Divorcing San Francisco

It's been two years since I left the city to come live in Concord in the house that Peach and I bought.  These past two years were heavily loaded with emotions and challenging sentiments.  For the entire 24 months, I will admit that aside from my separation from Peach, the other challenging emotion I had to face was my long-distance love affarid with San Francisco.

Within each one of those 24 months, I probably spend 20 days missing San Francisco and plotting my return.  I think that if it wasn't for the unbelievable spike in rent prices in the city, I would have probably returned - regardless of how unwise of a decision it may have been.  I missed the city so much that I was willing to leave the financial comfort of our real estate investment behind just so that I could be in the hustle and bustle of the over-populated city.  I wanted to be able to feel the pride and joy and excitement that I would feel before every time I said the word "I am a San Franciscan."

In all honesty, part of me just wanted access to the party, to be able to get pissed and then just be able to stumble my way home after the bars closed at 2 AM.  This behavior was a large part of my previous life in San Francisco.  The city; along with a serious of drunk friends, turned me into somewhat of a boozer.  Well, Concord has pushed to rethink everything.

It took 24 months for me to realize, that I am not a San Franciscan anymore.  There was one particular weekend when a series of events led to realize that I was certainly welcomed to visit the city; come to work, come to party, leave your money there... but that I was no longer a city boy.  I found myself; this very specific weekend, feeling like my ties to the city had finally snapped.  I was now a suburban boy who got flustered driving in circles in SF, weaving thru mobs of pedestrians who showed no respect for traffic lights and crosswalks.

On this said weekend, I went to one of my favorite bars in SF:  The Mint.  I saw new and old faces, good friends, frenemies and flat out enemies.  Nothing new there.  The Mint had always been; for me, a place of excitement and joy, but somehow my plate of fun was always served with a complimentary side dish of drama.  Drama that either involved me, or simply other people's drama.   Anyway, the bar was always fun until this day when I, for the first time, was made to feel like an total outsider.   Yes, I know that I don't go there as much as i used to, specially now that I have began to question the role of alcohol in my life and my relationships; but, I don't understand how it is that meaningful influential relationships can die or be weaken by a separation of three weeks or 30 miles?

The very interesting thing about friendships is that you learn and get to know everything about that other person; their weaknesses and their virtues.  Unfortunately, when a friendship or relationship ends, one has a boat load of ammunition to attack the other person with.   At the same time, when one is attacked by an ex-friend, you know it... because you know their tactics and ways of manipulating others.  So when the broad got up to sing "Back To Black", everything fell into place - I recognized all of the times that I had been manipulated to sing a song that someone else loved or that they could not perform to the crowd's liking or whatever; a request that was made simply to press someone else's buttons.  And now, the tactic had been used against me.  And bitch, it worked.  It worked because I nearly puked - I nearly vomited from the revelation when I realized at that very moment that I was no longer part of this place.  I was on the outside and even more interesting is the fact that; after some thinking, I was okay with it.   That act of treachery and manipulation, was something I needed to see and feel, to realize that my place was no longer in the city, but back home in Concord.

A second event took place that said weekend.  My supposedly "best friend" sent me a Facebook message to advise me that he was fucking the guy I had been dating just the weekend before.  Nice.  Very nice.  The night that the ex and I had our drama; which we never even discussed, that night the cunt moved right in and made my ex's acquaintance.   I was ready to move on from the ex after having witnessed severe personality and attitude changes towards me after a few cocktails.  Ex reminded of some drunk i used to know and I realized I didn't need that bullshit in my life - i was ready to move on because not only did I not want to deal with a drunk; but I had just gotten out of a five-year dysfunctional relationship and I was SO NOT ready for round two.

I will say that i certainly was not ready for my supposedly-best-friend's "We need to talk."    Again, the funny thing is that when we are friends with someone, we get to know them, we get to see their good and bad behavior.  So that when the "we need to talk" popped up on my computer screen, part of me wasn't surprised.  I was okay with it... at first; but 15 minutes later I was angry.  I was angry because I had trusted this person, even though he had given me enough signs to NOT trust him - i told myself how everyone deserved a chance, even if they cock-blocked you every single time you both went out to dance, even though they got you drunk as fuck and left you alone at the bar to go have sex with a trick.  Ahhhh, city girls!

The "We Need To Talk" put into prospective my relationship with The Castro.  I used to be there always, desperately trying to keep a hold of my relationship with San Francisco; this relationship that in essence boiled down to booze and dick.  I was having a hard time breaking away from the drunken reckless nights during which i would feel hot and sexy and desirable and then rinse and repeat.

"We Need To Talk" translated to:  "You Ain't Got Shit Here!"   That might not have been the attempt of the perpetrator ex-best friend, or the alcoholic-ex; but to me, it translated to that.   Those two things outlined to me the inevitable change that was to take place and that I had kept on delaying for god-knows-what reason.

So, here I am in Concord.  Finally making peace with where i am; what I have and what I want to be doing.   Yes, it's really nice to have quick access to all of the wonders of the city, and to have access to culture and diversity... but the bottom line for me is that I made a conscious decision to leave the city and I now have to make do with the consequences of this decision - the biggest consequence actually being a very positive one:   I get to restart my life; and I am in a place where I can start new relationships with people that will be of a more positive impact to my life; break with those that only brought negativity and I get the space to sit back and question just what it is that i want to do - and if I ever were to return to the city, it would need to be for a very positive and valid reason.  The alcohol and dick, are simply not reason enough.

Thank you San Francisco.  Please sign the divorce papers and return to them to me.

Sincerely,
Inked.

This Spicy Flavor Called Anger

The past year has been a journey of self discovery.  It has been a time of facing or suppressing emotions and ugly truths.  I have been successful at dealing with some of them; but i would be lying if I said that I tackled all of my emotions with flying colors.

Part of addressing my emotions has been done through conversations with my ex.  Part of me wants to feel sorry for him because any time that we get together, the conversation always reverts back to our failed relationship and us.  It never fails.  And yet, part of me doesn't feel sorry; part of me wants to ensure that he hears me and that he is aware of my pain and all that jazz.  Well, the conversations always end the same way, with an "I'm sorry", a hug and we both go on our separate ways.  I want to say that I get more "good" than "bad" out of these chats; but every time that we talk, I walk away feeling abandoned and with the gash on my heart torn open again.

I know what you are thinking:   "Girl!!!  It's been a year!!  Let it go!!".     I know.  I am trying to let it go.  I am still working on repairing things, healing parts and to make sense of the puzzle that was left behind know as my life.  I'm working on it.  I really am.  Don't forget that I am Mexican (we savor our heart ache like a shot of good tequila with lime and salt), and I am also a Scorpio (we never get over anything - we dwell until we rot.)

One specific conversation that the ex and I had was followed by a text that said:  "When will you stop being angry?"   My initial response to that was "Bitch, what the fuck do you know about my anger?"   I put the phone away after that and did not reply.  I wasn't happy; although the lengthy text was meant to be supportive, it just made angry.  That's right.  It made me angry, but it also made me think.  The text got me analyzing this anger that I supposedly would not let go off.

It's been days since this conversation took place and a couple of days ago I realized that it was true.  I am angry.  I am very angry.  Fuck, I am very fucking mad crazy angry actually, if you ask me.  I think I may have masqueraded my anger under a mask of "heart ache", or maybe it changed from ache to anger, because right now, if you ask me again how I feel about my separation, I am actually quite bitter.  i am angry that (although I love my house) I got left behind with the house 30 miles from the hustle and bustle.  I am angry (although I love my children) that I was left behind with the cats.  I am angry that I am not the one who got the chance to just throw my shit in a suitcase and walk away.  i did not get a fresh start.  I am mad that I have to sit here and figure out what i want to do with the house; how to get back to the city, if I should even move back to the city... where to go?  why to go?  Who to go to?  Etcetera.  Yes, it's true ladies and gentlemen:  I am a mess.  But that I never denied.  When I started dating last month, the first thing I told the man I was seeing was that i was a mess and that he was welcome to date me... at his own risk.  Oh lord, that's funny.

Anyway.  I am officially an old-angry-broken-and-damaged queen.  However, they do say that in order to fix things, you must first acknowledge that things are broken.  I am working on it.  I will continue to acknowledge my emotions and work on these - if anything, at least I will resurface from this mess a much stronger person, and wiser.   And I will work on no longer being angry and just simply letting go of negative feelings of resentment towards anyone.

Remember; in the end, the only one that ends up losing with anger... it's the angry one.

The Yellow Room

As I have shared with you before, the house talks to me.  Most of the time she likes to chat about Michael and remind me of the many things that took place here, both good and bad.  I guess eventually the topic will become shaped around me and the cats.  We'll see.

There is a particular place where she likes to corner me and emotionally abuse me.  It's that Yellow Room.  I don't know what it is about it, but a lot of emotional things seem to have taken place in that space.  Maybe because that was the place where I used to go and write.  Or maybe because that was the place where I went and bawled my eyes out after that night when Michael and I decided to part?   And where I had actually prayed to God to watch over him and bless him in his new life.  And I also prayed for the strength to get by.

I was in there late this evening on the exercise bike.  Once finished, I lingered for a minute to give my body some time to pull itself together.  I looked at the nearly empty space, with it's bare bright walls.  This room is empty because at one point I thought of renting it out and get a roommate.  I never really pursued the roommate thing.  I looked around and began to remember all the things that I have had experienced in that room.

Because it's empty and because it's winter, I keep the door to this room closed to avoid wasting energy heating an empty space.  So, over the past few months, it has sort of become a foreign place.  Like a dark place in the back of one's mind where you put all the things you don't really want to think about.  And this room has sort of become similar to my "memory" of him; I know he is there and he was really... but was he?  Yup, the room is there... I know its there, but... sort of not?

The Yellow Room was where we slept that very first night once we had officially moved in.  We had dragged in the mattress into the small room and slept there.  Gosh, the quietness of suburbia had freaked me out so badly that first night.  I recall turning off the light and being shocked by how quiet and dark it was - I was scared.   I had become so accustomed to the bright lights and noise of downtown San Francisco.

As I sat there, I saw Michael painting the walls.  That had been his project.  He was so passionate about it at the beginning.  Painting; although highly therapeutic, it is a lot of damn work!!   I know that I have made peace with his departure, but I have yet to make peace with the void that was left behind.  I still have a hard time believing that he left.  Somehow; although he drove me absolutely fucking crazy, he was my friend and my partner, and we had done so much and were moving in a positive direction... so that when it all ended, it was really hard to accept it.

The Black Box Of Lazy Sundays

Dear Ex:

I know today is not a Sunday; it's Monday but it totally feels like a Sunday.  Sundays are hard days for me because for some reason, it is on Sundays when I miss you the most.  I am not sure if these overwhelming emotions are triggered particularly on Sundays because of being hungover from Saturday's debauchery and my brain chemicals are all out of whack, or simply because Sundays were our best days together.

I miss our lazy Sundays.  We never got anything done other than stuff our faces with bad food but that was okay.  We sat around watching TV or totally absorbed with our iPhones, not necessarily interacting with each other, but to know that you were right there next to me was an amazing feeling.  I often thought about those moments when we would just chill and not say a word; and I asked myself if this was an issue, but I never really identified as such because words don't always have to be shared for a moment to be meaningful.  Yes, our lazy sundays were special.

No matter how hard I try to steer away from getting caught up in reminiscing of us on Sundays; something always just pops out of no where and reminds me of you.  It's weird.  These reminders make me ache - it's an odd type of ache.  It's an ache that has changed and evolved, and one that I certainly cannot say has started to fade allowing me to heal and move on.  The ache has changed and it has become a more torturous type of ache.

When i think of you now, the memory of you is almost distant; like a dream that you had one night and then you remember bits and pieces of it throughout the day.  I think of you and you seem so far away and I even have to ask myself if what we had was ever real?  Or is it all a figment of my imagination?  Crazy, I know it.  But that's how it seems... and the hardest part about it, is realizing that now, the ache that lives in me now, hurts more than when you left.  

Part of me; I think, fears facing what this ache will evolve into.  It might just turn out to NOT be an emotional scar; but instead... some sort of permanent void left behind aching to be filled.  I don't know. I simply can't explain it.  It's not an ache that burns or sizzles; it's simply... an empty box, so quiet and so dark and small but huge at the same time, with a silence so powerful that it hurts.  It has a loud quietness that echoes off from the walls of the almost empty house.

And so now it is that I don't like to think of you, because the thoughts of you open up this dark little box and I just don't want fall into it and possibly get trapped.   God only knows that evil creatures lurks inside the deepest darker corners of this box.  I just simply have to keep it sealed.

So, yes.  Sundays are hard for me.  Because Sundays were our days.  For me, Sundays will forever be marked by the things we did.  Things that I dearly miss.  Good things and bad things that occupied our Sundays and our lives that are no longer there that I dearly miss.  I miss them so much that the feeling starts to claw at the lock that holds the lid on that dark box I keep tightly closed.   I've almost sort of forgotten all of the good things, and the bad things have become good things.  Bad things that used to drive me absofuckinglutelly crazy, but that now I wish were still part of my life; for example, the sound of the french doors opening and closing when you went out to smoke; followed by the smell of the cigarette in your breath and you hands - who knew that one day I; who hates smokers, would say that i missed the smell of cigarette on you?  Or who the hell misses seeing an ashtray packed to the rim with cigarette butts?   And then some.  LOL.   I miss those Sundays during the spring and the summer where we would go sit on our bench and just sit there and look at OUR house.  It was ours.  OURS.  (Oh shit, the black-box lid is starting to come loose...  Need to reinforce it).

I've thought a lot about us.  I want you back but I don't want you back.  Why don't I want you back into my Sundays?  Because leaving was probably the best thing you could have done for yourself.  I am so so so proud of you.  I am so happy to see how much you have grown and all the things; however small or big, that you have accomplished.  And I look forward to seeing all that you'll achieve in life and I know it will be TONS!  Although I miss you like crazy and want you back but don't want you back, I gives me great joy to see the great person you've become!  I know that a little bit of the person that you are today was shaped by me; and the same goes for me:  you shaped part of me.

Okay, I better wrap-up this entry and go tighten the lid on that damn black box before I accidentally get sucked in and eaten by whatever dark creature that lurks in it.

Yours truly,
the other lazy one on Sundays.

Have you accepted Death as your exit door and savior?

And so Amy Winehouse died from her alcoholism and drug addiction.  Amen.  Rest in peace girl.

And somehow, it just makes sense.  Of course I am upset because I love her music and her voice; but in a way, I am sort of okay with her death, because something tells me that at a certain point, she was done... and so she lived her short life the way she wanted.  And Amen again.

I say that it makes sense because recently it occurred to me, that we all come to a point in our lives when we make that conscious decision of just how long we want to live.  And each of us makes this decision at different times - some young, some old; but once the decision is made, the rest is history.  Some of us decide that we want to live to be 80 and leave behind a legacy of American consumers; others of us... although we don't kill ourselves, we simply... accept it.  The inevitable.  And so I guess some of us die without the body dying?  LOL.  I know, I know.  Makes no sense.

And so when I listen to Amy's music; with that achy voice drowning in sorrow and heartache, I personally hear that "Fuck you.  I'm gonna drink and just curl up and die".   So, she did just that.  The Fame, the money, her family... nothing mattered to her other than love and her substances.  Love came and fucked it all up and the rest was history.  Same for Billy Holiday.  And Same for Edith Piaf.  Sweet Jesus!

I know a lot of people that fit this description.  Young and old, people that have lived; at different paces, and then they make peace with their death - however far or close it may be, or in whatever form that it may come.   At the same time, I know tons of people who live every day in fear of the unknown, avoiding danger and risk at all cost.

So, when I started thinking about Amy's death making sense to me, a lot of other things simultaneously made sense to me.  Writing about this is a little uncomfortable only because people tend to take things out of context and interpret them in different ways.  I will say this right now, loud and clear:   No, I am not suicidal.  Please, don't expect to come find me in a tub full of blood and lavender bubbles.  Go find your fun elsewhere bitches!!

Anyway, when I was a kid, I had a very intense interest in death.  I have no idea where that came from.  So passionate was I about death that I even attempted to kill myself at the age of 10 by mixing some lemonade and some "liquid" my mother had in a jar.  I remember adding tons of sugar to the potion to  make it taste good as it went down.  I drank the minty substance and then went to say my farewells.  As I approached my mother, crying my eyes out and confessing what I had done... she rolled her eyes and embraced me.   I fell asleep and then woke up hours later.  My mother wasn't happy with my efforts to encounter death at a young age, but she knew that what I had ingested (herbal ointment) would not off me!  So, she didn't panic and allowed me to rest.  Amen and bless her heart.  (She was a great mother, btw.)

I never forgot that episode, particularly because I had, without hesitation made that decision to go at such an early age.  I had lived.  LOL LOL.   Now, a lot has happened since that day.  It's been some 26 years and I have done and lived so much and there is nothing I have done in life that i regret doing, both good and bad.  My life has been amazing so far and it would not have been such an amazing ride if anything was to be changed.

When I got diagnosed with Diabetes at the age of 20; I gave myself 20 years to live life before I died.  Damn it, that's only four years away.  BUT, I am okay.  I have made peace with death and when it comes, I am ready.   I only ask for death to come fast and quick, and that there will be someone to feed my cats.  I have no children to leave abandoned behind; nor a wife or a husband to leave with the financial burden and a broken heart.  I have me and when I leave, I will be taking me with me.  Pack light bitch!!

So Queen Death Diva... bring it!!  I don't fear you.

In the mean time, while I await her arrival, I will just enjoy life, travel, have some Cabernet Sauvignon and enjoy all the wonderful things and people that surround me.

Amen.

Life's Tattoo

Both my mother and my father gave me tons of advice about life.  Many times they did not chose the right words and so their message was heard as nagging instead.  I know they just wanted to help me avoid the vast suffering they had already gone thru in life, but when the audience is a young person who thinks he knows everything... I just don't know how much filters into that innocent immature brain.   To parents, it must be hard to sit back and watch their child suffer the same nonsense they went through - it must make them wonder why they had to go through all the suffering to begin with, if they could not pass on their knowledge to their younglings.

My parents told me so.  And I even told others too.   But what it all comes down to is that life's experiences cannot be learned from a book, or downloaded from the internet, or from listening to advice, nagging or warnings.  Life becomes life only after you have experience it.  Kind of like a tattoo:  Life doesn't become part of you until you have gone thru the pain and then healed.  Life must be learned.  Life must be earned.

So get out there and suffer and earn your own life.  You'll look back one day and be proud of all you've done.   And, on that same token, allow others to live their own lives; you cannot take away this from anyone... that is probably the biggest crime possible:  Taking away someone's chance to experience the bittersweetness that is life.

Amen.

Our House

NOTE:   Imported from my myspace.com blog.  Posted originally on 1/3/13.  Minor edits.  


Last time I posted a blog in here (myspace.com) was sometime in September of 2008. Then life changed I guess. In more ways than I can think. And then it changed again. And then some.

So, him and I bought a house some 30 miles away from the city. At the time, it was something that I felt we both needed. A break away from the city and all the chaos that comes with living there. I thought we needed sometime to not just be "city gays in a relationship", but to be a couple building a future and thinking ahead. I mean, who buys a house if not thinking ahead?

Initially when I started the search, I was hoping that we would buy in Oakland - close to the city, urban, diverse and that when the housing market bounced right back up, that we would have some nice equity in case we needed to sell and move elsewhere. Well, we lost track of that vision and ended up in Concord.

And so don't get me wrong; Concord is awesome. It is not an urban environment for sure, but it is close enough that I am a train ride away from the city and the craziness that I love and miss dearly. And it is quiet enough that I can unwind if I allow myself to.

But suburbia does something to city folk. It really challenges you. It challenges relationships. It tests bonds and connections. Many fail, but many succeed. It just so happened that we failed. I mean; a year later after having moved into this wonderful house, we barely talked and we barely spent any time together - our discontent with each-other was hidden behind the pretext of our "busy" schedules:  appointments, yoga, over-time, happy-hours with friends; etcetera.  

I left the city looking for change and an opportunity to solidify what we had. I don't know if I was in denial, or hoping for a change to convert our quasi-dysfunctional romance into something stronger? I don't know.

So, him and I ended up separating back in July. Or was it earlier? I can't even remember what day it was. It's someplace blurry in the back of my head because it was an unreal event; although to be honest, I never expected us to last this long... we did, and I grew to love, count, depend and support my partner. And so that when he wasn't there... the void was immense!! The person who drove me absolutely fucking crazy, but who I could simply not live without... had left.

Everything in the house reminded me of him. His finger prints and his footsteps were everywhere. There was no place where I could go where I would not see him and visions would cut at me as I went by. It was such a painful experience. Being left behind with a house full of memories to sort out and scents and apparitions to expel.

I loved this house. Because it was ours. I know I bitched and moaned about him not helping me with the house projects and such; but those that I did myself I did them with pride and love. Because I did it for us both. There was a certain level of passion and commitment to working on something that belongs to you and your love.

And so now that he has left, the house changed. It became no more than a cold box that houses my cats and I. A box still packed with jabbing reminders of the places that were his as well:  the bench on the deck where he smoked, his ashes still stain the spot where he used t sit; the black sofa chair where he sat to play his video games by the window, etc.  The front door's keyhole laughs at me each day when I get home; it finds it funny the sadness that strikes me as i climb up the cement stairs to open the door. "What a fool!", it thinks. I think it too. I think what a fool because: 1) I didn't fight for it hard enough. and 2) because I am aching for a love that had become so overwhelming and demanding that I felt I was going to lose my mind, and I only make reference to "my mind" because I had already lost everything else? No? That was part of the problem I guess, when you begin to think of the things you gave to your love as things you lost.  The giving versus the losing.  

It's been nearly six months since we called it quits. Surprisingly; for me, the ache has escalated. For a while I had felt secure and positive and so ready to move on. For some reason; probably courtesy of the holidays, it has been exceptionally hard on me. My heart be nagging often. And the funny thing is when you reach out to those dear beings that support you and they can't simply listen - they always throw back on your face the vomit of what was your bitching about your partner. You can't really talk to anyone. Talking is like a boomerang, it always comes back around. I guess this is why people go to therapists; because therapist don't give a fuck - they just want to get paid. Come in. Sit down. Talk. Cry. Bitch. Pay. Now get the fuck out. I know because I tried a therapist for a while expecting him to help me secure my sanity before I "lost" that too. LOL LOL. Well, if anything came out of that... was the shock of hearing myself say these things out loud to a stranger. It's one thing to write in a book, or to blog... or to boomerang to a friend your guts out. Really, vocalizing your aches and worries to a stranger is highly liberating and eye-opening. I realized that I was being childish and selfish and I wanted Mr "Pay and get the fuck out" to just give me the answers to my problems. Isn't there an iPhone App for that?

He left a couple months after "Mr Pay and get the fuck out". We agreed to it. Part of me had agreed to the separation hoping that it would trigger better discussion and resolution of our challenges. That didn't happen. Two weeks after he was already back in the city on his own. Well, this is good for him. He needed it. Everyone needs to experience life and live it. It wasn't fair for him to live his life thru my experience. You know?

Was the separation good for me? I don't know. I am broke as church mice. But I am thankful to God for being provided with the income to hold it together, at least for the time being. Sometimes I debate between being alone and being lonely; it's a discussion I often have with myself. I am glad the cats are here to drive me crazy and keep me moving. One could easily fall into a sedentary lifestyle fueled by emptiness and vacancy. You know?

Well, I guess i could go on and on and on. Lots of things that i want to discuss that I need to sort out that were triggered by his leaving. Well, it's part of growing. Guess I'll get to it when it's time.

And so here I am, in our house... making the best of it. Dreaming everyday of returning to the city and being a lounge singer. I'll wake up eventually.

A Decade Of Love Searching

Note:   Imported from my myspace.dot.com blog.  Posted on 1/6/13.  Minor edits.  

I had my heart broken by my first love after a short romance of some six months. I can't say that I blame him entirely because I was one needy bitch with an unrealistic definition of what love was supposed to be.  Having an unrealistic idea or definition of what love is supposed to be has always been my problem - as I assume it is for a lot of people.  

After I got my heart "broken" in 1996, I spent the next decade searching for "love". And when i say 'searching" I mean "DESPERATELY" searching. I was desperate because society had led me to believe that in order for me to be complete, to be validated, that I needed to have a boyfriend. Who are you in the world if you don't have a boyfriend?  Because having someone in your life translated to "being wanted and desired".  Right?  

For an entire decade, I fell "in love" with so many men that either: 1) were not interested, or 2) just wanted access to the goodies and then goodbye.  In the past six months since I separated, I've looked thru my journals and found page after page of heart-ache and disillusion. It was a bit hard to swallow.  Now, I've grown a lot in the past fifteen years, and i was able to admit to myself that there was only one person to be blamed for all that ache i experienced and it was me.

It's really sad to admit it, but in all honestly, I was searching for someone to complete me and make me feel whole.  (When I think of it, the other me-half that was meant to complete me was out busy drinking and fooling around; one fourth was busy with school and the other fourth was obsessing over love.  LOL)

A decade went by searching for something unnecessary, and that doesn't exist.  Then I met Michael when i was least expecting it, and our friendship turned to dating and that turned to a relationship which in turn turned to a marriage and then... five years later a divorce.

So, 15 years had gone by and I was now a totally different person. I was on BART on my way into the city from Concord for work. I saw a gorgeous man standing by the exit door. I thought to myself "Oh. He's so hot. He looks well established. I have nothing to offer to him!".

I HAVE NOTHING TO OFFER TO HIM.

'I have nothing to offer him" was underlined and highlighted and bolded by my emotional editor.  It hit me right then and there, that I had almost slipped back into that mindset of that hideous decade wasted not celebrating who I was and loving myself. I stopped myself right there and then and asked myself:  "What are you saying? You have nothing to offer to him?".

And so why do we have to have something to offer to anyone? When did a list of "must-meets" and criteria become part of the love game? Or part of relationships, period?   It might be true, you know?, that I do not have what he is looking for or is expecting out of his "ideal partner", but you know... it was at this moment that i realized that I am an amazing, wonderful person, and that everything and anything amazing that I had to offer... it was for no one, but to myself.  Anything and everything that I have to offer; good or bad, I can only offer to myself.  

I deserve ME, damn it.  Nothing more and nothing less.  My beauty, my gifts, my flaws, my weaknesses and my strengths were for no one. Only for me. Even if I was to enter another relationship, I would enter it aware that everything that I am, I am for me and only me. And that this person who would be entering a relationship would love me and appreciate me for the mess that I am.

Or else, how can it be love or romance when we find ourselves going thru changes to become someone else for that other person?  

And so here I am. I am now an old queen; yes old... but not bitter. Just wiser. And as I inch my way to my 40's, there is no better place to be than in making peace with all those demons that reeked havoc in my head and heart during that decade known as my 20's.  

Amen.

My Roommate

I have a roommate.  Ever since my ex left I have had a roommate.  Her name is Melancholy.  She moved in as soon as Michael set his foot outside with his suitcase and his excitement for his new life.  She laughed at the look that took over my face as soon as I got back to the newly empty house.  What a bitch.

She's very quiet.  Never makes a loud sound.  She didn't bring much other than her heavy presence into the house.  She is almost like a ghost.  She never leaves the house, and she quietly follows me everywhere when i am here.  At every step I take in the house, she whispers in my ear small reminders of my relationship with Michael.  Points out things about him that I miss.  His hands.  His laughter.  His little walk.  She simply doesn't see that I am working on moving on and letting my heart heal, but the bitch has made it a task to attach little memories about what is no longer into every crevice and crack in the house.

I like having her around because now I can say that I am not alone, but her presence makes me feel rather lonely - she sucks the joy out of me.  Thank God for the cats or I would simply be miserable.  She's a lazy broad - never helps me with the cats:  never cleans the poopers, never feeds them, never pets them.  They are solely my job.   I guess her job is to keep on pouring booze into the cut that was made by dude's departure, and to ensure that it doesn't heal.  I've seen the dried blood under her fingernails from when she has plucked the stitches right out of the wound; just when you think that you are healing, there she goes and does her thing:  some plucking, some pouring, some reminding and a whisper.

She is a liar too.  Her reminders and her whispers are only of the good things about what was; she never reminds me of the bad; and so it is now that what was is nothing but goodness and that aches me because it makes me ask myself "Why?" or "Where did we go wrong?".  The bitch never whispers to me a word of encouragement or truth to help me see that maybe this is good?  No, she doesn't.  She just sits there patiently awaiting for the moment when I will get up and move about to say:  Michael touched that switch with his little finger.   Michael turned that nob with his hand.  Michael sat on that cough and laughed his ass off at the TV.  That big empty space on the bed was Michael.  And so on.

I going to ask her to move out.  I'll start working on a way to rid her presence and her negative input in my life.  Who needs that?   There is another woman waiting to move in and her name is Felicity; I think she'll be a much better roommate than Melancholy.