6 months

It has been 6 months since Karen sat down on the couch.
6 months since she gave me the news that we were no longer "we".
Sure, I guess if you broke my thumbs I would say that
she had made up her mind, so we were not "we" when she sat down.
We probably had not been "we" for a while.
I have written a lot of words since then.
I have taken quite a few pictures.
I am glad I did both of those things.
It gives me a perspective I probably would have lost.
I can vividly remember the exact moment when I took every picture.
It is frozen in time inside me.
Every feeling when the shutter clicked.
Every thought in my head at that second.
Some of them were REALLY bad.
A few of them were joyous.
At some point I will journey through all of them and write what I feel now.
However, this is the 6th month one.
The past few days have really been hard.
Actually the past week I guess.
I was really on the top of my game when I fell.
It was totally the stuff leading up to, and then signing the papers.
All of a sudden, I felt exactly like I did at the beginning.
In a way, it was almost worse.
All the anguish was back.
I almost took this project offline again.
But then, as I wrote more words in it, I began to feel a bit better.
Not good or anything, just a bit better, less pained.
I was again casting my words out.
That is what I do here.
For the past 6 months I have been sharing my pain.
Not with anyone in particular, just the world.
There is something about that that is very powerful.
It can change what is going on inside you.
Knowing that strangers can have a window inside you.
That they can see you as just a human being.
For some reason, that makes me feel a bit more normal.
There is so much I have learned in these 6 months,
yet, there is so much more I need to learn.
I do not want to keep getting kicked off track like this.
I know the only way I can have that happen is to get through this stuff
and then take the time I need to learn and grow from it.
I already promised myself that I would.
I don't think I am as bitter as I was.
Actually, I just want to get this done and get on with the healing from it.
I feel like I am a plane in a holding pattern.
I can now see the airport, but I don't have clearance to land yet.
Once I get that, well I will disembark from the plane.
I'll wait at the baggage claim for my luggage.
I'll drive home, unpack, and figure out how much clean underwear I have.
Find out how much laundry.

Then I will set about cleaning up.
Some things have become dusty.
Inventory and then clean what is left.
Yeah, that is my game plan.
Heck, I might even smoke another cigar along the way.
With this one though, I say 6 months have gone by.
I do not mark it with joy or sadness, it is what it is.