Tangled Child

Yet again, it's been awhile folks. Whoever is out there listening, if anyone.
I know what we were talking about was hypothetical and lame but...it bugged me.
So don't think I'm crazy, but we were kind of talking about wedding invitations. It's not what you are thinking...there was an old one from one of our fellow site leaders on the fridge in my house. He was saying that when he got married, he wouldn't do the whole crazy invitation thing and his wife would just understand he didn't want it.
And so I talked about "his wife." Like she was this imaginary woman we couldn't even fathom. And that bugged me. It's not that I wanted to get married to him. It wasn't really that at all. But it was that if we dated long enough I could see that happening. So him referring to his wife as this separate entity made me so sad. Call me crazy. Maybe Utah is just rubbing off on me a little too much. But I did want to get married someday. And maybe someday that could be him. Not today of course. Oh no. But....
It was like he could see no future for us. This was the problem we had had before. We didn't have that long of a shelf life. And that hurt me. September was our ultimate deadline and it was looming. Summer would be hard...so much space. I worked a lot and I know he did too. That didn't help my nerves. It was shortening the deadline somehow.
I felt nervous again.
And I found myself being annoyed by stupid things. Girls paying attention to him. The attention he provided them because of that. Oh. Why did that bug me? I knew they thought he was cool, even if he couldn't see it. And it made me angry. I could see the wheels in their heads calculating when we would break up, waiting for the moment. I could see them smiling at the small victory of winning his attention instead of mine.
Man.
I'm crazy.

Curiosity Killed the Cat...and then the cat came back, the very next day

Hey....
It's been a while.
Look at this girl.
Who is she?
The one who lets herself get hurt?
The one that lets doubt eat away at her.
She is Sara.
I know I shouldn't have gone looking...AGAIN. But I did. Curse facebook and it's many powerful abilities. It was this time preserver, of this time before me, and all the times afterward and it made me extremely sad.
So why did I let it?
Why did I seek it out if I knew this is what it would do to me?
Because I knew it was there, and just by existing it haunted me. So I had to double check, maybe half hoping when I pulled it up that I had made a mistake, that I was wrong. Of course I wasn't.
It was worse than I remembered, and it sent me into a tumult of anxiety and sadness.
Worst of all, I felt ignored. Maybe I was wrong. But is it my fault I sought out the attention? And that I would have done anything to get it? More than any third party could ever imagine?
Would this ever go away? Could I ever be convinced?
I didn't know.
Things didn't seem to be able to go back to the way they were.
I may have been toned down, I may have been trying less hard, but it still felt like I was trying the hardest. Why was that?
I didn't know how to make the pieces go back together.

Light Disappeared

My mood went up and down.
I was okay and then I wasn't. I was happy then I wasn't. I felt something then I didn't. I was sure and then I wasn't. I was up and then I was down. He was warm and then he wasn't. I knew he was right and then he wasn't.
It was almost rollercoaster-like. But it was more like the baby version that kind of made you feel cramped and slightly sick. Amusement parks always induced sickness in me anyway.
I knew he shouldn't want me as much as he had before, because that closed him off from everybody. I couldn't demand all his attention. That didn't mean I didn't want to.
And I still felt a little alone.
Now that I was okay, people were no longer concerned. Well, I knew that was mostly not true. But I still felt that urge to withdraw and close myself off. I still felt the urge spend every moment with him.
How could that be?
Things would be rough for a while. I still felt insanely too busy for this. I felt like my life was overruled by busyness. And that honestly worried me. He was busy too.
The days, they seemed to drag into forever.

Tried So Hard

I tried so hard not to be angry.
I tried so hard not to be hurt.
I tried so hard to feel good again.
I could feel myself withdrawing from everything and everyone, letting my emotions fester and fume. It was tearing me apart. I'd fallen into this sort of behavior before, and it wasn't so great. The one where I stopped letting people know how I felt until it was absolutely at critical mass. But I felt like everyone was so tired and so sick of it. I felt like I was doing a million different things wrong and couldn't make anyone happy. And that's when I stopped trusting them with my feelings. I only hurt people when I made the decisions. When I voiced how I felt. I hadn't felt this guilty about it in a long time.
And I wasn't happy and I didn't know how to fix it.
I felt so alone.
Opening up drove him away from me.
And now I felt like I was in front of this large decision...and I had this odd sensation. Like the one you face before getting a shot or taking a test. Maybe it was just how I reacted, but I get extremely anxious. You remember it more painful then you could have ever imagined. That is how it felt to me, and somehow that didn't feel right. But the alternative didn't feel right either. So I was in the middle. Alone.

Right

How?
What?
I didn't know...I wasn't sure. Had I agreed?
Maybe.
Maybe not.
I pulled him over. His body felt comfortable, it kind of seems silly to say, but it really did fit like a glove. The kisses were soft and sweet and fit me perfectly, didn't feel harsh or gross. Could it really be wrong? Somehow kissing him didn't seem like enough of a guarantee. So when he left, I realized I had no idea what just happened.
The shock. The shock on her face when she walked in.
I felt like I'd been caught doing something wrong, or as if she was angry.
I felt...like he hadn't quite won me over. I was waiting for that moment, to know when it was right.

Learning Curve

So I suck at letting go.
But I'm trying, ok?
Decisions seem so foggy. I'm not sure which way is up now. He tells me, oh how he tells me. But I have such a hard time trusting it. Maybe it's because time has finally hardened me. Or maybe it's because I can't. He hurt me so deeply and thoroughly. Something inside me is withdrawing, to protect my quivering heart. And how it quivered. It was scared. It was frightened.
Would being with him really be the wrong choice?
At this point, I had no idea. I thought of all the reasons there was tension. He hadn't promised to be committed to me, he hadn't said he wouldn't change his mind again. The way he phrased things bothered me. He had "come to his senses." He said he had been wrong. Why did that bug me so much? I wasn't sure. I felt it was almost impossible to go back to the way we were. If not completely impossible. Could I grow to trust him again? And what about him graduating? And could he reassure me in the way I needed to be reassured? He held no promise for change. At least if he did, he didn't vocalize it. And I don't know if I could do that.
This is the point at which he felt he was just coming back to me for easy comfort. I mean, I knew it couldn't be that simple or seem that way to him, because human beings are complicated things. But I wasn't sure if he had strong feelings for me anymore like he thought he did. And if he did have feelings, were they feelings? Or were they feelings?
I guess I would just have to see what decision I made, although I was dreading it, because a lot depended on him. Could I let it go if I needed to?
Time would tell, and I would learn.

You Let It Go

I resisted every part of my body that was desperate to reach out to him...every part that told me to pull him in, and grasp him tight.
He was sad.
Sad was something I couldn't handle. Something I couldn't turn away from. But then was I his crutch? Was I allowing him to fall into the same behavior? To keep the bad habit going. I was just...another bad habit for him. I was just what was comfy and safe...but he had made his decision regarding me.
I felt like I'd been speared. My limbs flopped asunder. His sadness pierced me. But I couldn't turn back. After his roommate chewed me out, no way. I had to wait. Wait until he was strong enough to come to me, maybe longer. I didn't want to. I wanted to leap into his arms right now, give him the comfort he wanted and needed. But that was in no way a good idea.
With each day I felt my strength declining...what I once thought was a good idea was no longer a good idea. What I thought was a bad idea was suddenly becoming more ok. I tried to fight it...
One thought pestered me and ate away at my misgivings.
"If you love something, you let it go."
Is that what I had to do to make it alright?
Let it go.
I desperately clung to it. But so far I hadn't spoken a word to him in...twenty four hours? New record for me. Very new. So I tried to send a message in a bottle, via facebook. Send it out there, see what happens. And what I got was he was sad.
I could see myself failing. I could see it.
And my strength wavered.
If you love something, you let it go...