwards hat, oversized tee, basketball shorts, giant grin and smiling eyes. She was swimming in her tomboy clothing, but that was the style then and to her, it came natural. I liked her. I was sincerely fond of A’s happy-go-lucky demeanor despite the fact that she was in the same madhouse as the rest of us, sullen and sulking, hatching schemes on how to get away with breaking curfew, how to get out of this TLP bullshit and into our own ILP studios. We all felt like we were ready. We were “grown”.

We were fucking idiots.

But A, always the one At Her Own Pace, she wasn’t in a rush. Time and again, she’d nonchalantly advise against trying to leave so quick. “Ladies! The world will still be hungry for y’all ig’nant asses next week, too.” Always with a smile and a chuckle so it was never taken as malicious or mean-spirited. Because she wasn’t. We passed our time mostly playing Spades and joking about the one lesbian of the group who was trying to sleep with all of us, “Nah C, it’s been a long time, but I’m into dick!” and I could have died laughing at her delivery. I let her braid my hair once – and that was a particular torture which I will never forget. I taught her how to cook grits so they wouldn’t come out lumpy. Low heat, cream and constant stirring with that whisk, girl. She didn’t involve herself in the pettiness of the female shit-talking, which honestly is a rarity among women, teenage girls even moreso.

We eventually all got placed. One would leave, another would slip in and claim their bunk/room. A new girl to get used to. It was only a matter of time before A was gone, too. It was amazing to me the amount of change in the general atmosphere of the home when she left. Huh. I wasn’t there much longer. I just upped and left. I wouldn’t say her being gone was a deciding factor, it truly wasn’t. Though I did miss her brightness. I was simply a 17 year old girl who had enough of idling by. Funnily, my “going on run” actually got me placed – because the powers that were needed good numbers. (I would have made for a bad statistic.)

That is the summary of it. I think of many people often, but on days like this, days when I am lost in thought and I find myself slipping into some of the sadder and more painful memories of my past, it’s nice to have an Aiesha as a reminder that there were still good people who found their way into lighting the darkness for many. That there ARE still good people doing that presently. It’s a small blessing dropped into the larger cruelties of Life.

I hope A never changed. What a horrible loss that would be.

*name changed because reasons

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The Last Sliver

Marriage counseling is the last bastion. It is the taut and tenuous thread.

And the weight of us might be just too much to bear.

You say you don’t understand why I’m still here. You expect I’ll leave.

I say, You said you wanted to try and make it work. If you have no desire or will, refuse to put in the effort, then tell me to go.

It’s a game of chicken.

This has once again become what our marriage used to be. I do a good portion of the emotional and mental heavy lifting. You stand idly by.  I step forward. You step backwards. I reach out. You pull away.

And it’s okay if you can’t forgive me for my transgression. It’s okay to be angry. It’s okay to look at me with the simmering hatred of someone betrayed. But it is not okay to expect only one person to mend the fence when it took the two to let it fall into ruin in the first place.

I am not the only person at fault. Yet, am taking the full blame. I am not the only one in this marriage. Yet, working double time to try to make things right.

As always, my thin sliver of hope eternal keeps me going. My preposterous belief in a new day, a better tomorrow. The idiocy of my idealism is transparent and laughable, especially when you have already left, years ago.

“I don’t expect her to wait around for me.”

But I did. For a long time, I did. And still am.

But only because you fed that thin sliver that had faded to near nothingness. You fed it enough so it knew it was hungry, but not enough to keep it full.

I/it … again wasting away.

 

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It’s Not About The Waffles

I’ve taken a step back from journaling my life. I do that every now and again. Depending on how badly I want to hide from reality at hand is directly related to how long my sabbaticals last. I’ve been trying to push myself more lately, delve into the things which are currently spinning my head and heart into debris flecked tornadoes traveling in opposite directions… despite my natural ostrich-like instinct to bury my head in the sand.

But that isn’t progress, is it?

So. Since my husband and I have been in counseling, I’ve dug my heels into my marriage and have been full throttle, “We’re Gonna Fix This!” Perhaps it’s just the Virgo in me. Or Oldest Child Syndrome. Or a smattering of this, that, and the other. Who knows, we are who we are. However, it hasn’t been lost on me that this has slowly turned into a one person effort and now I have been left to pick apart and analyze what’s worth fighting for and what isn’t.

It often helps to have a person to bounce such things off of. A living breathing sounding board to offer their own insight and perspective. I have long been a person who will come to my own conclusions on my own time, not swayed by others thoughts and opinions on how I live my life. ( Just picture the “I Do What I Want” meme and you’ve got a clear idea of my personality) However, this doesn’t mean that I don’t appreciate the input of others experiences. In fact, lately I’ve been seeking exactly just that – other people’s own struggles which I consider similar to mine, not for advice or definitive answers, but for some unconventional form of catharsis. I recognize and value the worth of their own encounters, their personal stories. I consider it an absract variation of education. Learning through the trials and tribulations of friends, family, and strangers by osmosis.

I met with a friend not too long ago. And this was exactly that kind of situation. Commiseration over food and coffee. (That always helps) During the back and forth, he shared a story from decades past, when his 3 yo child asked him if he’d like to sit and have waffles with her. He politely declined, saying he wasn’t very hungry for waffles. She responded, “It’s not about the waffles, Dad.” Aside from learning his daughter was a tiny Confucious, it also was a lesson in Basic Life Meaning. After sharing that very amusing and profound anecdote, we discussed how that is a general application to any close human relationship. A few more laughs, a bit more coffee, and I left having a touch more perspective than with which I had originally arrived.

We’ve had Therapist Recommended *coughassignedcough* Date Nights. I’ve attempted to include him more in the activities I enjoy. There have been more-than-I-can-count Days and Nights where the politeness and courtesy is suffocating and I would just like an ounce of genuine person to person interaction. And while driving yesterday, when I asked (since he wasn’t working) if he’d like to show up to my pool match this week, I half-hoped there’d be a Yes to quiet the volume rising truth which my Heart has already known. Instead, “No. I’m gonna stay home. Why waste money on a sitter.”

In the back of my head, as my eyes teared up behind (thankfully) shielding sunglasses,  “It’s Not About The Waffles” danced around all the fragmented bits of my rationale. My Heart kicked me in the shins, muttering “I told You so.” I remained silent for the rest of the car ride and felt the familiar vacuity of loneliness. Intermingled in all of that, a memory (one of the very few) of my Dad telling me about a breakup of his while imparting onto me some sageness which I did not fully comprehend until years later.

“I stopped respecting her time. She invited me to a party and I said, No. I didn’t feel like it. She’s a busy person and she didn’t have to include me in her plans. I clearly didn’t think that was important enough for me just to spend some time with her and I realized this wasn’t going to work anymore. When someone stops caring to make Time for You or to appreciate the Time you are making for Them, then do each other a favor and stop wasting each other’s Time.”

Cold. Very. But the truth is seldom warm.

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Lately

It is May 21 and the weather outside could have me fooled into thinking it is October. I don’t mind it. I’ve always loved the damp and chill, an opportunity for big thick comfy sweaters, many mugs of steaming beverages brimming with warmth and the excuse for not having to travel out into world unless absolutely necessary.

Though, it would still please me if I had to.

The light drizzle dampening denim covered legs, sliding off muddy soled, screaming red red rain boots, misting my hair like tiny beads of early morning dew on wispy blades of grass… I enjoy these small details. I don’t even mind the cold which comes with it. There is a freshness, an awakening, something which just shouts in your face, “HEY! You’re Fucking Alive!” Nothing like the burning, lazy, heat soaked days which leave you sticky and stagnant. A sweaty mess of discomfort. No. Days like these, I cherish.

On days like this, I am reminded of Lancaster. And Bristol. And almost all of the rest of England and of the love at that time which took me there. I am brought back to a period of adventure and curiosity. Of passion for Life and Living. And while that former version of self has long since grown and become something other, there had long been many instances where I missed that part of Me. I had chalked it up to furthering myself into adulthood. Into a new 2.0 representative of who I had become. I was fairly certain that the Woman of the past was no longer in existence.

Yet, not long ago on a colder Saturday night, I found myself free of immediate obligations. No husband. No small children. I was able to just go out and wander a bit, if I wanted to. I, naturally, didn’t feel the urge. I wanted to drown in streaming programming while I knit and kept the company of my cats. Yet, appealing to the logic of when was the next time I’d have this kind of freedom, I headed out.

Deciding to meet up with some friends, I spent a half hour looking for parking in a part of town booming with Trend and Cool. I hated it. I was already rueing my decision to make the trip into the city. After that battle, I found them in the bar, already filling up with people. And I hated that, too. But I was determined to see through the evening, if anything for the novelty of something different. Oh but wait – there’s a band playing and you know the guys and we should go check them out? At this point, I was considering calling it a night, but no. I agreed.

Here’s where my heart had a change. Three of us, walking to the next place, and my two friends stop to talk to a guitar player and his girlfriend with the ukelele, both sitting on the sidewalk, guitar case open for monetary gifts. They have a dog and he looks sleepy, but loved. They offer up a song and my friends say, Sure.

It’s about 40 degrees out, give or take. And this thin, scraggly looking guy starts playing one of the sweetest songs I’ve ever heard. His girlfriend, reminiscent of free love and hippies, joins in with her ukelele and soft fairy-like harmonic voice. My friends begin to dance and I am moved to take some record of this occurence.

And I realized I was smiling. Happy. Relishing this presence of spontaniety and True Beauty. I held up my phone to capture the best I could what was transpiring before my eyes… I didn’t do too well because I, also, was wrapped up in the vibrancy of the moment. I was vaguely aware of cars driving by, everyone walking past rapidly, in a hurry to get to the next bar/club/whathaveyou. For a brief interlude in time, I felt like all 5 of us were in a bubble, some magical window into a mirrored dimension of being able to experience and enjoy the Here and Now with no outside interruption.

Nothing lasts forever. The song ended, my friends gave them some cigarettes and cash, we kept going to the next place – but my heart felt lighter.

Joyous.

Alive.

So.

Lately, this has been on my mind. Of course, days like these… Days which remind me of previous excursions, long past days of foolhardy carefree whimsy, days which bring to mind bits and pieces of  the romantic and idealist I used to be… I am encouraged to once again find the magic and wonder of Living as opposed to simply Existing. I know now that those fanciful qualities I thought I lost to youth have only been shoved aside, forgotten and unused. The older a person becomes, the harder that feat. With age also comes some cynicism. Some convenience. Comfortablilty. All things which would hinder the search and stunt the growth of a curious soul. However, nothing which has been worth having has ever come easy, or so I’ve been told.

*shrugs*

I guess I’ll see.