Remembering an end
Aug. 26th, 2009 09:01 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
usernamenumberToday would have been Sequoia and I's ninth anniversary, which means it's been just over a year since the divorce.
I've been awash in thoughts and feelings today. I am happier separate, and would not want things to be different than they are... and yet there's this mixture of loss and shame that I also feel.
I feel the loss not only of the stability and permanence that our marriage had purported to be, but of the things I fell in love with about her. I think of her smile and the memories of a hundred little moments from when we were in college and I was first being struck by that force that is her personality come flooding in, and then I start to cry, filtering out for a while the troubles, even back then, and the baggage that eventually made our relationship untenable.
The shame I feel is about the naivete and presumption of claiming a life partner at age 21 after six months of dating. Yes, yes, I know that shame does no good and that it's silly to be ashamed, etc etc, and I'm not letting it get to me too much, but imagine looking back on your version of what so many say is the happiest, most momentous event of their lives and thinking, "what a fool I was", knowing that you'll both probably bear scars for a long time because of it.
I want to say that, for all that, I still believe I'm better for the experience, including its end (and even some of the scars), but then again, who knows? It's not like I have the slightest clue where paths-not-taken would have led, so I suppose the only question of any merit is "am I happy with who and where I am?", and for the most part, the answer to that is "yes".
It was a bumpy, bruisy trip, but here we are. I'm happy where I am and excited to see where she's going. Sometimes, though, I wish I wasn't watching from quite so far away. It's awkward, the hedgehog's dilemma. There are so many old wounds, and the people we helped each other become are too different for us to be close the way we were, but attempts so far to even reach somewhere in the middle have tended to open up the floodgates of pent-up feelings and un-resolved issues. Too many land-mines. And yet... I really miss the parts of her I don't hate, for lack of a less cynical way of putting it. I miss my friend.
I've been awash in thoughts and feelings today. I am happier separate, and would not want things to be different than they are... and yet there's this mixture of loss and shame that I also feel.
I feel the loss not only of the stability and permanence that our marriage had purported to be, but of the things I fell in love with about her. I think of her smile and the memories of a hundred little moments from when we were in college and I was first being struck by that force that is her personality come flooding in, and then I start to cry, filtering out for a while the troubles, even back then, and the baggage that eventually made our relationship untenable.
The shame I feel is about the naivete and presumption of claiming a life partner at age 21 after six months of dating. Yes, yes, I know that shame does no good and that it's silly to be ashamed, etc etc, and I'm not letting it get to me too much, but imagine looking back on your version of what so many say is the happiest, most momentous event of their lives and thinking, "what a fool I was", knowing that you'll both probably bear scars for a long time because of it.
I want to say that, for all that, I still believe I'm better for the experience, including its end (and even some of the scars), but then again, who knows? It's not like I have the slightest clue where paths-not-taken would have led, so I suppose the only question of any merit is "am I happy with who and where I am?", and for the most part, the answer to that is "yes".
It was a bumpy, bruisy trip, but here we are. I'm happy where I am and excited to see where she's going. Sometimes, though, I wish I wasn't watching from quite so far away. It's awkward, the hedgehog's dilemma. There are so many old wounds, and the people we helped each other become are too different for us to be close the way we were, but attempts so far to even reach somewhere in the middle have tended to open up the floodgates of pent-up feelings and un-resolved issues. Too many land-mines. And yet... I really miss the parts of her I don't hate, for lack of a less cynical way of putting it. I miss my friend.
