Thanksgiving Indeed

Today is Thanksgiving and while we're all eating our turkey and counting our blessings, I wanted to take a few minutes while the turkey is roasting, the family is making their way over and the boy is attempting to nap to acknowledge my own blessings.

This year, much like many others, has had its ups and downs.  Every year has its own ebb and flow of the good and the bad.  I think often I cannot wait by this time to be rid of each year to start fresh.  Instead of concentrating on the negative, I'd like to look at the positives as I try to be more positive.

This year marked the opportunity I was given to talk to the students at two high schools about my book.  It has truly been one of the most rewarding experiences of my life.  I love my writing but I love helping more.  I've talked about this before, but teenagers are scary (Thank you, My Chemical Romance, for putting that notion into song) and somehow I managed to reach a few.  This morning I received a text from one student (Mini Me!) wishing me a happy Thanksgiving and this afternoon I received an email from another student who thanked me for the advice I've given her, without knowing it, through my blogs.  I burst into tears when I read that.  Thank all of you - students and faculty - for allowing me into your days, your lives, your hearts. 

My uncle posted today on Facebook that he was thankful for his nieces and nephews - that without us, he wouldn't be here.  I can't conceive of a world without him in it and I'm thankful every day that he's part of our lives. 

I'm thankful for my family.  I'm thankful for their support, their love, their humor and the sense of "home" that they offer me.  Without them as my foundation, I'd wash away. 

I'm thankful for my son, for all he teaches me every day.  Kindness and patience and wonder and amazement.  I'm thankful for each day I'm granted to spend with him, to raise him. 

This year I almost lost a very dear friend.  There have been many dark days for him but as they've gone by, he and I have both realized that brighter ones are ahead.  I've learned that when someone is at their worst, they need you at your best.  I've tried very hard to be that.  I've learned never to give up on someone, to have hope that they can do better, be better.  He hasn't disappointed me in that. 

I've learned and am thankful to know that there will never be a day when there are no more things to learn, even about myself. 

I'm thankful to have my second career in writing, to have been given the gift to share my words with others, no matter how frightening that is.  I'm thankful for the unending support of people I never would have imagined would offer it. 

I'm thankful for the new friends I've made this year and the way they've changed me. 

When you stop to think of all the positives, change your perspective a little, things stop seeming so dreary.  It shouldn't take a holiday from work to make me see these things, but perhaps now that I have, I can continue the idea of Thanksgiving into every day. 

The Other Side of the Door

And this is the companion piece for yesterday's post...

The other side of the door….

Days of loneliness.  I suppose the days aren't nearly as bad as the nights are.  The days I've always spent immersed in work.  There are never enough minutes or seconds or hours to complete everything, to ponder and review the things I need to look at for the future, to plan, to scheme.  The nights are worse. 

It's the time I used to spend with him. 

Nights spent talking about our lives, our plans together.  Spent laughing at television.  Spent cuddling at the couch.  Furtive, coy glances at one another over dinner.  Retelling stories of our twenty year history, years spent together and apart. 

It's the nights I dread the most.  There's this hole in my life that I can't seem to fill.  Now, instead of preparing dinner with him in my kitchen, each doing our own task and with the occasional slap of the dish towel on my rear end, I microwave leftovers or eat cheese and crackers.  I can't remember the last time I actually tasted the food I ate. 

I've spent days trying to make sense of the worst betrayal I've ever felt.  I feel as though I've been torn inside and I can't heal. 

Every moment spent idle has been filled with thoughts and memories of him.  The mussed look of his hair in the morning.  The stubble on his cheeks when he hasn't shaved in a day.  The way he spends what seems like days brushing his teeth.  They way he looks when his glasses slip too far down the bridge of his nose. 

For every good thought or memory, there is its opposite.  There is the sound of his voice coming clean about relapsing.  Coming clean about the sanctuary he sought in the arms of another.  The arms of another when so much time had been spent telling me of how my arms were all he'd ever need, ever want. 

What was real and what was a lie?  How do you come back from that? 

I spent so many years longing for the right time, longing for the day when we could be together.  So many years dreaming of what it would be like, to finally be his woman and he my man.  We'd spent an almost idyllic year and a half since we'd reconnected.  The fairy tale we'd both imagined had seemingly come true.  Not without cost, not without baggage.  But happy nonetheless.

Or so I'd thought.

I wasn't so naïve that I was unaware of his demons, his past…even his present.  I knew the things that haunted his eyes, the fear I could see in those eyes when he thought it was hooded and hidden from me.  I was never ignorant.  I entreated him to open up to me, to confide in me.

To trust me. 

I fought to be where I had been.  In one day, in one conversation, it was all ripped from me. 

How do you look at yourself in the mirror when you have been your most honest, your most giving, your most loving…when you've done everything in your power to make someone feel loved, feel worthy and they spat all your words, your pure emotions back in your face?  How do you heal from a wound that reopens every time you breathe?

He wants to talk to me.  He wants to explain.  How can I find it in myself to listen? 

Everything in life is a risk.  He was a risk.  I knew there were no guarantees.  I signed on for the ride.  I signed the disclaimer, giving my heart to a junkie.  A damaged junkie, at that. 

But this…this was so much worse. 

How do you live with yourself knowing your love, your care wasn't enough?  How do you live knowing you weren't enough for the one you loved with a passion, an intensity, a purity that you'd never experienced before in your life?

How do I go on from this?  How do I recreate my life around this hole? 

There's a knock at my door.  It's beyond late.  No idea who would be coming by at this hour.  I'm in face cream and pajama bottoms and my fluffiest socks.  Anything to try for some comfort and solace.  I mute the television and head to the front door. 

I glance out the peephole, thinking maybe someone has the wrong door. 

They don't.

It's him. 

Why?

I'm frozen in place.  I can't speak, can't move.  I stand there, stupidly.  I've gone "tharn" like the rabbits in Watership Down. 

"I know you're there," I hear him say.  His voice sounds so raw, so desperate, so earnest.  I look again out the peephole.  His face is wan, gray.  The bags underneath his eyes are pronounced.  My heart breaks just a little more as I stare, transfixed.  He looks terrible.  He looks as destroyed as my insides feel. 

The words pour out of him, a slow trickle at first and then he gains his momentum.  He is trying so hard.  So, so hard. 

Part of me…part of me is torn.  Part of me wants to hear his explanation, his reasoning.  His sorrow.  His request for forgiveness.  Here, in short bursts, are the truths I've been looking for.  Here are the words that are the root of the situation.  The hurt, the fear, the all encompassing sorrow he has carried in his heart every day of his life.  He is breaking my heart.  Again. 

My hand flies to my mouth to stifle a sob.  I feel the tears, hot and angry and so sad as they run down my cheeks.  I see him in my head as the little boy he once was, the little boy who lost his innocence too early.  The little boy who no one protected.  The little boy who tried so hard to keep the appearance of normalcy.  The little boy who wanted to be good, to be loved.  To have someone hold him and tell him all was right with the world and he was perfect.  To sing him to sleep.  Inside he is still that little boy. 

He is the definition of failure to thrive.  He's existed.  And existence is not living.  It's a sorry excuse.  It's the wax figure of a real person. 

My chest hitches.  I want to cry.  I want to yell.  I want to hit him.  Repeatedly. 

His words…there is so much in them, so much behind them and not said.  But how can I forgive this?  How do I trust again? 

All of life is a risk, I remind myself. 

All he's ever wanted was someone to believe in him, I argue with myself.

I believed in him and he betrayed me, my head says.

I don't think I can turn my back, my heart says. 

He has a problem.  I know that.  Can I walk away knowing that?  I may never allow him back into my heart the same way, but can I walk away knowing what could happen if I shut him out?  If I become another in the tally line of those who gave up on him?  Who contributed to those feelings of inadequacy, of failure that he carries? 

I can't.  I can't walk away.  I know he loves me.  I know he's flawed.  I know he needs help. 

I can offer the first gesture.  I can try again. 

It is no guarantee of the rest of our lives, no storybook.  But it is a start.  It is faith.  It is knowing the soul I've seen inside his eyes, his heart, beyond the grave errors he has made.  I refuse to give up on that man.  Not yet.

I hear him turning to leave. 

Drawing in one last breath and holding it within my chest, I throw caution to the wind and put my heart on the line and open the door. 

Sometimes, we just have to follow our hearts and pray they don't lead us astray.  I've invested too much to give up yet. 

I stand aside to allow him entry - into my home and back into my heart.

One Side of the Door...

Here is part one of a short story I recently wrote which was inspired in part by a song - "Stay" by Mayday Parade and also by two people very close to me.  I will post part two as a separate blog in the days to come.  Comments totally welcome and appreciated.

One Side of the Door...

These last days have been agony.  Every waking moment, second, minute, hour.  All of them full of pain, of loss.  Of knowing what I had before I so carelessly threw it away. 

And for what?  For an hour or two of escape?  It's not even an escape.  It's a brief period of silence.  A small respite from all the thoughts I've been trying to outrun all my life. 

The other…the other I can't even bring myself to think about but know I have to force myself.  Answers will be needed and I'm just not ready to give them. 

How do you explain to the person you love best that you made so many mistakes that they spiraled out of control?  How do you say you've shared your bed with someone else, not out of love but out of a sick need for approval, for attention, for validation?  How do you find the words to say you're sorry for that? 

I don't believe the right words exist for that. 

I trudge down the sidewalk, feet brushing aside crumpled newspapers, the scattered detritus of all the other beings that shuffle the same street but living completely different lives.  I shrug farther into my sweatshirt, pulling my face as far back into the hood as I can, not only to shield it from the bitter wind and stinging rain, but to hide it and my shame from the rest of the world. 

Not that there is anyone else walking down her street at this time of night.  Quiet neighborhoods are just that - quiet.  And when you're approaching midnight, they're like a giant tomb. 

My fingers curl in frustration within my pockets, wrapping themselves around the small bags that lay within them, stroking them almost reverently.  They want out of their prison.  I'm fighting the urge with every part of myself to remove them from my pocket, fighting the urge to duck down a back alley for five minutes of privacy that will lead to temporary oblivion.

That's really what's brought me to this place, isn't it?  Those goddamn bags that I can't get out of my head.  It makes my skin itch, the anticipation of feeling their contents within my bloodstream. 

That constant siren song of silence, of quieting all the discord in my brain.  The voices of all those others in my life who said I was nothing, unworthy, stupid, unlovable, broken and damaged.

All those voices…but never hers. 

How could I betray that?  The one pure soul that ever saw past the faults, tried to see past my mask.  That mask of normalcy I try to put on each morning to function like all the other animals in this world. 

I'm getting worse at it.  The façade I've spent so many years constructing to make me accepted, to look like everyone else I see is cracking.  Maybe I want it to crack.  Maybe I'm just tired of all of this. 

I don't know another way to live. 

My clothes are getting too big.  Well, that's not entirely accurate, is it?  So much for that honesty I've been aiming for.  My clothes are staying the same size.  I'm getting smaller.  That's what happens when all you want to do is shoot dope and drink.  Eating is pretty low on the priority list.

Her door.  I'm at her door.  How did I get here so quickly?  What the hell am I going to say?  How do I fix this?

How do I put into words that I'm sorry?  That I love her?  That it was never anything she did, it was the deficiencies in me?  That I don't  know how to be loved.  That I have to destroy everything good in my life, partly because I feel I don't deserve it and partly because I'm afraid it would feel so much worse if it were taken away from me rather than setting it all aflame myself. 

I can't do this.

I have to. 

She hasn't spoken to me in weeks.  I've written her countless letters, emails, text messages, trying so hard to explain the how's and why's.  She wrote me one in return, on a scrap of paper, probably ripped from a notebook, which merely said, "Please understand if you see me again, please don't even say hello."

I was gone for two days straight after that note. 

I raise my hand to knock at the door, my fist shaking as it grows closer, inch by painful inch. 

My stomach is roiling and I don't know if it's because I'm terrified or if it's because it's been two days since I used.  My body is not happy with me on so many levels. 

Just do this.  Just make it through this.  If she throws you away, you have us, those little bags in my pockets keep whispering to me. 

I shake my head, scattering those spidery voices away for a moment. 

I knock.  Once.  Twice. 

Silence.

The overhead light above her door stays unlit.  I stand in the cold and the dark, waiting. 

I know she's home.  Buttery light glows from the picture window in the living room.  Her car hulks silently in the driveway. 

I remember riding in that sleek machine as we glided toward the ocean for a quiet weekend.  I remember talking about our plans for the future, our work schedules.  I remember fighting over the stereo.  I remember her holding my hand as she drove, wrapping her slim fingers around my larger ones.  They were always so cool, those fingers, as they touched me. 

Their absence on my skin has been noticed.  Missed. 

I knock again.

There is movement inside.  I can hear her feet, wrapped in the comfortable socks she wears at night, padding down the front hallway to the door.  I hear the silence as she's stopped in front of the door. 

Is she looking at me through the peephole right now?

Does she know that I haven't slept in days? 

Of course she does. 

"I know you're there," I say, my voice trembling but at least loud enough for her to hear me.  "I know you're angry.  I know you probably hate me."

More silence.

"Are you looking at me right now?"

Silence.

"I'm sure you can tell I haven't slept very well since the last time that we spoke," I offer, a weak attempt at humor, not fooling either of us. 

Nothing.  Not even the sound of her feet retreating.

That's a start, I suppose.  That she hasn't walked away yet.  Guess I'd better get on with it before she decides to.

"I tried.  I tried so hard to be good.  I tried to be who I thought you needed me to be.  I tried to be me without all the fucked up parts.  I tried to be me without the damage.  Without the Mommy and Daddy issues.  Without the drugs and the drama.  I tried to give you a version of me that you deserved, that was worthy of you.  I misjudged.  There is no part of me that is worthy of you."

Was that a sound?  It sounded like a sob.

"I know I broke your heart.  I know I betrayed you.  I can say all the things I'm supposed to, like it was nothing, nothing compared to what we have and while all of those things are true, I don't think they'll make you feel any better.  I think they're just the things people say because they're standard."

Can silence be stony when you can't see the other person?

"I wish I knew how to make this right.  I wish I knew how to pretty it up so I didn't sound like a complete addict loser.  I wish I could be the man you need.  I can't.  I don't know how.  There is something missing in me, something good that I just don't have.  You're all good.  You're kindness and light and love and beauty and forgiveness and I am none of those things.  I am dark and damaged and broken and sad and weak."

More padding feet noises.  Except they're coming closer. 

"I cheated.  I've been using.  It's been worse since you left.  It's been two days since I last used and it's been hard.  I hate it.   But I know I have to stop.  It's not just because I want you back.  That's part of it but not all.  I have to stop if I want to ever get to a place where every moment of my life isn't spent hating myself.  And I hate myself all the more for what I've done to you and put you through.  It's a start though, isn't it?  Everything has to start somewhere."

Silence.  But I know she's still there. 

I'm starting to find a rhythm to this, I guess.  My voice is getting a little stronger, a little louder.  I'm almost shouting.  It's a good thing her neighbors don't appear to be home. 

"I'm sorry! I don't know how else to be other than how I've been my whole life.  You're the first person who has ever accepted me the way I am - or at least as much of that as you've seen.  I'll admit that I was wrong about everything.  I was wrong.  I fucked up.  I did unforgivable things.  I broke your heart and your trust.  Despite all of those things, those awful things you didn't deserve, I love you.  You've shown me a life I never thought possible.  You asked for nothing in return other than for me to love you.  In my life, everyone wants something, everyone has their hand out.  They all want to take a little piece of you with them when they walk away.  Not money, not your time, not help moving a couch.  They want to take a piece of your soul.  And mine has been chipped away for so long that I don't know how much is left.  I don't know what I have left to give.  But please know whatever I do have left belongs to you."

Still there.  There might be crying.  I hope there's crying - yet at the same time I hope there isn't.  I've done enough.  More crying is no good. 

"I wasn't strong enough.  I wasn't strong enough to carry this without it destroying us.  I love you.  I love you more than anything. I love you because you loved me, you loved me selflessly.  If I made you stop loving me, I will never forgive myself.  I don't want to do this to myself anymore.  I don't want to hurt you anymore."

My fingers stroke the bags, feeling the smooth plastic as it warms to the same temperature as my fingertips, which feel far hotter than they should.

"I'm not even sure why I'm here.  I know you never wanted to see me again but I couldn't leave this unfinished.  I couldn't say nothing.  Even if these words mean nothing to you, I had to say them.  Just say you love me and I'll say I'm sorry.  And I'll walk away still.  Just say it through the door.  Just say something, please."

More silence. 

Shoulders slump in defeat.  I can feel me drawing into myself as the loss sinks in.  My hand curls around the bags.  I take a few steps back toward the street to walk home again. 

Warm light spills over my back as she opens the door for me.  I can see her shadow on the porch floor.

What that open door will mean in the future, I don't know and can't say with certainty.  But right now, that door means salvation.

I throw the little bags into the gutter, turn, and walk into the light.