A sweet, empty dream

It’s so hard when you think that you are on the same page as someone else in your life. And then you aren’t. And instead of wanting to accept that realization, it’s easier to go back to sleep. To not think about it. To forget for just a little while. I wish I was still in bed not thinking about it right now.

For years and years I was on the same page as my significant other. We finished each other’s sentences. We solved each other’s Pictionary drawings when only one line had been drawn: Pilot! Aardvark! We always seemed to know what the other was thinking. What the other was feeling. Until we didn’t anymore. We stopped paying attention. We stopped caring to look, to feel, to wonder. We were no longer in tune with the other person. Then we just let go.

I climbed into my bed that rests on the floor of my San Francisco apartment at 6:30 last night and I slept for three hours. From there, I wasted a bunch of time on Facebook and got text messages from the architect who broke my heart this past summer. “Leave me alone” was all I responded to him. His messages came on the worst day in the hardest week. I was feeling so vulnerable last night and it was tempting to reconnect with him. Not really. Well, maybe just a little bit. But I just ignored him. Leave me alone. Alone.

A couple of days ago, I looked at a house. A house that I’m likely to rent. It will be my house. My stuff. Not our house. Not our stuff. It’s terrifying, even though I have known for many months that Ken and I would eventually not share a house. Moving into my own house is just so much more official than not cohabitating. Even when he’s not in the house where our kids live seven days a week, he’s there. His stuff is there. His picture is there. Our family photos cover the walls. His essence is there. Even if he isn’t physically there at the same time I’m there.

After ignoring the architect, I had a bowl of Moroccan stew and went back to sleep. It was about 11 pm. I didn’t get out of bed until 11 am this morning. That’s 16 ½ hours of being in bed, most of it asleep. And honestly, I could have kept sleeping. I really wanted to keep sleeping. Those hours of denial are so appealing. I think I might also be coming down with something. Or that’s what I’m going to tell myself because that’s easier to accept as the reason of craving hours of nothingness. A sweet, dark dream of nothingness.

But I have a 15-page paper that due tonight. So I should be working on schoolwork. But this has been one of the hardest weeks for me since Ken and I split up in April. My emotions have whipped across the spectrum, like an erratic kite in the sky. And schoolwork is the last thing I seem to be able to manage right now. Because I’m writing about Riley’s early days in the hospital. His first surgery. And that means visiting really dark places. And thinking about what that was like. And wondering about who was there to hold my head as I cried. From there, I wonder who will hold me next time I need to lean against someone in the hospital waiting room.

I wish I was writing about puppies. Or rainbows.