There are split seconds in the morning between waking and sleep when you know nothing. Not just things missing like where or who you are, but nothing. The fact of being alive has no substance. No awareness of skin and bone, the trap inside the skull. For these split seconds you hover in the sky like Icarus. Then you remember.
- Janice Galloway, “The Trick is to Keep Breathing”
You knew this was coming. It was inevitable. I could only hold out for so long before it all came back to haunt me. It hasn’t been that long since “the end” was “announced” and while I’ve learnt I’m learning to cope with it, I don’t think I’ve quite reconciled myself to the situation. It’ll take me a while till I do. I think I still hold out hope… I’m being foolish, but not necessarily irrational.
I remember one episode of Sex and the City in which Charlotte said that we all get only two great loves in each of our lives. While he may not have been my first love, he was my first great love. And while I might yet have one more great love to my credit, I’m not sure if I can fall in love this way again. The risk to return ratio is far too high. As I previously quoted, “If you loved someone, you gave them the power to annihilate you.” (Glen Duncan, “Love Remains“) While I was happy to plunge deeply into it the last time, I’m not sure I would again. Age, and experience, do something to you.
You might argue that I’m only saying this now, in the immediate aftermath of the heart-break. You might argue that I will would get over it. You might say that in time to come, I’ll change my mind and that I will lunge, happily, into another relationship again. That may be true… But there’s no denying that those relationships, great or otherwise, and if at all they come, will be heavily coloured by my experience in this one. I’m sure it must have been said: pity the ones that come after.
I’ve started listening to my iPod again, but with one finger close on the skip button. There are some songs that I’ve heard many times in the past, but that I’ve only lately come to fully appreciate and understand - e.g. Dionne Warwick’s “I know I’ll never love this way again” and Annie Lennox’s “Why“. And there are songs that have acquired new meaning for me - e.g. Bonnie Raitt’s “I Can’t Make You Love Me“; Don Henley & Patty Smyth’s “Sometimes Love Just Ain’t Enough“; and Whitney Houston’s “I Believe in You and Me“. And there are songs I strenously avoid - anything by the Carpenters and Simon & Garfunkel. They’re suicidal. And for more reasons than one.
I realise that despite the cynicism, the defeats in the face of life and the struggle to keep up, most of us are optimist at heart. For some of us, that fire may not burn as brightly as before. But most of us still nurture a flicker of hope however deeply buried it may be. Otherwise, there’d be no point in living. I may be a cynic, and I may come across as being rather pessimistic, but deep down, I’m still an idealist at heart. And maybe that’s why this hurts so badly. And why letting go is not something I can easily bring myself to do.
But I suppose if even Barbie can split up from Ken, then I shouldn’t be surprised that real world relationships don’t last. Maybe I too should get my own Aussie surfer dude.
But I’m afraid. I am paralysed from fear.
I don’t know where this road will take me.
And I’m not sure I want to know.
But I don’t think I have much of an option.
I’m starting to hate things. I hate where I work. I see small things about too many small people and it makes me bitter. I don’t want to be bitter. Bitterness hurts. I’m lonely. I’m afraid I’ll go sour and nobody will love me any more.
- Janice Galloway, “The Trick is to Keep Breathing“
Posted on August 25th, 2004 by jl
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