Writing is a funny thing, for me. Sometimes it is like squeezing orange juice from a turnip (see previous several months) and sometimes the floodgates just open up and I can't stop the words from pouring out of me.
I am in kind of an introspective period right now. When you dig up old bones, it is inevitable that you will be haunted by some old ghosts.
Being presented with the shiny new lives of many old friends and acquaintances is an awesome thing. It is good to see everyone happy and thriving in their lives...but this is where you will start to see all of the tiny little fractures in my image for I am broken.
I have watched some of my old friends skate through life as though the ground was a smooth sheet of ice. Gliding effortlessly through high school, then college. Finding their true love and then exchanging vows with them. Having babies, buying houses and moving steadily forward.
These things are awesome, don't get me wrong...but they expose all of the ways in which my own life is a fraud.
For as easy as some people make life seem, I feel like I am skating by on a gravel road with a pair of old school metal skates strapped on over my shoes. Where they glide, I stumble.
The year was 1994 and while most of my friends were achieving Higher Learning, I was having a nervous breakdown. I was severing ties with everyone who cared about me (and by this point, the list was short). I was quitting my job as a manager of the pet shop I had worked at since high school. I was leaving a message on my parent's answering machine, letting them know I was running away. I didn't know where I was going or if or when I would be back. I was parking my first brand new car in front of the dealership where I bought it and hopping in my friend's van in search of greener pastures or death; I didn't care which found me first.
I wound up on Dead Tour which seemed an unlikely place for someone like me. I have never been known to wear tie dye or Birkenstocks...but there, I found that I was not the only person who was as fucked up as I was. Here I was, surrounded by a bunch of people who had tried and failed to be a contributing member of society. They accepted me despite my shaved head, Social Distortion tee shirts and oxblood Doc Martens. They took care of each other and they took care of me. I was fed. I was medicated. I was miraculously safe in a most unsafe environment. It was during this self destructive period in which I met That Guy I eventually Married.
As one would expect from such a situation, our relationship was built on a craggy foundation of False Pretenses.
**I had an 8 paragraph summary of the past 13 years all typed out and just deleted it all. For those of you who know me, you know my history and so you know why I have become such a bitter and distrusting person. For those of you who don't know all of the sordid details...too bad. I have never been good at the whole "forgive and forget" shtick, but I think it's about time for me to change that.**
Anyway, a couple of weeks ago, I had the pleasure of meeting two of the actors from the movie "Fireproof". I was invited to attend a marriage rally that they were facilitating...so I went. Alone. I cried silent tears as every couple in the room renewed their vows with one another. I got a free, autographed copy of "The Love Dare" and went home feeling more hopeless than ever. I was (and still am) convinced that I am never going to be completely fulfilled in this marriage...but I also made a decision. I decided to take The Love Dare. I have been on day one for over a week, now. I am afraid that this is going to be one of the hardest things I have ever done...
