The Heart Break Files, part 3

Day 2 – I got up, checked my blackberry and found myself more furious with each piece of junk email in my inbox. Each one was a new message slap in the face that he had not written. So, I haven’t healed – not at all. I went to work and tried to search out his MySpace page, see when he last logged in. Sept 22nd, the day before the heartbreak. Damn.

I wanted to find her, the woman who was filling my shoes. I wanted to see her world but only knowing her first name and her rough location, that was not really working. I was agonizing over everything. How do I stop? I caught myself sitting at my desk day dreaming about the past. I remember early on, his sweet face one morning as we had been rolling around and then he started to cry and said he wasn’t ready. I could find someone else that was, but he was not. He would understand if I left him. Tears rolling down his face, I held him to me and said that I was not leaving him. I loved him and that was more important. And then flash – over to his washer and drier as he did his laundry, smiling proudly about how crisp and white his t-shirts turn out because he has just the right system. I needed to stop. I needed to move away. I needed to breathe. God! I wanted to snuggle my face in his chest and just smell him one more time. The scent of laundry detergent and old spice and man, all mixed together. I went to lunch with a girlfriend and we talked about anything but him. He was on my heart but for one hour, I needed him off my mind. I was sure that my work was slipping and even more worried about my marriage. I wanted desperately to throw all my energy into my husband, all my love, all my care but I knew if I didn’t suffer through these raw emotions in a successful way, they would keep coming back. Would it have been easier for me to have just had a damn affair? I am beginning to think it might have!

Evenings seem to be better. I am not sure if its just being surrounded by my spouse and kids or if its that there is wine near by. I cracked open a bottle of Silverstone Syrah, turned on my slow songs playlist on my ipod and got to business. I sat and went through all the pictures I had saved from my past and read through old journals and relived all the feelings, in hopes that I could put all the guilt and regret and heart ache to rest once and for all. With each photo, I remembered the place, the time, the smells, sounds, and how I felt. I sat and breathed it in and, unless it was a good memory, I put it in the toss pile. I found myself putting a lot of old pleasant times into the trash pile and found a lot of relief in that. I made a special pile for all my Jesse photos. I would deal with those after. When I was done with the photos, I had gotten rid of close to half of my total collection and I saw a huge change of who I was and who I am now. Then I went through old journals and was amazed and disappointed by the shallow and self-centered little girl I had been. I saw my self-discoveries and my integrity develop, long after I remembered it. Apparently, my memory had failed me on a lot. I was glad to rip away pages and put them in the garbage. I did not need or want those memories in my life.
Finally, it was time to go through the Jesse pile. I went through each picture so slowly. I wanted to cry but I can't yet. I am not there yet. I remembered making a cake for his birthday and it being hideous so I bawled about it and begged my sister to run out and get a store bought one. There were the pictures of him blowing out the candles on the cake, the ones after he saw the ugly home made cake, and he still loved me in all my hopelessness. I saw how young we were and I felt the tension of being too young and in love all over again. Each photo held so much memory but it held so much more to me, too. Each photo was baggage. Each photo was a razor blade that had seared my heart. I threw them all away and didn't look back. I felt the whole thing to be amazingly cathartic and walked out, for the first time, instead of being regretful of who I had been, I found myself proud of the distance I had come and the person who I was turning out to be. This renewed me had much bigger shoes to fill and a life worth having.