When I finally figured out the root cause of my emotional abuse, I wrote a blog entry entitled What it Looked Like When I Stood Up. At issue was that I had been through hell and back trying to release my shame at everything that had happened as a teenager, and through it all, Diane had been silent. She wouldn’t talk to me, she flaked on meeting with a mediator, and when I told her that my nephew was in heart surgery and that Dana and I were too emotionally crispy to function, it would hurt beyond belief if she let me down again. So she sent me a note while my nephew was in surgery that our relationship was over. I thought it was the shittiest thing she ever could have done, and at the same time, poetic and beautiful because Philip (known to this web site as Wi-Phi because his full name is William Philip) lived and our relationship died at the same moment. I am of two minds on the issue. The first is that there’s no way she could have known he was on the table at that very moment. The second is that she is calculating enough to know when to launch an RPG that will hurt like a motherfucker for years afterward, and this was no different.
We hadn’t talked in months, and she sent me a picture of herself with her Portland Timbers scarf and a program signed by all of the players I loved… a note that said withuot my influence, she wouldn’t be there. I’m glad that I gave her a love of soccer, as Meag (high school girlfriend for those just joining us) gave to me, but this was beyond the pale. Just dropping a sweet note as if we were buds. Dana was incredibly supportive of my anger, confusion, and sadness. Argo made me courageous, because her words were, “gross. She doesn’t deserve to be buds with you… not your heart, not your soul, not your guts, anything. One day she will have no more power over you.” I felt ten feet tall, because I knew she was right.
That day came a few months later, because I just stopped caring. Kristie’s advice got through to me, because I couldn’t release myself from her grip, and then one day it just clicked. I could direct my own emotions.
I feel the same way about Argo, that one day, it will just click and I can stop caring so much. The difference is that I feel Argo is worthy of that friendship, because she did something for me last night that changed everything.
She stood up.
She owned it. She fucking owned it. It’s not all my fault. I am not responsible for anything and everything that went wrong anymore. The weight lifted off my shoulders is enormous, and I loved that moment with such white-hot pure love, as if it was radiating within me.
It makes letting go so much easier, because when she stood up, it was everything. It was ALL THE FEELS.
It was another part of being able to let go in peace. I gave up the thought that I didn’t want to be around her for a million dollars. I just prayed. I prayed for her happiness, her success, her drive and passion and all the things that make her, well, her. We clearly need to stop interacting, and I clearly need to stop caring so much, because my feelings are clearly not reciprocated. It’s complicated and messy as I try to pick up the pieces, but not impossible…. just sad beyond belief.
When we wrote to each other, she used these long ellipses that made her sound like Shatner, and it gave me one of my greatest inspirations… I even started a hashtag for it on Twitter and Facebook… that not only should you pray on the words, but the spaces in between…………………………………….#prayingonthespaces
And that’s what I’m doing right now. Taking her words, her ownership, and praying not only on the words, but the spaces in between. I feel that I can do so much more good for myself by holding her in my heart as a blessing, and just forget about the times we were at each other’s throats. There were quite a few moments when I just wanted to throw in the towel, I was so ashamed of my past and I just wanted life to be over, and she saw how depressed I was getting and literally kissed my soul…. saving my life over and over. If I focus on that fact, I will never stop praying for her, because the light she shone on me made me a better person. In fact, I will never be the same.
There’s so much I cannot say about this relationship because it would break confidentiality, but those are the moments I, in the words of Luke, ponder in my heart. I can either let go in anger, or I can smile that this relationship ever happened.
I wanted us to grow into wholeness, but you can’t help a little old lady cross the street if she doesn’t want to go. And this is where our paths diverge, and maybe always will. I need to grow more as a person regardless of whether her footsteps are beside me or not… and I think the Footsteps poem about Jesus is terribly cliche, but it has relevance here… that there were moments in time where there were only one set of footsteps on my path, because she carried me, my metaphysical Christ in the world even though she’s an atheist.
But now we will walk our own paths, because I saw what it looked like when she stood up, and it was a beautiful moment of growth and strength and everything I wish for her in the future. I will keep that moment for a lifetime, adding it to the tapestry in my mind.
Because she’s never met me outside of my writer personality, there’s so much that I wish could have happened, but I can stop regretting that I ever met her. I will always smile at the memory of her, and if that is all that is to be in our movie, it was a great one.
My Argo, my great ship who carried me through literally the worst time in my life. It’s not something you forget, and it’s not something you minimize, which I was trying to do in order to let go. I thought that it would be easier to dislike her to make it easier to separate, but as it tuns out, what I need to do is send more love, more peace, more forgiveness, more humility, more grace into the world. I don’t have to e-mail it. She’ll just know.
Amen.
Stories That Are All True 