Everything's Not Lost

Recently, I've been struggling to find something meaningful to tell you. Something of significance, something important, something with insight, with emotion, with thought, with feeling. And I have to admit that recently I've been holding back from this because I think I overdid it at the beginning of the month. But.

A confession: Since the conference I've been a bit angry with myself. On the last day, when everyone was finishing lunch, packing up and getting ready to leave Orange, I remember sitting at the computer in the university library writing that post, Untitled. And I remember crying as I wrote it because my heart hurt and ached so so much. And when I finished, I thought very clearly to myself: I'm in a public space right now, CRYING at a computer in a library in some strange PUBLIC area and the guy beside me must think I'm a nutjob and I'm totally letting myself do this. I WANT to think about it and write about it and cry about it. I know it hurts. I want it to hurt - I want ME to hurt.

I've since slapped myself out of it. I went to a bit of an extreme at times I think, and it got to the point where I could say that I actually felt my heart ice over whenever I saw him back at home. The person who once brought out the very best in me now brings out nothing but a heartless, angry, shell of a girl whose boiling rage can't even melt her icy exterior. I wanted to forget and this was strange coming from me, The Pack Rat who keeps everything for fear of forgetting the most minute details of life, who writes everything down, takes photos and wants to remember everything that was anything. But in the case of J, I wanted a Memory Hole, a dark abyss that I could shove everything into - even the happy times - because I wanted nothing to do with them. If I completely forgot, then I wouldn't be able to be sad. If it never happened, then it wouldn't hurt. I can't remember the day of our anniversary anymore. And I think that's good.

Today marks the first time I sincerely thought that one day, when we've had enough time apart and maybe even during those years forgot to remember each other, J and I would actually be able to be friends. Maybe one day far into the future, if I saw him walking down the street towards me, I might actually smile and wave and say Hi! and maybe, just maybe, give him a hug. Maybe.

And though it seems tiny, I think that this a good-ish sized step in the right direction. I've been distant and cold since my return from California - keeping people at arms length away lest they get too close and I get too close - because I never want to feel pain like that ever again. I told myself that I wouldn't let anything affect me that deeply ever again - being near him for a week crippled me and my heart shriveled. This is what a loss of love does to you, I thought. It empties out your heart. If I don't love, there will be no loss.

But the silver lining to having an empty heart is that it has the ability to be filled up again. With something new. From someone new. And it is this possibility, this potential that is keeping my shriveled, little heart beating.
11:42 pm