A LESSON LEARNED;

Have you ever had someone tell you that they love you, while looking you straight in the eye- right through to the centre of your soul? And know. Just know that they meant every word of it; the simple romanticism of the statement, the sheer audacity of the sentiment? Well I have or rather I had someone do that once. He poured out his heart to me, laid his love at my feet and told me in not so many words “do with me as you would please.” It was the most beautiful thing that had ever happened to me and the scariest too. How could I say yes to that? How could I take on the burden of a life that was not even mine? So I took the easy way out, the coward’s way; told him I was interested in no love but that of the creator and mine for myself. And then walked away. I walked away, not daring to look back for I had heard that that one glance back showed uncertainty, that half glimpse back proved indecision.

I was so sure that I could go on, move on with my life and erase the memory of those golden moments we had shared. I told myself that it could not be that hard to go back to the way things used to be. Had I not lived my life full and vibrant without this overwhelming feeling to that point? Had I not done quite alright by myself before he came along with his sweet words and gentle manner? Had I not been just okay without that promise of forever that lurked deep in his lovely eyes? I had and given the choice I had chosen to take and the circumstances as they were, I was sure I could do it again.

So I lived and in my own selfish way continued to love. Never giving away enough of myself to make an impression, never taking too much as to warrant THAT discussion. Life, I convinced myself was very much back under my control. And in a crazy way it was. I stayed where I chose to, run when I wanted to, stuck to that I had to and nurtured that which I needed to. But as sure as the sun rises and sets each day, time had to pass me by- as it passes us all by and one by one I saw my comrades in the struggle for independence, my partners in our quest for individuality, my cohorts in the drive to stay true to self fall by the way side.

She got married and was oh so happy about it, he had a child and could not bear to part from the bond of it, they fell in love and … well things just have to change after that. So I sit here alone most nights and wonder, other nights I get together with some or all of them and wonder even more. Where did our paths part, when did our ideologies begin to differ, how had we grown so distant; and yet remain so close? I look at my friends and they are the same people I hang out with even then. The ones who were truly ecstatic to be alone, then are now absurdly happy to be not alone. This has me thinking now, about the past that I had and the one I was offered more and more each day. And on those cold and lonely nights, the ones so dark and devoid of any form of company, human or otherwise I find myself to my chagrin contemplating the road not taken. My existence now has become like a stage play whose theme is always “What If?” And the scenes no matter the time, no matter the place are all imbued with the cacophony of chorusing altos and melodious basses; “Could have, Would have, Should have.” They taunt me.

So now I walk down the street and every couple I see is like a kick in the gut, I watch the telly and every other programme is like the scrape of nails on chalkboard. I listen to the radio and it feels like drowning in a tsunami of jeers and mocking laughter and the tabloids, they are like salt poured on a festering wound. And during these moments, these lapses in cerebral control I find myself in tears; no, not the type that trickles down your cheek and has you gain the sympathy of one and all. No! it’s the type that starts off as a slow simmer in the back of your mind, working its way up to a churn that engulfs your heart before becoming a scorching heat in the pit of your soul. And it doesn’t stop, I have discovered, until you satiate it with the one diet that it finds palatable. The only elixir that can calm it.

I have found this tonic to be the truth. And the truth is I loved that man the moment I first saw him, and fancy this, it was even before he knew I existed. The truth is I wanted nothing more that to lie in his arms every starry night and walk by his side every glorious day. The truth is I have desired nothing more before or since I came to know of this man. The truth is I am shattered now and torn because of my feelings. I scorned his want of me, I ran from his need of us and to what end? The lifestyle I craved so much now is empty and null now that those I shared it with are gone- no (I really should refrain from my spurts of self denial) it was empty even before that. It has been empty since that first day I saw him when he wasn’t yet mine and it has been emptier still since we parted ways that cold November day.

The sun does not shine the same, not as bright and not as warm; just as the rain has not come down the same, not it that rhythmic pitter patter that went beat for blissful beat with the rumbling of your frantic heart. Sugar is not as sweet and the robin’s ballad not as pretty, the river flows but in a rugged and disjointed fashion that hides nature’s poetry. I even try to find joy in the simple things; the birds and the bees, flowers in the fields; coffee with cream, sweet and sours cream, children’s laughter- instead I find nothing. Nothing but the big gaping hole that his absence in my life has left: a hole that I have tried repeatedly but unsuccessfully to conceal from myself.

So my dear diary I sit here today, a different woman- a woman with a mission. An ambition that will not be tried by the test of time nor will it be threatened by the presence of another in his life. I have decided that I have had enough of this broken heart; I want out and there is only one way out. That one way is to be free of the guilt of leaving him. And the only way to do that is to get over the emptiness of not having him. Dear diary I will have him, if it’s the last thing I do and even though he would refuse me what I ask of him because of the hurt that I have done him, I know that I will be okay, that we will be fine. Because in my heart; this bleeding heart that has cried rivers of tears of blood for him, I already have him. This heart that fought valiantly to keep him out for the past many years has opened up wholly and exclusively to take him and just him in. Poor soul that he is, he does not realize that this battle was decided before it was begun. He is already mine.

Impressum

Tag der Veröffentlichung: 22.01.2010

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