I’ve been thinking a lot about writing lately, like I used to… I found one of my old journals. It was a graduation gift from my favorite high school teacher, who believed in my writing ability. I filled the entire journal, and I kept it hidden away all of these years. I graduated in June of 2002. Here it is the end of 2016. The end of yet another chapter. I tried to continue writing, but for years I was lost. I wrote randomly. A poem here, a journal entry there, a prayer or two, a short story to make someone laugh… but it just wouldn’t stay… that will I used to have to write every single day. The past couple of years I have been wanting desperately to create something new, unique and beautiful... anything at all… a painting, a story, a drawing, a cartoon character, a dreamcatcher… anything… where has my imagination gone? I see them… I see the paintings being created in my mind. I see the brush touch the canvas and just unleash an ultimately unique work of art. I see the chalk pastels blend together… I see the pen hit the paper and my fingers hit the keyboard… but… when I pick up the brush and dip it in the paint… nothing happens. When I start to write my hand starts to cramp. When I put the chalk pastels to the paper, the chalk just blows away as if it had never been there…. What has happened… Where has it gone… Where has my imagination gone?
I recently sorted through my trunk of memories, which by the way is literally a trunk, and I disposed of many things. I tossed pictures, old journals, letters, all kinds of things I just didn’t need to hold onto. I had decided that morning that I only wanted the memories I share with my husband and his children, my children. It felt liberating. I felt like I could breathe when I was done. I had held onto way too much, way too many bad memories. I held onto those bad memories because I was told at a very young age that I wouldn’t deserve anything better. I was told that I wouldn’t do well or go far, no one was going to love me, I would only be good for sex and nothing more, I was going to fail, it was always going to be my fault… and much more. So I spent the majority of my life convinced that every good thing that came along, I would eventually destroy. With that stuck in my head, my heart was constantly sad. I was always depressed because I was absolutely convinced that I was going to destroy it anyhow, and eventually I did… This took my husband from me.
This was our number one problem. He loved me. He looked at me with a sparkle in his eyes that made me melt. I felt safer in his arms then anywhere else in the world. His kiss made me lose my breath... In my entire life, the happiest times that I can tell anyone about are all involving him and and his children. I feel the same about my husband as I do about the sunrise and sunset, they are the most beautiful things in the world and they take my breath away… as does he. I don’t know what the future holds. I don’t know if I will ever write like I once did. I don’t know if I will ever create beautiful artwork like I once did. I don’t know if I will ever be in my husbands arms again. I just don't know. What I do know, is that he inspires me to be the best version of myself, and that used to confuse and scare me. I didn’t feel that I deserved that.
As the end of 2016 closes in, I have forced myself to recall who I was when this year began. I was in transition. I was in the midst of some of the biggest changes of my life, on my own. I spent countless days alone. I would work and go home and sit in the dark and think. Many will tell you that you can’t find yourself in the dark, and I don’t know how I feel about that statement. I found myself sitting there and I changed because of it…. Wouldn’t that constitute as “finding oneself in the dark” … I got up one day and changed it all. I began to fight back. I was battling the voices in my head and the ones in my heart. I started working out in the mornings and working harder at work. I got out of situations and “friendships” that were toxic for me and moved until I was in a healthy place. During all of this I got myself to a point where I don’t hate myself anymore. I am no longer the girl I was. I am now the woman I want to be. The only thing missing is my husband and his children. We have developed a great friendship and are going to continue to do so, but my husband is not by my side. I can only hope for the opportunity to make it all up to him. I hope to spend the rest of our lives together so that I can make it up to him every day. I wake up and for the first moment I smile, until I roll over and realize he isn’t next to me, then I am sad for a moment. That moment passes though, because as I fully wake up I am reminded that I am still alive and have another day to show my husband how much better life will be, how much better I am, how much more alive I am and myself than ever before. I have another day to feel an amazing, life changing, breathtaking, heart warming love that I took for granted, didn’t fully understand and feared for so many years.
We didn't keep in touch for a while there, he and I. It was hard. I was confused and angry, and I think he was as well. I never should have listened to those people, especially my dad. I love and respect my dad very much, but him being on his third marriage (which isn't going very well) I should never have let him get into my head. I never should have let anyone guilt me. But this past year ad a half since my husband and I have been apart, I have grown a back bone. No one guilt's me. No one makes me feel like my feelings are invalid or wrong. I am who I am and I love who I am. The only opinion that matters to me is my husband's opinion. I refuse to let anyone tell me not to live. I am tired of not living because it isn't what someone else thinks I should do... this is my life. I have found my life. I will continue to fight for my husband and the chance to be a good wife to him, and if that never happens... well... that isn't today... so it doesn't matter. That "if" does not matter.
Today...
Today I love me. I love my husband. I love my son. I love my stepchildren. I love my friends. I love my home. I love my cats. I love my job. I love my car, even though it's a ford. I love life. I love that I woke up this morning and felt alive. I may have lost a lot through out my life, but in the year of 2016, I found me.
