Monday, August 25, 2008

Writing to heal.....

It would be easy perhaps to regret him....
But i've never lived my life that way - and there's too much beauty in these past years to resort to regret in light of what's happened....and besides, deep down i will always love him - as much as in some moments i want to curse him, hate him, hurt him as deeply as he etched scars upon my heart.....in the end all i can do is glance with a certain sadness back at a shadow of the man i fell in love with and wish that something might have been different, wish him a different path than i see him walking down and believe that somehow this is how its meant to be.

What becomes difficult now is forgiving myself for the outcome of these years....that ultimately the decision to walk away was forced into my court, for my own sanity and welfare i had to allow the distance to accumulate emotionally between us, i had to shut the doors. The physical distance is happenstance, but it added another layer of insult and injury on a wound that little needed more salt rubbed therein. He is no longer the man i fell in love with, he has spent a long time diving deeper into his mourning and misery until i can barely recognize the shell of the man that is left....yet occasionally i could still see that old twinkle in those eyes, those eyes i longed once to be lost in forever...oh and that nose i loved to kiss. It was my epic dream...he was my epic love....and none can say i didn't try so very hard to make it work.....

And the nightmares come now - more frequently than i can bare sometimes and i find myself walking in the early morning hours simply to be free of my bed and my dreams. In night terror i see what i have long feared, the ultimate loss of him. How many times over the last two years have i heard him beg and plead and long for his own death i wonder.....the peace he longs for is the thought i cannot bare....and it haunts me. Life did this to him and he chose the path, he pushed me away despite my attempts to stay close, to love him, to fight for that - maybe someday i'll let all those arguements actually absolve me of the feeling of responsibility for his happiness, or at least his survival.

I spent many years hoping, trying, praying that i could bring him back from the misery that he wished to swallow him. I don't know how any parent recovers from the loss of a child - and the light went out in his eyes and in his heart that day when his took his own life. i don't think i've ever found it in me to truly blame him for what happened between us - not even as ugly as it got at some points - maybe he shouldn't have gotten the ultimate get out of jail free card - but if you ever saw the tears in his eyes in the morning, or on a holiday, maybe you'd understand - just a little bit of why i would have done anything - why i almost let myself drown in the misery before i couldn't go any further, before i walked away.

i have learned many things from him and in part thanks to him, i have learned the true measure of my strength, the beauty of my commitment, i have shown myself and the world just how tenacious and self-reliant i can be, he opened up a new world to me, and i lived it, breathed it, drank it in in all its splendor - and i will never be able to repay him for all that he gave me, in many ways he set me free and showed me my wings to fly. He gave me hawaii, he gave me home, my rainbows, my history, my waterfalls, memories of my Daddy holding my tight in sweet tradewinds......he gave me history and science and politics as i sat adoringly at his feet.....he gave me my lullabye, and once upon a time, a long time ago, for awhile, he gave me his heart.....before it turned to stone.

But there are a few things i must fix that he left me with, a vulnerable voice afraid to speak at times, afraid of the rejection or the anger or the mocking which were constant in those later days. He left me with a fear of putting this heart on the line - a fear which makes me angry inside because i've never been that person before. i became prickly, defensive - with walls much higher than they've ever been.....


I walk on every day - and every day i glimpse back wondering if he's okay. That's who i am - he won't believe i loved him - i haven't stopped loving him since the very first day we met. There are other things i'm meant to do with my life now - i'm not meant to drown in him, but it makes me endlessly sad that he refuses to grab the life preserver and that i must swim away in order to live.

I write to heal.....maybe i'll sleep tonight....maybe....

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

syl, your writing is heartbreaking and beautiful. it doesn't take much to make me cry but even on my best of days, this would put me over. i suddenly feel a fool in my self-pity. xx

syllista said...

awww hon, while i appreciate the compliment about my writing, please don't ever feel the fool about how you feel your emotions. You're a beautiful vibrant and yes, emotional creature - you can get through the difficulties you're going through now....it may be a long road but you truly are strong enough, and so definitely worth it.

if you ever need a shoulder you know where i am.