What if

What if I'm meant to be alone in order to be happy with myself?

What if, when i come home from work I cook myself a lovely dinner and sit down to it with a glass of wine and quiet contemplation.

Maybe even put on some relaxing music, lights some candles... rip off my bra. 

Dance around while i'm cooking?

Sing?

Clean up, if i feel like it.

Go to bed at 8:00pm because i like the warm softness of my blankets and the feeling of floating on clouds. 

Or stay up late watching "real" tv........because it's so ridiculous and entertaining.  Curled up on my couch in comfy pj's that are pretty too. 

Or search the web for more recipes to try, more life hacks, more decorating ideas, more projects i can do by myself, more places i'd like to go.......or stalk my ex's and try not to laugh.  Or cry.

Or......stare at a wall.

Maybe call a friend to come visit, so we can sit at my kitchen table and talk, laugh.  Or cry. 

Or call a friend and stop over their house to revel in the noise, the color, the activity of family life.  And then go home and appreciate my space of  one.

Long for my granddaughter.

My own children.

Maybe on Saturdays i'll get up early and go grocery shopping, take a walk on a trail, join an early morning yoga class....

After I can meet up with a friend for coffee before going home to do chores. 

Get dressed up, a little more makeup than usual, some perfume - go out.  To the movies, to dinner, to a concert, a show, a friends house..........it's the weekend, i'll go alone or with many.

Sleep in late on Sunday, hang around in pj's reading books, cooking or gardening.  Listening to music - dreaming. 

Talking on the phone, making plans to see people i love and miss.  Planning to travel.  So i can again come home to "my" space of peace and happiness.

It's time for me.  To be just me.  Boring, or dramatic, or needy or happy, sad, mad, glad.  Just. Me.

because its not about you

Some people have punching bags.  I have my blog. 

I’m looking for is a way to pop the emotional zit that gets larger and takes up more space than it should whenever I try to pretend it’s not there. 

Time to get popped bitch.

My present life? Can’t ask for more without being greedy. Situations have changed in my work so that I no longer need to barricade myself behind a sign, or dread the opening of my office door.  So that’s good.  Our home is slowly but surely taking on the look of a couple living there, and my relationship is the kind where fighting is anticlimactic.  We get annoyed.  We go to our separate corners.  We come back and appreciate that there is literally no drama.  It’s kind of weird and honestly I’ve considered going back to my therapist to help me accept that I’m in an adult relationship with a fully grown man.  Which requires me to be a fully grown woman.

Dammit.

Am I happy? I am satisfied.  Many times, more often than not, I feel a surge of appreciation and lightness.  I feel a sense of security – in myself.  Blind trust isn’t something I’m lucky enough to experience but thus far, that wall of protection has been steadily chipped away by his reliable presence of actually wanting to be here. with me. Sharing our life.  that’s good too.

I still need more time alone than what others might consider “normal”.  I am easily drained by other people. I’ve become more selective of where my energy is actually spent. I’m taking care of my needs and paying attention to myself. 

Like physical therapy.  Holy. Shit.  Yes, that hurts!  But then, days later I find that it worked so I go back for more.  They’ve made an incredible difference in how my body feels and works from the inside.  I can move in ways I haven’t been able to in…decades maybe?  Click click, poke and electrocute …..wam bam I’m almost a person who can do things again!  Like walk.  Without pain.  Most of the time. I’ve even added deep tissue massage to the regiment and let me tell you…..sigh.  I got the word today to join a gym and start moving. 

Not so a man will think I’m worthy or attractive enough for him.

So I can feel good and be healthy – you know.  For me.  Mike tells me I’m beautiful every day.  The gym is for me.  But still not cleared for yoga.  Yet. I can’t wait to feel physically good again.  I see it around the corner….

My pain is literally in my past and yet it keeps rearing its ugly head when I least expect it.  Its emotional.  I didn’t ask for it, or call it back.  It just happens. My dreams are vivid again and angry.  There is no peace.  There is no SENSE.  Just emotional pain and a whole lot of anger.  And embarrassment.  And anger.  A lot of anger.

So. Did I mention anger?

Below this I went on a tirade of fuck you’s and you did this and that and blah blah blah but I am smart enough to step away now because I know everything is temporary.  It felt good to type it out but not so good to read it back to myself. 

Here’s the lesson I’m learning on the daily – everything takes time and not everything needs to be said.  Especially when it doesn’t matter anymore.

It may take years for me to detox.  But it’s happening.  Most people are complex and can have feelings for many or more than one person at a time and still manage to act honorably.  Loyally.  I can have residual feelings for what I thought someone was to me. Seems like love is always the easiest to erase and anger just wants to hang on forever. But there is no such thing as forever.  Everything ends and then new things begin and the cycle goes on and on.  Someone with strong character and a loyal heart, that’s the person I aspire to be, that is my goal.  Not dwelling in a past that cant change.  That truly is a waste of time.

Who you are, what you think, how you feel and remember things is up to you.  Not mine to carry.  So – dreams be banished and replaced with goals for the future events, relationships, lessons and living……I’m on my way.

Finally

My voicemail has been full for .......a long time.  I haven't listened to messages in probably over a year.  Today, i not only listened to but deleted the majority.  I'm proud of me.

I didn't want to listen to what i should delete but didn't want to just delete everything without listening.  So.  I finally did it.

Now i feel stupid for stressing about something that was nothing.  Sometimes I build up things in my head to be a lot bigger than they are, or ever were.

I need room on my voicemail so i can get new messages.

On that note, i looked up my previous address online to see if there are still pictures and there they were, from when it went on the market.  My little house that i loved so much.  I showed Mike and while i was doing so i realized that I love our home.  It's old, it has character, it has details that others don't have and it needs love and attention.  Like us.  It's our, big home. 

Funny to think that things that meant so much, that filled my need in the past have been surpassed in my present.  I didn't even know i could hold so much in my life without having to fight for it.

Its when i stopped fighting and projecting that i finally found my happiness.  The fear of losing it is no longer larger than the joy of having it.

Finally.

It's a facial. Really.

Sitting at home literally, is making me a bit......not myself.  Surgery on my foot means hopping along with a walker (yes, a walker) because putting pressure or weight on my foot is a bigggg no no.  Fuck me.  I never appreciated being able to walk on two feet as much as i should have. 

My hands hurt more than my ankle, so sitting seems to be the goal.  I sit.  and i sit some more. It's not too bad when Mike is here because he talks to me, but once he goes to work i'm slipping into the coma of television, or ....Sims.  I admit it.  If i can't live in reality i'm gonna do it on the computer with made up characters.  I create the characters so i can build them houses.  Thats my favorite part so i'm not too ashamed or concerned.

Time alone gives you all this extra space to think.  Think, chew on it, get mad, get sad, feel relieved, grateful, bored, regretful and grossly happy.  Within the space of moments .  Because, normally that's all anyone really has to give to useless thoughts when there is SHIT TO DO. 

But.  When you are perfecting the art of sitting...thoughts take their time walking across your brain and sometimes they even turn into ideas.  Not all ideas are good ones.  Especially when in that moment you are visiting the past and you act on it in the present as if you can time travel.

Do not bust someones ass who you have not spoken to in a long time.  It isn't welcome.  It isn't okay.

See?   I learn something new every day even just sitting and staring at the wall! 

My sense of humor can be, harsh?  yeah.  Harsh.  But i think it's directed more at myself than outwardly most of the time.  No one can tear me down better than myself.

Blogging, writing it out, is mostly a good thing for me.  It might not be coherent to others, but thats fine, it doesn't need to be.  The problem with a lot of writing is a lot of thinking and mostly my thinking runs in circles, no cycles....it runs in cycles. 

And then i finally hit on a thing that has had scabs over it for so long that picking at it makes it bleed all over the place and i have to do something about it.  So i write, i rework, i remember, i forgive.  I don't forget, but i forgive.  It's all about releasing the toxins in my thoughts into writing and not holding it in my physical self taking up space. 

If you've ever had a facial you know that your skin feels fantastic when you leave the spa HOWEVER within hours your face can begin to break out in at least one of two pimples that were waiting there, below the surface, waiting for you to clear the way for their arrival.

Blogging is like that.  For me.  I take something out, look at it, put it into perspective, and then send it on its way.  The problem is, that makes room for more somethings to look at.  Again, and again. 

I'm kinda hoping that the somethings will eventually come to nothings so i can use that room to store the good things that are happening to me now.....for future reference.

So blogging is like a facial. Did you expect me to be poetic? 

Texting, is a privilege and  honestly, i'm putting myself on restriction.  At least until i can get to the spa for a full body massage.

She didn't want to

Harvey Weinstein.  I find it so perplexing that anyone would think what he did wasn't rape.  Or at the very least sexual assault.   Why didn't these women speak sooner?  They got what they wanted in return for sex.  If it was rape why didn't they call the police when it happened?  These aren't uncommon thoughts and questions from decent, intelligent people.  Unless you have experienced rape, or sexual assault or know someone close that has, it is difficult to wrap your mind around the nuances of what rape really is.  or can be.  

Rape doesn't have to involve having a gun held to your head, or a knife to your throat by a stranger.  I think everyone agrees that rape doesn't have to be perpetuated by a stranger.  It can be by someone the "victim" knows, trusts, even loves.  While that may be accepted as possible, the fact that no threat of death or serious bodily injury is not.  And yet...it happens. 

I lost my virginity without my consent.  There were no threats, no violence.  Nothing more than one minute I was saying no, no, no and he simply did not listen.  I knew him, he was my boyfriend for a short time.  He was experienced where I was not, he was assertive, where I was not.  Making out felt wonderful.  I had hormones that were beginning to rage but I still didn't know what to do with them or how to control them.  I didn't think ahead to what comes next.  I was having too much fun being a virgin and the idea of actual sex struck terror in my heart.  I didn't want to get pregnant.  I didn't want to get caught.  I didn't want him to go around talking about it after.  I didn't want to be labeled a slut.  I had a lot of reasons "why not" and none of them ever came to fruition.  My fears about having sex were not as bad as how I felt having him ignore "no" and go ahead and force himself inside me.   

Was it my fault?  I had been making out with him heavily, having no issue with it.  I wasn't shy.  I just didn't want to have actual sex.  So, did he have a right to do what he did?  Did I lead him on, get him too excited...did he misunderstand "no"?  Did I call the police or my parents or my best friend when he was done?  No.  I lay there feeling like I had done something wrong.  I had.  Not him.  I didn't cry in front of him or act like I was bothered in any way.  I pulled up my pants, went and cleaned myself up and didn't make eye contact with myself in the mirror as I chastised myself for putting myself in a situation where something like that happened.  And then, I carried on like nothing had happened.  I was never alone with him again and we broke up shortly after.  I didn't tell anyone but the man who would turn out to be my husband, now my ex husband.  It was years later and it was because I had some issues, who would have guessed.  I told my daughter years later, as a way to warn her of placing herself in situations where she might not be safe.   

Is that rape?  I think It's called date rape now.  I'm not sure what the difference is.  I had a dick in me when it wasn't invited.  Whatever it's called. 

There is no way for  me to be gentle about talking about , writing about, what happened to me as a teen.  A Long ass time ago.  But I will tell you for certain that the memory is crystal clear as if it happened yesterday.  And that isn't the only one. 

Without going into an entire novel, I will make this short.  My mother hated my boyfriend, who would become my husband.  She didn't want us seeing each other because she found out we were in fact sexually active and she had issue with it.  We found ways around her to see each other and one of them was to wait until she went to bed at night and he would come see me. I slept in a walk out basement. Sometimes I would go down to the park and meet him where he would wait to see her bedroom lights go off.  There were other people there sometimes and I knew most of them.  They knew who he was, and what we were up to.  It wasn't a secret among peers. 

One night there was a light tap on my door.  I hadn't been expecting my bf but it was part of the elaborate signals that we had set up so I opened the door.  There was this guy I knew from the park.  He was older, out of high school.  He had always been nice to me.  He asked if he could talk to me and I said yes and sat down on the stoop with the door open behind us.  He sat down next to me and began talking about what was going on in his life, and I listened, because that is what I did then, and what i do now.  He asked for a hug goodbye and I gave it to him........and from there it turned into a silent tussle of me trying to get out of his embrace and him backing me into my bedroom.  We hit the floor which was cement and i started crying with his hand over my mouth grabbing at me and telling me he knew I wasn't going to make a noise and get my mother down there....she would know I was having "boys" come to my room at night and then what would happen?  He hit the nail on the head, if i yelled, she would come and she would find out about me seeing my bf and put a stop to it.   

We struggled silently, him trying to get at me and me not being the docile girl he expected.  I was screaming in my head but silent during the altercation.  No. No. No.  Stop. Stop. Stop.  I was crying.  He stopped.  He got up, stood over me and called me a cock tease.  I told him to get out.  He did.  I got lucky.  This time, I told no-one what happened.  I didn't tell my bf because I thought he'd be mad at me.  I didn't tell my mother because i didn't want to lose the ability to see my bf and I truly believed it was my fault that it happened at all.  I shouldn't have opened the door.  I shouldn't have sat there talking to him.  I shouldn't have hugged him.  I made myself responsible for his shitty attack on me.  I'm not alone. 

I consider myself lucky.  I'm a 50 year old woman and aside from a few unwanted ass grabs and a few "accidental" brushes of my breasts, I've escaped any sexual violence.  I live in a country where women are supposedly valued and treated fairly.  Yet, even now, rape and sexual assault seem to be on a sliding scale of you asked for it on one end and you were attacked at knife point by a stranger at the other end. 

There is a a whole lot of middle there.   

Does that make it okay? 

I say no. 

What do you say? 

Karma

What goes around comes around, so trite. So true. How does it feel to be controlled? Be given ultimatums? Be forced to be someone you aren't? To make someone else temporarily happy? To be afraid if their anger and what it will cause you to lose this time. how do you prove yourself? Over and over, no warning of when its coming. You less and less.

Yours to have

My people will always be my people

As i am theirs

You aren't me

never will be

They will always see me where i was supposed to be

Where are your people

Acquaintances

Not me, not mine

Ride or Die

More loyal than your man

those places you go

I've been before

these people you meet

still with me

the life you chose

someone elses

set free

from lies and betrayal

That, is yours now