So, This is What That Feels Like

So the suspense is over and I can finally finish what started a few years ago. It's now official, I am that guy, the divorce guy. I'm not sure that this is going to sink in very easily. I am a terrible quiter. What do I feel like? Mean, selfish, scared, lonely, but funny, I don't feel any regret for this decision. So what happened? Well I can frame it a little bit, but it still sucks.

You never think that will happen to you when you start, at least I didn't. I knew exactly where I was going and what I wanted to do. I think that in general I have been on the same trail for. It's kind of funny, I read a paper while I was packing up my stuff that I had written in college, and for all intents and purposes, I am the exact same guy. A little older, better credit score, more crap to take care of, but the same.

So where did I go wrong? Well, no excuses really change any result. I wish that I had done a few things differently in the past. The real kicker though, I'm not sure that anything that I did would have changed the outcome, other than to just say "ya, that's cool, do whatever you want, whenever you want, and with whoever you want, and in the end I'll still be here bringing home a paycheck. Oh ya, and please yell at me all the time for stupid crap, and please tell me how stupid my friends are, and no we don't ever need to have kids, and sure, I really wanted a roomate more than a wife."

No, in the end it didn't seem very palatable.

About 3 years ago something fairly drastic changed. Counseling said that a certain friend of the wifes was a "vector" of change. Fair enough. In the end I'm not sure that I will ever deal well with everything that happened as a result of the "vector". In general some advice for all from someone who has no business giving any; if it looks like a duck, and walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, its not a turkey. Be carefull who your friends are, they affect what you become, and for all you spouses out there, if you have a bad feeling about someone being around your spouse, be honest about it and tell them why. Now if you get lied to after that about the nature of stuff, that's not your fault, but still, you gotta say something. I will never no exactly everything that went on in the past, and I really don't want to know all the details. I do wish that things had been different. I do wish that the "change" had never occured.

What change? Well, it's tough to put a finger on, but when activism and femanism and independence and liberalism take over for things like moderation and equality and interdependence and family, that makes it really hard for a traditional punk like myself. Just my opinion? Yup.

I came to a critical moment a few weeks ago. I had another good friend pass in a horrible accident. I began to think of how short and fragile life is. At the same time, after being roomates instead of a couple for the last six months or so, I had to ask myself "Do you really think that things will change and go back to how they once were? Can that happen?" For so long I had hoped that around the next corner it would, and I thought that if I just did a little something different, sacrificed a little more of what I wanted then it could. Then I noticed, that in every scenario, the person I was with that would make living with the past and the pain okay, was not this new person, but the one that i was in love with so long ago. And I had to ask, is that person ever coming back, and how many years do you wait and work for that? I am done.

Friends and family are great, all of mine have been nothing but supportive. Strangley, almost sureally, most have said something to the effect of what took so long. That doesn't stop you from feeling. It is the most low I have ever felt. I know though that it gets better from here. I really just got tired. I've felt alone for what seems like forever. It hurt so bad, but felt so good to say I was through. It sucked, but at the same time it was so good. I hate to lose, I hate it. I hate to quit anything, I'm the optimist. But in this situation it was finally time to accept that I cannot win everything. I cannot have everything. I cannot change everything. And as much as I'd like to, I cannot make people live in any manner other than that which they choose.

It reminds me of a great principle of why we are here. It would sure be nice sometimes to be able to have all the decisions made for us, and have everyone follow the life map to the T. But that's not the plan. I feel like I will have to pay for this, because I do think it's wrong, but I can't help but think that repentence is found in starting over, and trying again with someone who wants to be a companion, a friend, a lover, a wife, a mother, and ultimately a piece of me, and I of them. I know that is possible, I know that it does happen, I know that it can happen for me, and I don't belive in chance and luck and happenstance. I also know that I can go and do the things that I'm supposed to, because their is a real eternal plan out there, and there are no expectations given by the guy watching over us all, unless he preapres a way for us to meet those expectations that he has for us.

So what now? Now i'm going to do all the things that I have been doing. I'll just be doing them alone for awhile. I may throw in a trip to South America or Africa and just dissapear for a while, but I'll be fine. In the end, the most exciting thing about the terrible ending, is the prospect that there then must be a wonderful begining.

So, this is what that feels like.