Bad Dreams

I had totally bizarre dreams last night..one about my new boyfriend and one about my ex husband. I cannot believe I dreamt about them both on the same night. Both dreams were disconcerting and I wonder why I had them. Well, the heat was on too high..so that contributed to the weird dreams--sleeping in a house that is too hot can do that! But beyond that, I wonder where my head is or was, to conjur these up. I may be on some sort of bridge, without even knowing it. Like every day I get further and further and further over the bridge of "divorce and being over" and further and further over the bridge of "new beginnings and love." It is like I am split and walking both bridges at the same time. It is weird, how long and full of turns the journeys of the heart are. At this moment I feel good about both bridges. The walk across them gets easier and easier. I think of romantic love, like music, or art, or the great unknown..things that just cannot be touched or seen or expressed, but they are there. It is like this great mystery to me and at times I can cross into an another reality with it all. I don't see love in black and white. It is a very complicated dance, and at the same time so easy.

In My Head

I may have written in the past about being "in my head." It is not a new phrase or way of being for me. It is like this slow decent I do, every now and then, usually hormone related.. :) and I don't see or know that I am slowing walking into my head, and then I am in my head, and it totally becomes my reality and I see things differently, and yet I can't figure out that I have now entered my head and in many ways it is not real..Does any of that even make sense!!! It does in "the world of Danna."

So my latest trip into my head was over analyzing my love interest, like I went on hyper speed for 48 hours--this was mostly in my mind until I spoke it a little bit to friends, 2 of who pointed out how much I was living in my head, with great laughter. It was like a lightbulb went off, and I came out of my head, really. And my hormones got back in balance..:) Now I followed it up with a visit from my love interest, and realized I did not have any resentment to voice, it was more like giddy school girl love, and there was nothing to say, nothing that is about living in my head..

A very good point was raised to me, that while I am one way, it does not mean every body else is, nor can I expect them to be, even want? them to be, and certainly cannot with all fairness view them through all my past filters. Wow. It is a lot to retrain the head and the heart. At least at some point I was aware I was in my head and managed to get out before doing damage.

That is a big step for me.

I remind myself I want to live my life, I don't want to waste it, drag it down, punch it out, squelch it, resent it, beware of it, scared of it, tire of it..I want to use it, I want to fill it with love I suppose more than anything and that certainly is not that hard to do, or should not be. I told my mom the other night in an email that while I am happy alone, I am happier loving someone, it can just never be the same for me alone (I am not a lonely person to be clear..) But I believe I do need to remember that life cannot be lived in my head, full of filters, but it must be lived in reality and open to all the gifts people have to bring to the table not just my idea of what should be..that is when I shut down and retreat to my head, alone..It is all a process, I do forget what being in love is like, the many, many, many dimensions of it.

A New Day

I hope what I am feeling, lasts. It is true what they say, everything starts to look different. Cannot say it is love yet..but maybe puppy love? :) It is this all encompassing feeling that surrounds me in all I do, like a force field around me. Yet even so, I think if it fell away, I might still be okay. I don't know that for sure though, and am in no hurry to find out.

It is just the space I am in now is something I do remember, but guess I forgot about. I hold myself responsible for forgetting about it. I did not see that I had during the latter years of my marriage. It is so hard to see the forest for the trees. But then again, I suppose we all lose it over time in long term commited relationships. Or maybe not? I did love him. A lot. But in the end it did not matter.

Now I feel a sense of profound freedom with my emotions and my being. It is like I am somewhat floating, I am basking in someone liking me. I cannot totally "do that" for myself. And it comes in, so quietly and so quickly at all once. I have a fan :) a truly nice thing to have again.

I am only in the moment these days. Maybe that is my new found secret. I used to say I had to live half day to half day during my divorce, as I could often hardly breathe, and not stop the tears. But those days seem to be gone. Funny.

My one brother and I have a phrase we say to each other when we are down...
"What a difference a day makes." We say it when the other one forgets it. And it happened for me. A day made a difference. Bless that day.

Revelation

Falling into the "rush" can be overwhelming. For the first time in a long time, I have fallen a bit out of my routine. I don't have time for cleaning :) Funny how adding one person in can do this.
"I don't know where I am going..and I don't know where I have been.." A line from a favorite song these days "Revelation." It is almost like I fell into a revelation, which is a word I love, let alone saying, as it just rolls off the tongue. I am not sure if I can totally put my revelation into words. Something like this. .. I gave up the ghost. I moved forward. Suddenly there was a shift. I don't cry anymore (really, I hope it lasts..) I forgave, fully.

I am not sure if I know what falling in love is anymore, or maybe it is just different now that I am not 25. I wonder about that. Maybe now I have a lot more filters and a lot more going on in my head that has to match up to my heart, because I feel way more grounded than I did way back when. I almost think I used to have a bit of "craziness" in me. Where was "I" all those years, I honestly don't know. Crazy to even say. I had no sense of who I was, how to take care of me, any real value in myself. I was like living an out of body experience.

I no longer think love is the only answer in life, but I sure think it matters. Someone close to me recently said they looked for romance within themselves, creating it for themselves. I never thought of it that way, and it may be why this person is so ahead in life and always has been. They know how to take care of themself. However, I do believe that we can never fully love ourselves or "romance" ourselves quite like a significant other can. It just can never be. It could be close, but it is not the same. To see yourself loved by someone else is a certain magic that may be the gift of being human. Not a child or friend or neighbor, but those are beautiful loves to have as well. But a true love, to love you in body, mind and spirit, to reach your very heart and hold it close. This is the magic I believe in. I have lived without it for a long and lonely time, and yet at the same time was not lonely and had my own personal seminar inside the 4 walls of my home. I am happy to report that it worked :) .

I thought the other day about a broken heart. How I have once again lived through it. And yet at the time, there is no hope, there is so much gloom and dying seems to be the way out. Yes. It. Does. But. You. Cannot. It is like eternal night, f o r e v e r it seems. And then somehow it goes away. And then you are changed. So I have lived through it again in my life. I cannot believe how much I have laughed as well in the past year, and certainly in the past month or two. I almost feel like a new me in a way, or certainly the "new and improved me." Laughing and crying made up 18 months of my life. Now mostly laughter :).

At this very moment I feel like I finally made the jump. Like a jet stream cruising above me, that I saw for so long, but could not reach it, and then one day I was effortlessly in. I am not sure how it happened. I am not sure where I am going these days. But at the moment, I really like the path.

Love Alters Not

I just reread my last post and I like it so much. There is a certain peace when I read it and a groundedness that I have waited a long and lonely time for.

My fingers almost don't even want to type the words or thoughts for fear they will disappear before my eyes. I seem to always have that in the back of my mind. I can be left, and easily. However, I had a great 3rd and 4th date, almost back to back, and now this moves into the realm of exclusive because once intimacy starts there really is not room in my heart, head, morals, for more than one. And it is a huge bridge to cross, going from casual "whatever may be," to "what might this be?" That is just how my head works, I never was one to not fall in the fire.

There is a whole newness before my eyes again, like I am seeing the sparks of what could develop into great fondness and love (and again, I know me, these two things don't take long..) But it has been a long and lonely time since I saw that or even thought about it again, in a real sense. Mostly it has just been a heart ache of a lot of longing for what has left me, more so than what could be again. It seems in the darkest hour that there is no "new" there is no "future" because the present just goes on and on, and there is no joy to be found.

I don't know if my little spark I found in the world of match making might become a much larger fire. I know what I hope and think about, but I am trying to stay somewhat rational, in looking at the time table of things. There now has become the longing, when will I see you again, it is amazing how fast it zips in, like it has been just sitting there in the shadows waiting to be seen again. My life could be full again, and that prospect makes me happy. I see love like another form of art, and how I love loving someone. There really is nothing like it. Yet love that is not real, difficult, deceitful, always in motion never constant, never for sure, those parts I have felt, and those are not something to want. It just leaves the heart in a constant state of upheaval.

What I seek this time around, is a deep constant, unending love, that as Shakespeare says, "Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, But bears it out even to the edge of doom."

Scattered

There is a certain "scattering" in the air, I don't feel too grounded these stays as I struggle to somehow reinvent myself.

Tomorrow is my 16th wedding anniversary, and I still wish I was celebrating it versus remembering it as a day a long time ago, that is now gone, no longer exists. For most people tomorrow is just plain old May 7. And while I write this, I just chomped, I mean so hard on my bottom lip while chewing gum, that is caused me to yell swears words. I can see the bite mark on my lower lip--am I taking my eye off the ball, my teeth off my gum, and somehow not watching what I am doing..?seems so.

And while I have thrown myself into the "dating world" because I believe I have no choice, what am I going to do, sit here and wait for "Mr. Wonderful" to show up in a fancy car in my driveway one day..not going to happen. So throw I did. It was exhausting to write all about myself, post photos, and then like a major fishing expedition wait and see what shows up in the net. And to be honest, it is an odd odd odd place to be. I still wish one person was here, I wish it all worked out, because that is how I wanted it to be. But I am not sure that wish will ever go away, and maybe I have to just force myself to find someone new to love--I am not sure one can happen without being connected to the other.

And if there might be a new future for me, I don't want it to end again, unless it is years from now and death is doing us part. I just am not meant for break ups and broken hearts. Some people find it liberating to move on, some people don't even care. I find it paralyzing. Now my lip really hurts.

Honestly I am not sure I am even ready to go out, but I know I cannot sit here at my desk, day after day after day and speculate on a future I don't know. It is like being at a crossroad, and neither road I really want to take, but I believe this one might be the better one. So I feel like I threw myself off a cliff.

Cannot Live Without Each Other Love

It is the last day of August. Even though summer is not over for a few more weeks, the end of August always feels like the end of summer to me. It is the end of another season, in a year of an ending. Sometimes there just seem to be endings and then nothing, it is not like the beginning shouts out "hey I am here, look at me!" No to me the beginning comes in slow and quiet, and you might just miss it, it is elusive. I am still not really sure when my beginning arrived, maybe it is still sitting out there on the horizon. But I am quite certain of endings.

I watched one of my favorite episodes of Sex and the City the other night, the last one, when Carrie is leaving Alexandr, and says about the love she is looking for, "ridiculous, inconvenient, consuming, cannot live without each other love" and she realizes it is not there, and walks out, only to find Big in the lobby. I love the way she says that line. For a long time I thought I had that, or wanted to believe I had that, is most likely the case. I realize I cannot live my life from a line in a show, but I love that line. Maybe not all day, every day, but moments, glimmers, but always always in the background, never leaving.

In New Moon this summer, I recall reading that "love can break you" (I think that was a Bella thought..) and that is how I have felt for quite some time now. Some days completely broken, beyond repair, other days just a piece or two falling away..broken mentally, physically, and heartbroken, and knowing only time is the savior, or is it, I hope so, that and someone else..for I am not sure if we ever get completely over the bridge of h e a r t b r e a k without someone to bring us the final steps from despair.

This makes 50 entries this year so far. It is something I can leave behind for 2009, a way to exist, if just for me, beyond the ending which has often consumed me. The photo here is Maria and Captain Von Trapp from Sound of Music. I love love love that scene. It is what I so want.

Love of My Life

Today I went to see my attorney, as I sort through the various legal documents on the road to divorce. It is like this meeting each week that I just don't want to go to, because I don't want to face reality, face the music. I keep thinking I am in some sort of unending dream and one day it will be over, but one day never comes.

As part of the paperwork, she has her clients write "The Story of My Marriage." She told me today it was clear as she read it, that Evan is the love of my life. Like this amazing ton of bricks, I just broke into tears. I had not even expected to cry in the office today. But it is such a truthful statement, there is just no denying it. And again I was face to face with a reality that is no more, that just does not matter, that will not be, and I have nowhere to go with it, but just to look at it, cry and let it be.

It is quite a powerful thing to have a love of your life. That is not a title easily given to someone. I don't think anyone earns it though, if we had to earn that, most of us would never get such a title. It just has to be felt by the other person. And once the title is bestowed, somewhat like not having to earn it, it is equally as hard to take it away. The mind might want to rip it away, but the heart continues to hold on, like a total separate entity, living in another reality. I do believe in more than one Love of Your Life. I guess letting one go is a hard thing to do. But it does happen. I guess I was the love of my husband's life. At least I think I was. I did not often feel day to day as important as I would like, but I also cannot say that I did not feel loved. Maybe it was all an illusion, but none the less, it felt real to me. As the song True Companion was sung at my wedding, I always believed I would be with Evan forever, looking for him in heaven one day. As we danced to What a Wonderful World I don't think I could have been more happy than I was in those moments. I loved him to pieces.

Oh I know, one should just get on with the process of divorce. Stop with memories, the heart stuff that just crushes. I agree on some level. But to deny it, is just a lie, and fooling myself.

"It is clear, he is the love of your life" just sits in my ears. I knew it, but hearing it aloud was like a statement I could just not avoid. It makes the whole thing of ending this so much harder for me. I so wanted to age with him. I just had this vision, like the song 100 years. Maybe I live too much in a unrealistic world, full of hope and dreams, and then sometimes tempered by reality and I cannot juggle both. I don't know. 20 years. The love of my life. Gone. Almost in the blink of an eye. I feel so forgotten.