Soul Mosaic

Meanwhile, in the rest of my life…

If my life from 1983 through the summer of 1986 had been a non-stop Nor’easter of a storm, the next two years, by comparison, were more like the calm of a tropical Caribbean paradise.

Regarding work, while I continued my efforts to sell articles and read more books on how to write effectively, my switch to the evening shift and working in the other lab departments was a major improvement. While still a struggle at times, the change offered different co-workers, more variety as every week I worked a different department of the lab, and growing confidence. By getting back out into all the other lab departments, I had a chance to reinforce my knowledge and thus, feel much more skilled at my work.

Hobby-wise, I continued to paint as well as explore other mediums, such as pen-and-ink, charcoal, and watercolor washes. And business-wise, I took the opportunity to refinance my condo mortgage when a better interest-rate was available.

For the moment, my parents were still away, living in Texas, where my father’s job had taken him. That was a relief for me. I could explore my feelings about them in therapy, as well as slowly learn about boundaries and effective ways to live, without the pressure of having them nearby. I will also confess, I didn’t know what I felt about them. A few friends were losing parents, some way too young. And parents whom they loved deeply and had good relationships with. They struggled with why their parents had been taken away. I was struggling with why did I have mine, who had been nothing but pain. Why were mine healthy and alive when I wished to be free of them, and others, who still wanted their parents with them, lost them?

And God? I was still pretty angry at God. For sure, I had no use for any form of organized religion, and I kept God at arm’s length. But…there was a longing for some kind of spirituality. I wasn’t quite ready to delve deeply. But it was there, gnawing at the back of my brain. I just sort of kept the whole area “on ice.”

That said, I was finding a way to be more comfortable with “leaving religion” as an open question to be explored “later.” And now and then, I would open a bit to God. But if there was a relationship wall up at that point, it was with God.

And About Ed…

Here, life was good. Once we got back together, we stayed together. Weekend visits, trips camping in Vermont. Visits to museums and Boston. It was great. He even started accompanying me on Sunday morning breakfast visits to see my great aunt. She was the aunt who had lived on the third floor of my grandfather’s house. She was now living in a senior apartment building. And I had continued to bring her the Sunday paper, and she would make breakfast. I sensed her growing approval of Ed.

One Sunday when he wasn’t with me, she gently asked questions.

“Is he older than you?”

Even though Ed was almost 4 years younger than me, since he was mostly bald, I knew that was why she asked that. So I told her that no, he was actually younger. She seemed pleased,

“Has he been married before?”

I could see growing interest and approval when I answered, “No.”

So, she went for one more:

“Is he Catholic?”

I wasn’t sure how my 84-year-old, Slovak, Catholic aunt would respond to this one, but I said, “No.”

She seemed to consider this for a moment, but then must have decided that “2 out of 3” was good enough. So she always set a place for him at breakfast after that.

Another time, he and I spent a spring Sunday morning exploring a local greenhouse. I checked out the herb plants while describing the herb bed I’d had at home, which I missed. And then there were the concrete bird baths. I had indulged in bird feeders at my condo, and was learning to identify all the different breeds.

Later that week, I came home to a message from him that told me to look on my back deck. There, waiting for me, was the unique leaf-shaped bird bath I’d been admiring that day at the greenhouse. Apparently, after finishing up a job with a software client, he drove across the state to that greenhouse, bought the bird bath, and set it up on my deck – a surprise for me.

He treated me like gold and told me I was “precious.” Every time he would say that, though, I would recoil. I found it impossible to take in that level of honoring. I wasn’t ready yet…and wouldn’t be able to hear that word about me for decades. In fact, only now. But still he kept saying it, and has always meant it.

Metal gas cans, control issues, and “tough trees”

One of the things about crafting a life after being so controlled and abused is that I never wanted to be controlled like that again. So the pendulum swings to the other side for a while. Frankly, even now that pendulum is still moderating. So I have my forceful “declarations” about things and my quirks. Ed will just nod and accept it without interfering. One of the things that has always been a gift is his ability to let me work it out my way, no matter how hard-headed I am about something.

He one time observed that, “When you decide to do something a certain way, there is no deterring you. You will insist on going directly through a brick wall and will pound your head against it until your head is a bloody pulp, before you will finally decide to take the easier way, get up, and walk around it.”

And…he is right. I have mellowed over the years, but I am still struggling. Another time, he noted that when Olivia Newton-John did her song, “Have You Never Been Mellow,” she did a special version for me entitled: “You Have NEVER Been Mellow!”

It is one of my scars, one I keep trying to ease. But he has never tried to control me, and gives me a lot of rope. That said, he does have his line in the sand, and I know where it is and respect it. When he has had enough about something, I don’t push him.

Regarding “outbursts,” I decided one day I needed to get a gas can for my car. Remembering my escapade in Litchfield when I purposely ran out of gas, I’d been meaning to pick one up. I knew exactly the kind I wanted — one of those heavy-duty, solid metal gas cans. The REAL type of gas can. Metal. But all I could find were plastic ones. I came home in a rage, venting about the demise of a society that no longer offered decent, real, METAL gas cans. That is now a joke between us, and even with my friends. They all know that when I am serious about getting the “proper, well-made” type of item, whatever it is, it has to be a “metal-gas-cans” quality object! And yes, years later, I finally found one…and it leaked! But I did eventually find another one that is solid and doesn’t leak.

Ed’s sense of humor extended to the “control issues,” such as leftovers in the refrigerator or other things I didn’t want to deal with. I would just ignore them until the item rotted, or whatever it was, no longer needed my attention. One day, he left a note on a very old “something” in the refrigerator: “Is this a control issue?”

And he never said anything about the Christmas tree I destroyed by leaving it in the cold garage for a week without water. When he came over and saw it, he asked carefully, “Shouldn’t it be in water?”

I dismissed the question with a cursory, “It’s cold out here. It’s tough. It can take it!” A completely idiotic response, yes. Just because it was cold, that didn’t negate its need for water to stay fresh. And of course, when I did pick up the tree to bring it into the condo, all the needles dropped to the ground like an extreme “Charlie-Brown” tree. He just smiled and then came with me to get a new one. My “It’s-tough-it can take it” comment is another family joke to this day.

He also never said anything about my bumper sticker then, which said, “If you don’t like the way I drive, stay off the sidewalk.” Nor did he lecture me about the speeding tickets, though I still think it was a dirty trick that the state was using snow plows and confiscated Corvettes as the “speed traps.” But all joking aside, yes, there was that sense of rebellion at anything “thwarting” my wishes. Not an attitude I recommend, and one I’ve spent a lifetime trying to heal. I’ll speak more about that later in terms of what I understand now.

My dogs – two small poodles – seemed to accept him. Well, one accepted him. The other battled him for the “alpha male” role.

My mother and the “pissing contest”

By the summer of 1987, Ed moved in with me. We had decided to give things a try at the “next level.” We were still pretty independent in our activities at times. In fact, the weekend he moved in with me, I was away with friends. Looking back, I know that while we had come a long way in bonding, I still needed “space.” But he was fine with that. And where intimacy was concerned, he accepted my boundaries and didn’t “push” if I needed space there, too.

My male dog, on the other hand, was not pleased that Ed moved in. In fact, one night, he resorted to a literal “pissing contest.” Ed was reading in the living room and heard “water running.” He looked up to see my male dog staring him down while he marked his territory right on the living room rug. Needless to say, it was the first of more than one tense moment where Ed had to get down at eye level and let my dog know who was the “top dog.” The other dog was a happy-go-lucky female who just reveled in running around and playing. She didn’t care who was there.

And then there was my mother. My parents returned to Connecticut in late 1986 or 87. Though they never lived in Torrington again, they were in an apartment in Farmington. When she heard that Ed had moved in with me, aside from telling my sister that she hoped Ed and I weren’t sleeping together, she asked me if I did that “on purpose.”

What she meant was that my missionary uncle was visiting for a month right at that time, and she considered my timing to have Ed move in to be an affront to them both. Frankly, it had never even occurred to me. But, at least she didn’t have to be “shamed” by my living in sin too long.

“Happy Birthday”

By the fall of 1987, we were moving toward making our arrangement “permanent.” We even looked at a few rings. One November weekend, right around my birthday, Ed approached me with a small box and, on bended knee, asked me to be his wife.

The ring was beautiful. He had gone to the diamond district in Boston, where he worked with a man to select the stone and a setting. That was so him. Unique. Special. Full of heart and thought.

With no hesitation, and full of love and certainty, I said, “Yes.”

It may have taken me a long time to commit. But once I committed, it would be for good. And that was going to be necessary for the challenges and blessings we would face in the next many years.

Looking like crap

I remember being very uptight waiting for Ed to arrive at my condo that Saturday morning. For sure, I had no idea how he would react to what I was going to share. I kept rehearsing things in my head for different ways to tell my story. But in the end, there was only one way — just put it out there…and hope he wouldn’t leave.

If that wasn’t bad enough, there was how I looked. I had spent the previous day at the shore and had a bad sunburn. Not just on my skin, but my lips. So on this, the very day I wanted to look my best as I delivered the hardest news, instead, I now had fever blisters all over my lips.

I just remember looking in the mirror and thinking, Oh great! The hardest conversation of my life, and I look like crap. So on top of what I have to tell him, now he’ll also think I’m diseased and ugly! How can this possibly go well?

When he got there, I immediately explained what had happened and how frustrated I felt. That whole “we finally get together after months, and I look like crap.”

True to that good heart of his, he laughed and acknowledged the irony of it all. He wasn’t disturbed by my poor sunburned lips. In fact, I remember him saying that it was good to be back at my condo.

So about your request that morning…

A lot of that day is almost a blank in my memory. Nervous tension, I guess. I have a vague recollection of sitting across the table from him. And of reminding him of his request on our second date: “So tell me about you! I want to know who you are.”

At that point, I remember taking a deep breath, and then I just “jumped off the dock into the deep water, hoping for the best.” I laid out for him why I had been unwilling to answer him, or to let him close. And I told him all I could think of about the abuse up to that point.

He sat there quietly and listened. I give him credit because he didn’t bolt. He heard me out. I think we went out for supper or something. Again, I think I was so drained from the stress of it all, I cannot remember.

Ed did tell me more recently that it did take him a bit to process what I shared. It was not a given that he would stay. But, in the end, he came back. Again. And again… for which I am eternally grateful.

Could a “normal life” yet be possible?

I was really sad that Ed had chosen to move on from our relationship. I kept wondering why he couldn’t have given me just more time. But…he wanted serious. I was terrified and just didn’t know WHAT I wanted. So, I guess I could understand. With reluctance, I returned to the dating service.

The real estate guy

Well, he was actually a high school history teacher in another town, but his real passion was real estate. He bought a house, fixed it up on his weekends, then flipped it for a profit. I don’t know if it was lucrative or not for him. If it was, he certainly didn’t spend it on dates or outings. We mostly just met up at the local diner or another fast-food type of place, ate, and argued.

I didn’t invite him over. He didn’t invite me over. Frankly, it was not that kind of relationship, at least to me. And…after the breakup with Ed, I wasn’t really in that place anyway. But, he was company.

He told me he liked me because I argued with him. I remember shaking my head at that. But we did argue. A lot of the things he said I just didn’t agree with and told him so. That apparently intrigued him. I just remember him as a decent person, hard-working, who didn’t share much about his life other than about his houses, which he was always working on. Sometimes I wondered if he had a secret family. But we would have dinner now and then, as I wondered if he would ever share more about himself.

One day, he called and said he wanted to share something special with me. We met up by the airport near Hartford, as that was central for us, then he said he would drive me to the place he wanted to show me. It was a nice afternoon, so I enjoyed the ride while we argued some more.

I expected we were going somewhere in Hartford, but after about a half an hour or so, I realized we were still going. Finally, we got to Middletown, and while I still wasn’t worried, I was now a bit more alert.

In fact, as we got off the highway, I thought of Ed. Right before we broke up, he had moved to Middletown – bought himself a condo there. As we drove into town, I thought that if I needed help, I knew I could call him, even though we weren’t together anymore. No matter what his situation was, he would help if I needed him. I knew that heart of his.

We headed down one of the main streets, past the playhouse on the Connecticut River. That’s when we turned off onto a side road, then down a quiet road with only a couple of houses on it. It was getting dark now, and I noticed that the last house on that road had its outside light on, though no one seemed home. Suddenly, I was getting uneasy. Unless we were visiting someone here, there didn’t seem to be any other destination around. My hand went to the car door handle.

Passing the last house, we turned down a dirt road on the right. I gripped the door handle and looked back to see where I could run for help. At the same time, the voice in my head was screaming: HOW could you be so stupid?! When you read about finding women dead, THIS is how it happened!

At that moment, he stopped the car, looked out toward the empty woods and the river in the distance, and said, “This is the saddest place in my life.”

The voice in my head responded with Oh great! Is this where he buries the bodies?

I was about to bolt from the car when he added:

“I had a chance to buy this piece of property, and I blew it.”

Property…real estate. I should have known it wouldn’t be about a woman.

He then drove the rest of the way down the road to the brightly lit parking lot of a marina. Apparently, he kept his boat there and wanted to show me.

It had all been truly innocent. This man, who never spoke much about himself, finally decided to open up to me and show his passion for the river, his boat, and how he longed to buy a piece of land and build himself a house on the river.

I was drained and shaking, and must have looked pale because he said to me, “Are you okay?”

When I told him what I was thinking as we drove down the dirt path, he was horrified and realized how scary this must have been for me. We laughed it off, and I calmed down. But if we looked at his boat, I can’t remember it.

We drifted apart after that. He was busy. I moved on. A little over a year later, I did get a phone call from him asking how I was and if I wanted to get together. I thanked him, but by then I was engaged — something I’ll get to shortly. He sounded truly sad. Offering congratulations, he told me that if things didn’t work out, to give him a call. I thanked him and wished him well. I do hope he found someone who was equally passionate about boats, rivers, and real estate.

The true gentleman

About the same time, a coworker fixed me up with a friend of hers. He was a really nice man, very kind. And I liked him very much. It had been a few months since my breakup with Ed, and I decided to try to be with someone again.

We went to his home, and things started gently and very nicely. But that voice in my head spoke up. It and my gut declared, This is wrong. I don’t want this.

I hadn’t expected that response in me. He was a nice man, we liked each other, and I wasn’t trying to lead him on. It’s just that in that moment I knew…I wasn’t that person anymore. I didn’t want “light and fun.”

Apologizing profusely, I told him I truly had wanted to be with him, but it just felt like this was the wrong thing to do.

To this day, I will be very grateful to that man. He was a true gentleman. You hear so often about date rape. And I certainly had put myself at risk without intending to. But he was truly gracious. I hope the Universe gave him someone who could bring him the happiness he deserved.

The dream…

The last straw after these two experiences was the dream. In it, I was about to get married. I was standing at the altar, about to say “I do,” even though I didn’t really want to be there. It seemed to be more a situation of “someone asked, and I said yes.” So I went ahead and said “I do.”

At that very moment in the dream, I looked across the room from the altar, and there stood Ed. Heartbreak and pain seared through me as my brain screamed: What have I done?! I’ve just made the biggest mistake of my life, and it’s too late!

I remember waking up still feeling that terror, and I was so relieved to know it was just a dream.

The most carefully worded card ever…

Very shortly after this, I was riding with a friend somewhere and shared these three almost simultaneous experiences. I lamented about how I wished I hadn’t been so afraid of getting serious with Ed, and how much I missed him.

She said the most useful one line in my life: “Why don’t you write to him?”

I had not considered that. I assumed he had written me off and moved on to someone else. But…what could it hurt to send a simple hello card?

Ed would later tell me that when he got the card, he read my note several times, trying so hard to glean any sense of what I was feeling. But he said it was the most carefully worded card ever, and so he just had to take it at face value and decide – should he contact me or not?

I had written it very carefully because I didn’t know if he was in a relationship, and I didn’t want to create a problem. But I held my breath, hoping desperately that, unlike my dream, I wasn’t too late.

To my greatest surprise, relief, and gratitude, he replied. I asked him to come to my condo to talk.

I had decided. My background was the real block between us. I had kept up my wall so that I would never have to share my story with anyone. But that wall had broken us apart. I was tired of running.

So. He had wanted to know who I was?

Well, maybe he would run, or maybe he would stay. But whatever his decision, it was time for me to take a risk and tell the whole story…

Those walls

Not long after that trip, we met up another weekend. He knew that night in Boston that I didn’t respond well to his declaration of love for me. I had explained it simply as I just needed to go slowly.

We stood outside his apartment one evening. He looked at me with such kindness and said, “I want to help you take down your walls.”

In my mind, the answer was instantaneous. Oh hell no, I thought. I just got my life under control.

The struggle as I stood there? Before me stood the kindest …truest heart… and one that I knew had been hurt by others. I did NOT want to hurt him…I could walk away from others, but …he was different. Yet I couldn’t risk upsetting the stability that I had just obtained.

“Couldn’t we just keep it fun and light, no serious ties?”

We met again for dinner at that “family-style restaurant” where I again tried to explain why I didn’t want to get serious. He listened. He was very quiet.

That January, not long after that night, we met on a weekend morning in Torrington. At a diner…which was just across the street from the Burger King parking lot, the parking lot he met up with me the first time he came to Torrington.

Looking at me with what seemed a mixture of sadness yet acceptance, he told me he was setting me free. He could see that I didn’t want to get serious, and he understood. Then he wished me well and took his leave.

I sat there thinking…But…but…

Looking back on that time from now, I feel such pain in my heart. True pain. For the hurt he felt. For the place I was still in, full of fear, yet not wanting to be apart.

Sniffing bags in the garage

We stood together, hunched over the trunk of his car in the Boston parking garage, sniffing the aromas of various white bags.

Closing up the bags, I said to Ed, “You know. This looks bad, us standing here sniffing all these bags. Anyone watching us would think we had something more interesting than coffee here!”

We both laughed, and one of us commented that while freshly ground coffee smelled great, it was too bad it didn’t taste just as good when you brewed it.

Given that Christmas was only a few weeks off, the coffees were gifts for several of our friends. This was an era before local coffee shops, so it was a rare opportunity to find so many exotic and flavored beans in the stalls of Quincy Market.

The first weekend away

Ed had been up in Boston all that week and the next for a software training conference. Since he was already there in a hotel, he invited me to join him for a weekend in Boston. That was the first time I’d ever spent a weekend away in a hotel with someone I was dating. Yet again, I felt no worries. Just excited to spend time with him and explore Boston. Between shopping, museums, and restaurants, we were having a great time.

In fact, that whole fall, getting together with Ed on weekends had been such a joyful time. We both loved food and history, went to museums, went horseback riding, and took walks in local nature parks. Sounds just like one of those classified ads. But truly, no matter where we went or what we did, being with him was peaceful and fun.

We kept finding that we had so much in common. And he respected my wishes. Some weekends, I didn’t want intimacy, just companionship. And he never pushed. I was always amazed that a man could actually accept and respect boundaries, ESPECIALLY around sex. So it made perfect sense that I was totally at ease going away with him.

Anyway, later that particular Saturday afternoon, done with shopping and frozen from the biting cold, we started back to the parking garage. Winding our way from Quincy Market, we turned down North Street, trying to get out of the wind. We suddenly found ourselves in the middle of a farmer’s market. Booths of fresh vegetables and all kinds of foods lined both sides of the street, and people packed the street. Vendors stood around 50-gallon drums that served as makeshift fireplaces, which we gladly made use of ourselves. In spite of the cold, it was a special moment. Just a small little world of its own, tucked into the middle of this bustling city.

Continuing down the street from one fire barrel to another, we turned down a side alley and headed toward a large intersection that turned out to be Union Street. There on the corner was this most amazing seafood restaurant in an old brick building — The Union Oyster House. Apparently, it is now a National Historic Landmark and has been a restaurant since 1826. In fact, according to the sign there, Daniel Webster used to spend many a night at its oyster bar, downing “a brandy and water with each half-dozen oysters, seldom having less than six plates.”

Absolute perfection

Between the charm and ambiance of the old brick building, its history, and the fact that it featured the freshest of seafood, not to mention that it looked incredibly WARM, we went in. And it was better than we dreamed.

The crowd inside generated a warmth that immediately started thawing our frozen faces. People were jammed everywhere, especially surrounding the wooden oyster bar. The old dark wood of its base supported a display that was mounded with piles of fresh oysters half-buried in ice, and surrounded with barstools. If only the place could talk, what stories it could tell. History just oozed from every wooden panel, and I half expected to see the ghost of Daniel Webster sitting there amongst the crowd.

The hostess took us up past the second-floor level that was filled with dark bench tables to a booth on the third floor. It was a bit quieter up there, so we could actually chat and hear each other. It was like stepping back in time to another world. Dimmed lights. Wooden booths and floors. Parchment-type menus. And the dinner itself. Warm drinks. Thick clam chowder. Baked stuffed lobster. And us. A moment of heaven on earth.

And then…

After dinner, with stomachs full and bodies warmed, we strolled back out into the cold and ended up inside a little bar called Frogg Lane, which is long-since gone. But that night we sat there bundled up and indulged in hot chocolate spiked with peppermint schnapps, and topped with Creme de Menthe-drizzled whipped cream. The night was absolute perfection. And then…he said it….

“I love you.”

And I quietly freaked out inside myself.

So, this is Torrington…

As he shared with me later, Ed’s “auspicious” introduction to my hometown was watching a fist fight in the Burger King parking lot while he waited for me to come by. I think that left him wondering just a bit what he was getting himself into. But again, he stayed.

I had invited him to come to Torrington for our second date, and rather than struggle with convoluted directions to a restaurant or my condo, I told him I’d meet him at that parking lot. It was right where the road from West Hartford came into town, and thus, the easiest way to manage things in the “pre-GPS” era.

Our first date at that “family-style restaurant” had actually gone…wonderfully. Beyond my wildest dreams. At least I thought so. We spent several hours at the restaurant, talking the whole time. Everything from our childhoods and jobs, to hobbies and life dreams. I shared my longings to be a writer and all my attempts to get that going. He spoke with excitement about all the exciting new computer technology he was getting exposed to, and all the unusual installations he visited to solve software issues. And this time, I was fascinated. Here was a computer person who could not only express what he loved about the digital world, but also explain intricate topics like he was telling a story.

It was just…easy, comfortable, safe. I couldn’t give you scientific evidence why. But my gut said so in spades. I’d never felt so in sync with another human before, like I did with him. So it was a no-brainer for me to invite him over when he asked about getting together again sometime. And we made that sometime, soon.

“So tell me about you”

The question was filled with genuine, kind curiosity.

“I want to know who you are.”

I rolled over, climbed out of bed, and said, “You don’t want to know who I am. Let’s go out for breakfast!” Heading out into the sunny day seemed like the best way to dodge deep questions.

Emotions swirled through me. I had never allowed any man to stay overnight at my condo before. If I invited anyone over, they had to leave afterward. Nobody got to stay over. And it’s not that I did that very much, anyway. And even then, it was only the gentle, sensitive types. Macho types could take a hike. I’d join a convent first before I’d give one of them the time of day. But no matter what, no one got to stay overnight.

However, this man? I never even hesitated to consider the question. He was such peaceful company, a sensitive person — I could feel that on a deep gut level — and just a fun person to spend time with and talk to. And he was an amazing lover. So I was both drawn to him and wary. That latter part was because I had the uncomfortable sense that this was a man I would not be able to easily walk away from. Not like the others. I intuitively knew that a gentle heart like his shouldn’t be trifled with.

The other men I had dated, I always kept up a wall between us. No matter how nice they were, I wasn’t going to get deeply involved. I wanted to remain in control and comfortable enough to walk away if they got too serious. I didn’t want to hurt anyone, but I wasn’t going to give up the freedom and relative stability I’d finally achieved for the upheaval of adding someone to my carefully arranged life. As far as I was concerned, I was content to keep things light, free, and fun. I would be happy with a long-term setup like that. A way to have a deeper connection and enjoy their company, without having to disturb my present peace and independence. Or discuss my past.

And that had worked just fine…until now. There was just something about him. The others were nice men. But he was nice on such a deeper level. How was I going to keep this under control?

All the self-caring touches

He told me later how, when he was in the bathroom, he noticed all the small, self-caring touches I had in there. The perfumes, the powders, even the bar of Maja soap – an exotic soap from Puerto Rico that was a gift from my uncle, who was a missionary there. I loved how it smelled, and I kept it in there just to inhale its fragrance now and then. I still do. I don’t use it. I just revel in its fragrance. And remember my uncle, too.

Also, Ed loved the flannel sheets on the bed. That was something new for him and a real treat. They were so warm, snuggly, and inviting. To this day, it’s strictly flannel sheets. We tried silk ones one time because they were supposed to be what everyone loved. Couldn’t stand them. Too cold…physically and emotionally. And all you did was slide around on them. Nope. Flannel only.

Years later, he told me how all those small sensory things impressed him. Told him here was a person who knew what she liked, and liked herself enough to treat herself to them.

But maybe if there was one true predictor of our supreme compatibility, it was that we both loved and had a lot of books. And he immediately noticed that we both had the same “log home and underground home” books. It was like two nerds recognizing a kindred spirit, even as the deeper significance was lost on us at the time.

So, while emotionally wary, I couldn’t resist seeing this “very different computer person” again…and again…

“I believe we have two lives. The life we learn with, and the life we live with after that.” — Iris, in the movie, “The Natural”

Read the ——- manual…

At 29, you could never accuse me of being wishy-washy or not willing to push the limits.

One sunny afternoon, I took a drive out into the backroads areas of Litchfield. I’d gotten to like that routine as a way to center and think. I had a new car and was trying to get as familiar with it as with my old one. I happened to notice that the fuel gauge hovered at “E.” On my old car, I knew from reading the manual that “E” meant there was about a gallon left and still a fair number of miles to spare. I wondered if this car did the same.

Now, your average person would have just pulled out the new car’s manual to check that, but hey, I just didn’t feel like stopping to read. Instead, with a streak of adventurous spirit, I decided to just do the “experimental” method and find out. Duh.

I ran out of gas. Out in the countryside of Litchfield. In an era of no cell phones. In a time when most gas stations were self-serve, and any kind of “rescue service” was hard to find. When I didn’t have AAA, and the nearest house was a half mile back down the road. So yes. I walked. Thankfully, someone was home, AND was even willing to make a call to a local station that still did repairs.

Suffice it to say that it was the most expensive gallon of gas I ever bought in my life when you added together the inflated cost of that gallon of gas and the service call fee. In any event, I learned that day, never question “E” again. “E” really did mean “empty,” not, “Hey, you better get to a gas station soon.” And next time, read the ——- manual.

But maybe the biggest lesson I needed to learn that day was the one I had been out driving around and thinking about – rules.

Why had I felt the need to push my luck that day in the first place? Why had I resisted reading the manual and instead just “rolled the dice?”

Rules. I had lived by so many my whole life. And they not only didn’t save me, they nearly destroyed me. I was angry and had thrown them all away. But was that serving me well? After all, there is angry, and then there is just stubbornly stupid. This ranked up there with shooting yourself in the foot to get back at the world.

I needed a new relationship with life, period.

A map to see what was?

When I was a kid, I came into possession of a topographic map of our town and the surrounding areas. I was fascinated. Here was something that not only showed you where various things were in relation to each other — north, south, east, and west —but also VERTICALLY!

Each of those rings stacked within each other told me if I was in a valley or on a mountain top, about to fall off a cliff, or amble on a level plain. Just the kind of thing I needed for my life.

I’d like to say I had the presence of mind to do something like this for my life then, but alas, I was still too unaware. I was just trying to stumble my way into new rules. And I would yet have a lot to learn.

But recently, I thought back to that map I had as a kid, and decided to look at my life during that period in a “topographical kind of way. Not just what happened and when, but what effect those events had on me.

What this tells me, what I was unaware of at the time and thus had no empathy for, was just how much damage all that chaos had inflicted on me. I saw the cliff I’d fallen off of when I saw that movie about incest that night in my condo. And just how deep the pit was that I landed in. Not to mention just how steep the walls of that pit were, and how hard it would be to climb back up.

By listing all the forces that pounded me all at once in that 1983-1984 time period, it left me amazed that I ever even tried to come back. And maybe a little less judgmental of that 20-something me. In contrast, looking at it all now, I am flat out amazed at her courage and tenacity. She was doing her best in spite of being a bouncing pinball at that time.

There is a saying that I’ll paraphrase: It’s not how far up you go in life, it’s how far down you had to start from….

New directions:

What I do know is that I came to the decision that I needed to get moving. I didn’t ever want to find myself that far off track again. In fact, I was proud to be simple, and if I couldn’t abide “complex,” that didn’t make me a baby. And…I had every right to be who I was.

I also needed to get back to focusing on my life and where I was going in it. There were some basic rules from the past that maybe were okay to keep. Basic decency. Love. Loyalty. But new things were needed… like boundaries. Never say “anything” again.

Regular life was resuming

As to my friend, we remained so for several years. It would be other things later that would finally break that.

In my outside life, work was getting worse. I had been working in the bacteriology lab now for seven years. I couldn’t do it much longer. That spring, I decided to take a solitary trip to Germany, a place I’d always wanted to visit. And a friend of mine had a brother there in the service that I could meet up with at some point on my travels. I went via a flight to Iceland and Luxembourg, then directly to Germany. I had no particular itinerary other than the one place where I would visit my friend’s brother. I drove around the countryside, saw some World War II sites and cemeteries, and thought.

It was, reflecting on it, a gutsy to just “wing it” on my own. I’d had German in high school, so I had a somewhat basic ability to ask questions at least. And for the most part, everyone spoke English. It was, at times, lonely and a little scary. But for the most part, it was beautiful, a boost to my confidence, and a breath of fresh air.

By the time I returned, I had decided I needed to make a change to my job one way or another. I started checking on pharmaceutical sales jobs. Looking back, I know I was not a good fit for that, but I was trying. And I kept doing my freelance writing, trying to sell articles to magazines.

Finally, a stroke of luck came late that spring — a second shift job opened up in the lab. It meant working all the lab departments — chemistry, blood bank, hematology, etc — and no longer doing the daily grind in microbiology. I applied. When the lab manager asked if I would reconsider and stay in microbiology, I told him I wanted the new position, or I’d quit and work at a burger place. So I got the job. THAT was a major shift for the better. Thank God. The second shift was all about emergencies, and getting back into all the lab areas versus only one. It also meant working with more of the other lab staff. It was a relief and made it possible for me to remain at the hospital job.

In that time period, I also finally resumed my dating service membership, which had been on hold for the last few months. It was a gentle easing back into life, and was working well. I met some very nice men, including one whom I dated for a bit and was able to be intimate with and experience no terror. There were others who were clueless that I didn’t bother with, and felt confident in saying so. I was slowly learning to trust my judgment, even as that quality would still take years to develop. But it was beginning.

Recover, repair, begin again…

The bottom line was that slowly, my life was starting to mend. The giant tear in my heart was finally pulling back together, even if scarred. A ripped apart heart will never, ever be the same. Not possible. But it can mend. And it will hold together enough to grow stronger.

That would be important because life was about to change again, dramatically, in August of 1985. The rapid changes would continue…

Pollywog revisited

So. In the months since being suicidal, I had managed to allow my friend to be a close emotional support. Something I never had before. And with her and her husband, I’d gotten beyond a major hurdle. But…what did that all mean? And did I even have the presence of mind then to begin to question things?

My friend observed where I was currently at: “You can’t keep getting sex from my husband and emotions from me. You need to unite the two in one person.”

As soon as she said that, I remember thinking, “Duh! How could I have been so stupid and so blind?”

The truth is, I wasn’t stupid. A harsh judgment again, especially given that I’d been “hanging on for dear life” to something that felt safe through the rapid changes over the last few months. But of course she was right. And I realized in that moment that I was like that kid back in the Pollywog class at the YMCA, desperately hanging onto the side of the swimming pool, terrified to let go and determined to just stay put and stay safe. But this wasn’t Pollywog, and I needed to start swimming on my own in my life’s “pool.”

Because there is only “now”

Looking back, I understand that this situation was a temporary thing. I probably realized it even then on some level. But at that moment, I was just “frozen,” appreciating the first semblance of solid ground I’d had in many months. And in my house growing up, I’d always had to operate from the “present moment” to deal with whatever mood Dad was in. So I was always reacting, not looking ahead.

In her book Of My Own Making, author Daria Burke spoke about how abuse and trauma narrow your focus so tightly that all you can see is the present moment:

“Surviving under such conditions puts a constant, draining demand on both body and mind…siphoning your energy as if simply making it through is a battle you fight over and over again….a cycle that leaves no room for rest or reflection….The brain, molded by the forces of environment and experience, turns its focus inward. The aperture narrows to the present moment…blur any vision of the future, making it difficult to see beyond the pressing needs of now.” (pg 72)

I certainly wasn’t in a place of reflection, seeing the bigger picture, or looking down the road. There had been so many changes, so much confusion over these last several months. I was struggling to handle the present, much less know what I needed to do next. The truth was that I had gotten in over my head in this….and I found myself asking myself: How did I end up here? And what had I done?

After the rejoicing, the shock and shame

In the light of day, blasted out of my narrowed focus on overcoming my sexual limitations, reality was shining a hard light on things.

This had helped me, but…had it been right? Ethical? What had allowed me to do something my old self would have never done? These were questions I would continue to ask myself for years to come, and the true understanding was years down the road.

In that moment, my reaction was simply a growing mixture of shame, horror, fear, and guilt. Shame and guilt, not so much for a same-sex encounter, or even the threesome, but more that I had been alone with her first, without her husband knowing. And that, by my old rules at least, was adultery. How had I let myself do that?

My one realization was that it had been driven by intense need and fear. The POWER of those needs took control, and I ended up doing things I never thought I would. At the time, I even shrugged off the red flag that maybe this wasn’t the best or a permanent choice when my friend had said, “Don’t tell your therapist about this.” All of it shook me to my core.

The person I was in the past was that devoted Catholic who followed every “Thou Shalt Not.” But I did. So, then, who WAS I NOW? I had thrown out all the rules in my life because everything from my past seemed a lie or a failure. And God had failed me. Still, I found myself questioning if having no rules was really the right answer in life.

I’d been like a pendulum in the wind, swinging wildly, struggling to hang on. I’d gone from one perception of reality to having it blown apart. From suicidal to hanging on, but lost in a pit of confusion. I may have clawed my way back from the edge of life and death, but…to what? I had stayed alive but crashed on the shore of relationships.

I couldn’t shake the guilt. Yes, we were all consenting adults, though, again, that first part left out her husband. And unlike childhood, I wasn’t a “victim.” While I was vulnerable, that didn’t make me a victim. Given my emotional background and my history, this all made perfect sense. In that moment, I simply knew that with no solid ground under my feet, and no moorings or rules, it wasn’t surprising I’d ended up so far from who I was at my core. But still. I owned my part in it all.

So, while I knew going back to the person I was before leaving home wasn’t the answer, still, it was time to figure out who was I, REALLY? Where was I going, and what WERE my ethics and guiding rules for life? It was time for a course correction here.

For the next several months, I didn’t go near anyone. Didn’t even date. I needed time to think, and figure out who I was, and what DID I believe in?

The more I thought about it, the more I realized this was not the direction I wanted to be in or stay in. I realized that my friend had, in fact, been right about one thing – I was NOT the sort of person cut out for “complicated.” But this time, I didn’t see that as my failing. It was me, who I was at my core, and trying to live any other way was just not me. I was a simple person, not that imagined “sophisticate.” And I was far down a road I did not want.

It was time for some rules again. While I realized that maybe the rules of the past didn’t apply, I needed to find a new set. Life still needed boundaries, ethics, if I was to live in a way that matched my conscience. So the next focus was to determine: Who was I, and where was I going?

The chapter in life never read aloud

We all, no doubt, have moments we are not proud of. Whether the transgressions were big or small, if they were in a book, they would be the chapters “never read aloud.”

But as many memoir writers have noted, to shy away from telling the truth is to defeat the purpose of writing. How do you learn? And if I am writing to heal and to share my story with readers, then I must be honest. How can I connect with anyone if I pretend to be above it all? If I were reading that kind of story, I’d spot it in a second and toss it in the trash.

A therapist, listening to my story a few years ago, said, “Did you expect to be perfect?”

Her frank calling out of my silliness in denying human frailties made me laugh and see how the only person I’d been fooling was myself. Of course, I had WANTED to be perfect…I had DEMANDED that from me. But then that had been demanded OF me my whole life. The truth was, I was just like everyone else — simply a human being. And…there is nothing wrong with being a human being. It just took me a lifetime to learn that.

Still, for me, this is the chapter that is the hardest to write. Others have been hard in a painful way. This one is compounded by the years of judgment and self-hate, and shame. Both by me, and by expecting others to judge and despise me. After all, I figured it would be easier for people…and myself… to feel compassion for me, the child who was abused. I assumed no one would have compassion for, or even understand, the messy path of my young adult self traveling on her way back to stability. So I hated me.

The months from the fall of 1984 through early 1985 were a time of need, yearning, confusion, and then of crossing a line I never would have crossed in the past. It is not possible to go smoothly from that abused, emotionally-battered, and immature young adult to a fully functioning, balanced, and confident one able to have and engage in adult relationships. Like so many other things I didn’t know then, I didn’t understand that the chasm that had to be bridged was huge, and the process for me, maybe for anyone, would be messy. I only knew I had a problem, it needed fixing, and one way or another, I would fix it. All it would need was determination and strength. No time for whining or weakness.

Having been brought up to be tough, to have no needs, and to follow Dad’s command to not be a “stupid woman,” aside from a couple of friends, I was, for the most part, a loner. Friendships with women were mostly a trainwreck, and I especially couldn’t stand to be around women who whined or seemed weak. I thought I was being strong, but the truth is, I was rigid and brittle. That is not strength. At some point, rigid and brittle shatters, and in those moments, you discover just how much you need, and how human you are.

Mother Hunger

I did have a good friend who was so compassionate about my ordeal. During my suicidal months, she checked on me, made sure I ate, and included me in her family outings. Her loyalty and intense caring blew me away. And I was so grateful.

But beyond nurturing, she saw me as a peer. Valued me as a friend. Needed me as well, as she had her own pain and wounds. And even though I was younger, she saw me as intelligent and mature in many ways, and didn’t mock my predicament or my wounds.

For me, I was incredulous. Surprised. Caught off-guard even, because I would never have taken anyone’s interest in me as real. I would have assumed I was misreading things.

Yet with her, for the first time in my life, someone listened to me, saw me…REALLY SAW me. And needed me as much. She affirmed me, defended me. Filled that empty core that felt it had no worth.

All my life, I’d had to fight for my survival at home all alone. There had been no mother I was close to that I could go to. No protection from his abuse. And often, I felt her coldness. I hadn’t realized just how lonely I was until I felt the power of my friend’s attention and caring, and bond. I had such a hunger for any mothering.

Daria Burke, in her book Of My Own Making, described the intensity of that need:

“For girls without mothers or maternal figures suffer an injury that author and licensed professional counselor Kelly McDaniels calls mother hunger, the feeling of terminal brokenness, of primal fear of abandonment, or disordered boundaries, a wound that resides deep within the right brain as a result of not receiving adequate nurturance, protection, and guidance in the early years of maternal attachment.”

So, my friend was exactly what I needed at the time, the combination “Mother-defender-older sister-best friend.” I couldn’t understand what she saw in me, but its effect on me was powerful.

The funny thing was that she was the type of woman I had also been told had no value. She loved nice clothes and was skilled with makeup — all the things in life I’d not learned to be good at, and had always treated with disdain. I wouldn’t have ordinarily been drawn to a woman with those interests, and I considered them trivial, maybe because those were the types of girls in high school who had shunned me. They may have looked good, but I was smart.

But somehow, in my friend, I saw you could be both. She was professional and accomplished, yet also valued makeup and feminine things. In fact, she gave them a grace and dignity. It went against all of my father’s programming.

But, I decided to hell with that. I’d already tossed out religion, God, and any life rules I’d grown up with. Time to toss the preconceived notions of womanhood my father had instilled, and give “femininity” another look. Maybe life, and women, didn’t have to be all one way or another.

The bottom line was that she was amazing to me. And I was grateful. Devoted. And intensely loyal for the care she showed me.

Oh, for tribal elders….

Most people have a time of experimenting during early teens. How to grow up? Have friendships. Meet boys. Share with friends. Those early teen same-sex relationships are a real bonding time that lets you learn so much and grow.

And as more than one therapist would explain to me later, those friendships and that time of life are all about experimentation and learning. Answering questions like who I am attracted to? What do I seek in them? What is it like to kiss? Am I gay? Straight? Mixed? And exploring things at your own pace as you move toward becoming a healthy, sexual adult. They added that most people’s first sexual experiences are often not great.  People are trying to figure things out, testing out approaches, and sometimes just trying to get beyond having sex the first time so they can get past that “never-having-done-it” stage.  You’re experimenting. Learning. Screwing up. And I didn’t have any of this.

Between my total domination by my father, my isolation, and the rules of my religion, I was totally unprepared for this part of life. So while I was a 28-year-old adult, in a lot of ways, I was emotionally a 16- or 17-year-old. That is a difficult situation to resolve, especially when you add in intense emotional needs and then the physical needs of young adulthood. Hormonal power versus the terror of men. Not an easy mix.

It was understandable that there was terror about men and sexual intimacy. My life had been filled with violence, terror, and fear.  The message from my father was always, “I need this, you must do it,” so sex was something that had to be done or else. All depended on it. His messages: This helps me with your mother. This keeps the family together. This is love. It was all so badly skewed. And it put all the responsibility for family integrity and his personal satisfaction on me. There was nothing in any of that about love, connection, or soul mates. To me, as far as sex and men were concerned, it was all one-way demands that were out of control and sucked the life out of one’s soul.

Add in that even if I did find a man I liked and maybe even TRUSTED, I had that whole disgusting background. How could I ever explain that? How would any man ever love me, much less not revile or judge me?

Yet, the power of hormones and the impatience to make a “normal life” for me was such that, in spite of all the odds against me, I wanted to try. At this point, it was almost an obsession. A “let’s just get this over with,” and then it will be all right. I saw it not so much as an emotional thing or connection, but a problem to fix. I was out of sync in life. I had no good prospects or boyfriends. There wasn’t a relationship that was going to slowly lead me to a gentle crossing over from virgin to “initiated.” No, this was a problem that just needed to be fixed. It wasn’t going to solve itself. And I was going to have to do something to just GET THIS OVER WITH. It would need action, not the passivity I’d had to learn as a victim all my life. No one was coming to rescue me. I had to rescue myself.

That said, I so wished I were part of some tribal group where the women elders guided, instructed, prepared, and supported the younger women as they made this crossing into adult womanhood. But that wasn’t going to happen.

I shared my despair, impatience, and frustration with my friend. I trusted her. And she was my mentor, my older sister, the one I’d always wanted. Maybe she had some advice.

The “eyes” have it

Hearing my woes as we drove somewhere, she laughed and said, “You just really need a good lay!”

Totally frustrated, I acknowledged the plain truth of her words, “Yes! I know that! But HOW?”

I so deeply appreciated that there was someone I could talk to about this. Yes, I could have brought it up in therapy, but we hadn’t gotten that far yet. And he was a man. I wanted that mother/sister figure to commiserate with and help me find my path in this area. My friend didn’t mock me but honored me with her caring and empathy. I responded one day by telling her how much I appreciated the respect she showed me when no one else ever had.

“I just want you to know I so appreciate you, and am totally loyal to you. I would do anything for you.”

She had a funny smile and said, “Anything?”

I noted the tone in her voice and the mischievous look in her eyes, but shrugged it off. Just as I shrugged off a couple of other looks I thought I saw from her. One time at the gym when we were in a sauna, and another time when I was in a bathing suit, it seemed like there was a slow looking me up and down. I wondered, felt flattered almost, but figured there was nothing to it. At that point in my life, the fact that someone was nice to me was overwhelming. And while I sometimes wondered and felt a strong attraction to her because of the emotional connection, I had never allowed or even considered anything more. I was satisfied with having the friendship.

Yet, there were those looks, and the question in my mind.

We continued to discuss ways to help my “problem.” One time, she suggested that since I was a 27-year-old adult but an emotional teen, maybe I should find a teenage boy. It was probably a joke, and for me, even in my current dilemma, there was no way I wanted that. That would have been what happened to me, and it would be statutory rape. No. That was not the answer.

And another time, she said maybe I should accompany her husband on a business trip. That I was totally uncomfortable with.

I came to the conclusion that this was not going to get fixed through normal channels, given my age and background. I’d seen articles about sexual surrogates. To me, that seemed like a possible answer even as it was a fringe idea. But I had grown up through those 1960s years of the sexual revolution and free sex. Maybe extreme problems needed extreme answers? And at least it wouldn’t be some teenage boy. Maybe there was someone who could help me overcome my phobia? All I knew was that this was my responsibility to fix.

Now I will say that I would most likely have brought that up with my therapist. I don’t think I would have unilaterally taken such an extreme step without consulting him. I do know that these days there have been studies with therapists employing sexual surrogates as part of therapy, though I don’t know how mainstream it is even now. And I am grateful I never pursued it, given that the early 1980s were the beginning of the AIDS epidemic. In any event, before I could discuss this with the therapist, things took another turn.

The energy

The conversations between us veered more and more into the topic of sex. What we thought about same-sex relationships. Preferences during sex for being in control or being led. Also, there was a lingering, and an energy to the kisses hello when I came by to visit. I felt drawn, safe, and loved.

Before I pursued the idea with my therapist of a surrogate, I came across an ad for a couple of dating services. One was, in my mind, too weird, with people making videos and talking about themselves. It wasn’t me. But the other was almost more like a matchmaker. You had to visit their office and fill out extensive questionnaires. Were you looking to get married? What kinds of activities did you like? Dining? Theater? Sports? And it was expensive. More than I had.

I almost walked out of the office. But then I considered things. They promised 3-5 “introductions” a month. Better than I had been doing with friends, trying to match me up. This was in the Hartford area, and these were men who were professionals — businessmen, doctors, men who wanted more than the bar scene and didn’t have time for that. I considered how in my town, there weren’t many options, and they often involved the doctors at the hospital stepping out on their wives or guys in bars, neither of which appealed to me. The form said you could stop your membership at any time. I looked at the book on the table with photos of happy couples. I signed up and paid the money. What did I have to lose?

The way it worked was that they would send you a note with someone’s name and contact info. You would call the office, and they would tell you about the person. If you were interested, you could arrange to meet somewhere. That kept it simple, safe. If you didn’t hit it off, you could each leave, and no big deal.

That was how I met a nice, gentle man who lived near Hartford. I was relaxed with him. We met up a few times and had a nice time. So when he invited me to dinner and his home, I nervously agreed. My friend helped me get ready — pick out an outfit, do the makeup…all those things I’d considered silly in the past, but now really appreciated help with.

It was a lovely time at dinner, and yes, I felt safe enough to join him at home. It was a risk, but I was going to try. It didn’t work out well – that whole first time with someone is often awkward, but this time it was not because of my issues in this area, but his. Maybe that was for the best. It was an opportunity to experiment with “being with” someone and to learn that it didn’t have to be out-of-control, and that others, men included, weren’t perfect in the sexual arena.

While maybe that could have been worked out in time, the fact that he didn’t seem to care about my needs in this raised a flag. And the last straw was his mentioning about have had sex with his cousin. That was a deal-breaker right there. I flashed back to my father telling me on a car ride how upset he was when he was in the Navy, because he missed out on the same thing with his cousin when his brothers didn’t tell him about their escapades with her.

So while that first experience left me feeling more confident and less afraid, there was no satisfactory outcome.

Can you handle it?

At this point, things continued to be suggested in conversations with my friend. And a sharing of some porn videos. Then, on one car ride, she admitted she wanted to be with me. I was both surprised and electrified. By this point, the increasing innuendos had affected me. And the depth of my feelings for this person who had helped me through the worst times of my life was very deep. All of it together made it overpowering.

She did hold back on one point. She wondered if I was “up for something complicated like this.” The implication was that this would require a more “sophisticated” person who could handle “complexity and shades of gray.” Could I handle something like this?

It was that kid part of me from years ago who answered with indignation. That kid, who, when riding her bike around the block, and her buddy said he could nail his football right in front of her bike tire, retorted indignantly with, “Go ahead! I dare you!” That kid who never ran from a challenge and was convinced she could do it. I, of course, hated the implication that I was a baby and couldn’t handle sophistication.

So, overwhelmed with need, emotionally and physically, I went ahead.

I had no idea of my own power yet. And emotionally, I was too far gone to turn back. I knew what we were doing was wrong. Not because it was a same-sex encounter, but because she was married. That was the wrong part.

At my house, she said I had to make the first move so I wouldn’t feel trapped, and again, I rose to the challenge. It started okay. But it’s one thing to kiss, and another to try to actually have sex. I was awkward, clumsy, nervous, and after a certain point, non-functional, and didn’t know what to do. And, frankly, aside from the kissing, I wasn’t really “feeling it” in terms of proceeding. And based on her responses, I suspect it wasn’t working for her either. Afterward, we both noted that.

But instead of dropping it there, we moved to the next step. She involved her husband. That worked better. And it was a relief. Finally, a situation that worked.

At the time, I just remembered thinking, “FINALLY I overcame that terror, that hurdle!

I can be NORMAL…I can be like everyone else! I just wanted to leap and rejoice….and of course, I felt proud I had handled “complex.”

In over my head after all…

The arrangement didn’t last long. My friend bowed out, but did send her husband over a few more times. But then it started changing again. I was in over my head and didn’t know it. I actually didn’t understand the rules of this, and was stuck in the “present moment.”

She said something that was right on the money, and when she said it, it was like someone snapped their fingers and the hypnotic dream world of it all evaporated. Instead, I was like “DUH! Of course…how could I be so stupid and not understand this…”

And once out of that dream world, I found myself in shock, wondering, “How did I end up here?” It was like that time on my bike with my friend and the football…I DIDN’T outrun it and instead, found myself upside down in the air….