Once upon a time, & not all that long ago, she was the centre of his world. There was no question nor a doubt in her mind. And it was all those little things that made her feel so. The little things that cost nothing except in the time it took for her to cross his mind; to live in his thoughts long enough to say “Good Morning Beautiful.” She knew she was his first good morning & his last goodnight . . . & it was all she needed. So when did it all change? And why? When did the 7 seconds it took to send that message become unimportant, require too much effort . . . when did the “little things” become too big to bother doing? When did she no longer become worth the effort?
Was it a misrepresentation of character? Was she a fool in allowing herself to believe this was real? To trust again? Why could she not keep one single fucking promise to herself . . . “Protect yourself, keep the wall intact, stay safe, stay whole & never give any more pieces of yourself away; for heaven’s sake just keep them tucked away. Learn from your past.” However, for the brief moment that she believed she was being adored & loved simply for being her very plain self, she had to admit it felt wonderful. Oh how she hated to admit that but dammit all, it did feel amazing, if only briefly, to believe that that kind of love existed in the world & that for a brief time she got to experience it. His first good morning & his last good night . . . it’s all she ever really wanted to be for anybody. Just simply his first, his last & his only.
And NO, she wasn’t looking for nor interested in a fairytale. She used to believe in fairytales but 40 plus years of life had taught her otherwise. And besides, fairytales are not everlasting & she wanted everlasting, in the growing old with someone. Growing old with her best friend . . . long after passionate kisses at sunset & nights of endless love making, she wanted to look into his wrinkled face & his “lil’ shit grin” & remind him “I love you more.” To remind him that being his best friend, lover, occasional pain in the ass, but always his partner & biggest fan, was one of her greatest gifts . . . one of her greatest joys.
It’s not like there weren’t warning signs. She just chose to believe in the good in him being greater than & more than anything that was less than that. She choose to continue believing in & seeing all that she saw in their first conversation . . . an incredible man, with an incredible heart & a tremendous capacity to love. He was real, she was older & she hoped wiser, at this point in her life. She did not expect him to show up at his best all the time. How could she ask that of anyone when she herself, didn’t always show up at her best. She needed to see all the raw & messy parts in him as well as the beauty, because if she could handle those, then the rest was easy. And besides, those messy parts counted for so little of all that he was, in his soul space. He was much more of everything else. And how could she authentically love him if she were unwilling to accept the messy, tangled up parts? Everything . . . all of it, was the total sum of who he was & she was so in love with all of him. So to discount any part of him would mean changing him & she was not interested in changing him. She was not interested in changing anyone. To be accepted & loved for who she was at her very core, she had to accept & love him for who he was at his. And she really did love all the parts that made him into the man he was.
But maybe this wasn’t enough for him anymore. Or perhaps, he just took her for granted. Perhaps he had become too comfortable & too complacent in knowing that she would always be there; that she would always “show up.” That no matter how he showed up, she would be there . . . she would listen . . . she would put herself aside to be completely there for him. Perhaps her kindness & willingness to sit back & keep quiet about her own storms & to put him first, had taught him that she did not matter; that her needs & her feelings were not a priority. Yes . . . she had taught him this & so she owns this. And in her silence & in her desire to be everything that she believed he needed in her & from her . . . she had taught him that she was less than. Worse than that . . . she had taught him that she was okay with it.
The truth is her heart had been terribly broken. Her spirit, hurt. Her faith in humanity, questioned. She had lost, she had sacrificed & she had cried rivers & oceans of tears. But she knew that the only way to heal a broken heart & a bruised spirit was to move forward with hope, to tend to her spirit & open her eyes to the abundant reasons to have faith once again. It was the only way she knew how to get better, to be better & to live happy & free from the shackles of her past. She wonders now if he ever really was aware of just how much this was a part of her. Was he ever aware of how much this accounted for her messy & tangled up parts? She wonders now if he ever really opened his mind to just how much she had to let go, in order to completely give herself to & trust in all this; to trust in the “Us.” Did he really understand just how scared she was at times, but also how excited & happy she was in all the possibilities of what could be. Did he “get it” that in letting go & trusting in herself & in him, she believed she would be okay, but also that in allowing herself to not be bitter & live from her past, she was the most vulnerable she had ever been. This was the only way she was going to be able to immerse herself in all this & really feel it, live it, embrace it . . . she had to let go, she had to trust & she had to believe that even if . . . that even if she were to get hurt, she would be strong enough to survive it . . . again.
But still that one question lingers in her consciousness & weighs on her heart . . . when did the little things stop being important? Perhaps the better question is . . . “When did it cease to be important, how much all those little things mattered to her?”
xo ~ Tonya
Tonya Fines 