Sittin On A Porch

Sittin On A Porch
Our little back porch

Wednesday, May 4, 2011

A broken heart

I have been using this blog to get things off my chest, to talk to myself and try and remind me that it is my attitude on life that will get me through the challenges of the journey I am on.

But maybe it was a very bad idea to share the address of this blog with my imaginary boyfriend.  Yes, the amazing man that flies a helicopter.  I got an email from him today.  You see he is a real person.  It is just that we don't know each other very well, and he is my imaginary boyfriend because when I am lonely and need to have someone there to talk to, to wrap their arms around me and catch me before I fall off the baggage that I am still carrying around with my past relationship with Larry.  We don't know each other's hearts, but he has his own story, maybe not so different then mine, and then to go to my blog and see me say that I still love my ex-dead-husband, I think that is a hard thing to read.  He has been very clear not to lead me on.  I have not try to lead him on, or to play games or to lie or to push as hard as I want to push to know him.  He is one of the reasons that instead of ignoring all those boxes in my closest like I have for years, I was willing to open the closest and as those emotions pour down on me, try and look at them and work through them.

Did I ever think things would work out between Larry?  No, yes, no, not really.  But of course I wanted that dream of 25 years ago.  Not so young people, but with young hearts in love made dreams of sitting on a porch watching the sunset over a glass of wine, holding hands.  But that was not Larry's dream for probably the last 5 years or more.  His dreams were of alcohol, large breasted wild woman in his porn videos and cocaine.  Lots and lots of cocaine.  I realize now that some of that addiction is from his brain cancer.  And if he died from a cocaine overdose would I feel different?  I think so.  Yes, I think that would have been easier then watching him give up alcohol and cocaine because of the cancer and then it eat him alive until his brain could no longer keep his body working and he passed on.  But even during that time you had to hide every drug in the house.  Partially because of the pain he endured every day.  Mostly because, he liked drugs.  After the Ativan incident that was really the beginning of the end for him and I was so mad that he had once again abused his body, he said, "what did you expect." 

And now as I am working with Colleen and Linda to finalize his memorial service, and the people closest to me through this process are his cousin Bonnie and two of his most beloved friends and their wives, I again must face the fact that the love I thought had been smoked and snorted and drank out of my life through his addictions, I realized that I had to face the fact that I loved him still.  But not the kind of love with a future.  I still love both of my parents.  My Mother died the end of August 2001.  My father is still with us.  I still love them, but not the way I did as a child.  No, now I love them as friends more then parents.  People that I have taken care of, and will continue to be there as a friend and a daughter. 

And yes, I am happy to have realized that hidden among all the anger was love.  It would be terrible to have spent 25 years with someone and not still feel some love for them, no matter how terrible the relationship was.  And I am someone that does not hold grudges.  There is no one in the world that I hate.  There may be people I prefer to not spend time around because of their choices in life, and that was what started me down the road to divorcing Larry.  But I soon realized that the divorce was more about trying to save anything that we still had before it all went up in smoke, literally. 

But this new person who I want to come into my life, well, I think I screwed up by admitting my feelings.  And he is in no way in the wrong for his feelings.  But for not knowing him but for a matter of months, my heart is again breaking.  This time it is saying, see, you are not right.  There is so much baggage, and no one wants to be with you.  No one wants a used up woman who is trying to come to terms with a life that I was unprepared for.  I was unprepared to deal with Larry's addictions when he was alive, and I made many bad choices in an effort to work things out.  Always keeping my head in the sand, always hoping that when I finally pulled my head out of the sand, that the life I thought I had would be there, not the life that I was actually living.

Then over the last few months, I met someone who was kind.  Kind like a brother who understands his sisters.  Adventurous, a biker, a crop duster, a man who loves flying helicopters.  He is funny, and sweet and deep.  And now, I have hurt him, because maybe I should have been more honest with my self and my own feelings.  But shoot, I have had my head in buried in the sand so long, I didn't know.

Do I still love my ex-dead-husband.  Yes, but like my love for my parents, it is not the love of a wife or a lover.  No, this is the love of finally accepting someone for who they really were.  The kind of love you must find again to forgive him and yourself for the mess we made out of your relationship.  And then you must let it go.  And each day and night as I weep over this hard hard thing that I am trying to do, it takes on a better perspective.  And I realize that a divorce that never took, in death, I can finally let go.  I can throw those rose petals with his ashes in the water, I can throw his ashes onto my property so that he is with his dogs.  For the last 3 years of his life, Larry had no home.  During the divorce he was in the process of buying a house.  I gave him part of my share of the settlement so that he could buy that house.  He bought cocaine instead and lost all of his money.  When he spent the last week at my house, he was happy.  He was with his dogs, he had his lawn chair and he just sat outside and was happy.  By promising to spread his ashes over the dogs, I am trying to give him the peace he never had when he was alive.  And then by spreading some of my ashes with his and Maggie, Lily and Harry I hope that we all find closure.  And a new beginning.  I have no idea what that will be.  Will we be holding hands and skipping through heaven?  No, I don't believe in heaven.  I have strong beliefs about the afterlife, but living in a mansion on golden streets is not part of my beliefs.  But I do feel that if I don't get things worked out now that those emotions will follow me past this body's life.  Reincarnation.  No, that is not quite how I see the afterlife.  And my opinions on the afterlife are very close to my heart, and I do feel that I will be one with the source of all energy.  Energy can not be created or destroyed.  And that energy will reflect all the good and bad emotions that we take across with us.  I want as much good energy as possible.  I want as little bad energy as possible.  In this life.  and whatever the next holds.

Life is messy.  Emotions are messy.  And my heart is breaking, not just because I may have lost someone in my life that I might have found old love with, but because I may have hurt him and or others with my honest appraisal of my emotions.  I had hoped that one day I would find myself jumping into the air and the arms that reached up to catch me were arms that I do not know yet, but was hoping to get to know.  But maybe that is not to be.  I am alone now.  I had hoped to find someone to walk out of this loneliness with.  But not if it causes pain for him or anyone else.  I would rather sit alone on my porch, learning how to be lonely and be happy in my loneliness.

3 comments:

  1. I'm glad we're going to Thomasville today. I want to be with you today.

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  2. Once I was rejected by someone I deeply loved. I thought, I know that people have to make choices for their lives, but I don't want to be with the kind of person who would reject me. So the rejection was a fortunate event. And even though I had to feel sad until each bright new day caused the sadness to dissipate, that thought helped me let go of the relationship sooner rather than later. And when that door closed, some wonderful new doors opened.

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  3. It takes time to process all the feelings about someone who was in your life for so long. I don't think as a feeling human that I could let go immediately of the grief over the death and the loss of what might have been. It takes time. I am sure that helicopter man will understand that. We are not automatons who can turn emotions on and off like a switch. Process, think and feel. It's okay.

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