It's been over a year since I wrote a post. A lot has happened. We lost both of Shawn's paternal grandparents within six months of each other. Shawn quit his job to go to filmmaking school in San Francisco. I lost my job trying to figure out how to be the wife that Shawn wanted me to be - supportive of his dream even though it shattered all of mine. And our marriage fell apart. We finally acknowledged that his dreams have done a complete 180 from what OUR dreams were together.
So I have been a somewhat emotional train wreck that just kept gathering momentum. We talk, but it is more like friends calling to see what the other one is up to. No words of love. Not allowed.
Tonight I came home from a cook off that I took part in. I was feeling pretty good. Shawn's avoidance of talking to me in anything other than platonic terms is helping me to realize that he really doesn't see me in his life anymore. I woke up this morning for the first time in a while and it didn't hurt so much not to wake up without him. Because through all of the fighting and resentment and hurt I still found solace just having his arms around me and laying my head on his chest at night. And it is all I have wanted for weeks now. But I have to let it go. Anyway. Back to coming home. I walked in the door and the very first thing I see is one of my very favorite coffee cups shattered on the floor. I had left it next to the sink this morning and Bella had pulled it off of the counter. This cup was special - one of a kind, irreplaceable. Shawn's mom bought it for me in Caltagirone, Italy on a trip and I have loved it ever since. I should have put it away a long time ago, but there was something about drinking coffee out of this mug that brought back so many good memories that I just kept drinking out of it. And now it lay shattered on my kitchen floor. I just knelt down to pick up the pieces and began sobbing. And I sobbed, and screamed even, angry that I had been so stupid as to leave it within her reach if she misbehaved. Angry that it had to be THIS cup, not one of the more generic ones that didn't matter as much. Angry that this happened when it seems like so much is going wrong. The dogs were so alarmed that they went and hid. Bella went outside and lingered at the fringes of the light, knowing that SHE was the reason for my grief. Normally she is so attuned to my moods that if I am even the tiniest bit sad she comes and licks me and tried to put her paw on me. But not this time. This time she knew it was because of her that I was curled up in a ball on the floor crying my eyes out, holding a silly piece of pottery and crying over it as if it were a living thing. But I realized that it was the culmination of all of the grief from the last few weeks, months and even years that was releasing itself over broker shards of pottery.
As if on cue, Shawn called at that moment. I don't know why I even answered the phone in the state I was in. He sounded alarmed until he heard the reason for my sobs, then he said he was sorry but it didn't sound sincere. Shawn has always been so sympathetic to my hurts and when he says he is sorry you can tell in his voice that he is sincere. This wasn't the same. So when we got off the phone I cried some more. Poor Ryker, he came and stayed by me for the longest time. Then I dried my eyes, got up and went to find Bella and hug her. And that is how I will look at things - dry my eyes, pick my ass up and do what needs to be done. The hurt will lessen over time and I will work to achieve MY dreams without feeling like I didn't have the right to dream for myself anymore. I will pick up the shattered pieces of pottery and drink out of a different cup.
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