New Understanding

Balled up in the fetal position, if not actually, then emotionally. I picked up this book in the airport last week because a friend recommended it months ago. I read half of the book during my flight. And as tears streamed down my face I made a note to call him and tell him thank you. That isn't what I said to him, though. It went something like this:

Me: You bastard

Him: What?

Me: I am reading the book.

Him: You are?

Me: Yes, on the freaking plane.

Him: Oh, don't read it on the plane.

Me: You think?

Him: Close the book. Step away from the book.

Well....maybe it wasn't that clever. But, close.

It is powerful. And it is killing me. It has my guts ripped out and on the floor. It has touched me at my core. And I don't enjoy being touched there often.

I enjoyed my weekend and didn't open the book again until the plane ride back home. During my layover I sat facing a wall and wept. Then I received a phone call and a relationship ended. One that would inevitably end. And the message in the book was milling in my head. The heartache was real. The pain was real...and very much still is. But the longing and the emptiness is about yesterday not about today. And there is so much more work to be done.

I got onto the plane and finished the book. And again I cried. There is so much loss that I must deal with privately, perhaps publicly.

As the plane descended upon DFW I looked across the city and didn't get that same feeling in my heart that I once did when I would land. Those open arms calling me home were not outstretched. Or maybe they were but the longing for their embrace has faded. I have much more searching and uncovering in this drive toward authenticity. While I have done so much to become a woman I love deeply and am proud to be, it isn't over. As if I am without a home.

When I woke to a feeling of finality yesterday I began crying again. And eventually it turned to sobbing. 18 hours of crying. 18 hours of letting go. 18 hours of embracing the fear it will take to move forward. Shaking and crying and sitting in front of a person with whom I believe I can be completely honest and....listening.....l i s t e n i n g.....listening. To that still, small voice inside. That is where to work. That is the core. That is the ache.

"We cannot make anyone love us. We cannot change anyone. It is not our job to hurt someone who has hurt us, to change someone who is self-destructive, to convince someone who doesn't love us to love us. As long as our well-being and self-worth are dependent on those around us, we are children hanging on our father's affection, waiting for our mothers to call us "darling", our teachers to tell us we are smart, our friends to include us in their clubs, we are waiting, waiting for enough kindness to break open the tight bud of our hearts". ~Roth, G. (1992). When Food is Love. New York: Penguin Group.

Losing and gaining today.