Love amongst the ruins

Sometimes, I think relationships are like dreams and I am wandering in a nightmare right now...
Somewhere along the way I lost my joie de vivre, my raison d'etre, I seem to have misplaced me...
Somehow I am just sitting here, helpless, watching my house of cards come tumbling down around me like Athena's temple, crashing down, taking my life away...
Somewhere, somehow, someday I need to believe there will be love amongst these ruins, but
Somehow, I don't believe there will be a phoenix rising from these ashes.
Sometimes, I think I will be just an illusion of my former self, a facade - and if you look very closely you begin to see the cracks...
Somewhere along the way, when I gave my heart, I did not realise that you have to ask them not to take your soul too...
Sometimes, I just want to wake up from this horrible dream - and just be me again, even if it means being alone.

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"From where do I return,and on what wings, that I should accept, so slowly, humiliated and exiled,
to be myself" - Colette

Haunted by ghosts tonight - this one's for Tommie

Tommie....

Tommie was the father of my first-born child - my daughter - my beautiful daughter who is now carrying her second child. God bless them and keep them safe.

Oh the memories of Tommie - it's been so long since I have thought of him, but since I am being haunted tonight, (and since his ghost decided to descend upon me on my way home from work this past Thursday), I felt should devote a blurb to him...

It was sort of weird meeting Tommie - he was the not-quite-a blind date that I met through a mutual friend - his step-cousin. Weird - very weird. He was friends with this young man who happened to be living in the apartment down the street from me - Johnny - everyone loved Johnny - you could not help yourself - he was the life of any party - and back then at the tender age of 19 yrs - party I did!
At any rate Johnny had just hurt himself pretty badly in a biking accident - he had a broken collarbone and my sister and I - who were friends with him - were helping to take care of him. That particular day it was my turn....and he told me his step-cousin, Tommie was in town and coming over and that I should hang around to meet him.

Tommie showed up - he was very dark and brooding, very unusal; he just had non-conformist written all over him - he was an artist (I did not know this then) - he was very quiet - he was kind of cute - 1/2 Cherokee Indian - great cheekbones and eyes.

We all decided to go for a ride in the car with Tommie. Johnny sat up front riding shotgun, and I sat in the back seat. I happened to glance down at the floor of this very clean car (as it turned out, it was Tommie's mom's car) and spotted a thick book by Larry Niven (Sci-Fi writer) - I asked whose book it was - don't know why I asked....there was a silence and I looked up to find Tommie staring intently at me in the rear-view mirror - he had a weird little smirk on his face and he said "Why? do you read?" - don't ask me why - but just the little look and the tone in his voice - it wasn't quite sarcasm - it was more like a challenge - kind of intrigued me.

We ended up going down to a park by Lake Erie and Tommie and I got to know each other better. He had had a very rough life and he was currently working in a carnival. He had traveled all over the place. He was very smart and very street-smart - yet he had this vunerability about him and by the time we left the park I decided I liked him enough to say yes when he asked to see me again.

Our relationship began very slowly. He was quiet and he was hard to get to know. But I loved his wit, his humour, his talent with fine-line drawing - his artwork was amazing, his easyness with everyone - his attitude which was pretty much a blend of 'Fuck you and calm down' - he was tight - he was contained - he was deep.

Eventually we ran off together - I spent a summer as a 'Carny' - very interesting stories there - it's for another post or when someone asks me to write about it...
We made our way down the Eastern seaboard, we lived in New Orleans for 6 months and then moved on to Houston, TX.

In Houston - I wound up pregnant - it was not planned - Tommie did not want me to have the baby, however, I insisted - he became sullen and abusive - he did not want to get married so we didn't. I eventually left him when my daughter was only 18 months old - a lot led up to this - including his refusal to get some much needed medical help because he was looking very very sick to a lot of us down in Houston - which included two of his 1st cousins and he ignored us all - it's like he had a death wish. 2 weeks after I left him and was living amongst friends of ours - he collapsed in a restaurant - he was rushed to a hospital and was found to have a very rare kidney disease - he was already in end-stage renal failure by then. It turned out while he was in a carnival in South America, he had drank the water and somehow picked up a parasite that basically destroyed his kidneys....

Tommie pulled up stakes and moved back to Cleveland to be by his mother. I did let my daughter grow up knowing him because I felt it was the right thing to do - he had really been being poisoned by his kidneys, and that was one of the reasons he was acting the way he had been (as a side note - because I now work with living donors and renal transplant patients (kind of ironic eh?) - I have learned so much about this disease and how it can make people crazy and nasty) - so I reasoned he deserved to get to know his daughter and every time I visited family in Cleveland he saw her. He loved her with all his heart. He was put on a waiting list for a cadaver kidney - he ended up moving in with some girl, I ended up marrying the man who was to become my son's father.

Tommie's life after the discovery of his disease became a waiting game - waiting for a kidney and coping with the devastation of his disease process - by the time he reached the age of 29 he had suffered 7 heart attacks - the last one was so severe that his mom eventually had them stop 'bringing him back' - she felt he had suffered enough and she let him go to God. He did not live to see his 30th birthday. One of the hardest things I have ever had to witness was watching his mother and grandmother at his funeral.

So Tommie this is for you....thanks for helping me make our daughter. Thanks for teaching me it's ok sometimes to be tough, to not care, to not fall into those tender traps all the time that end up not making us true to ourselves and end up short-changing us and those we love the most.

The first time we made love - I remember that this song was playing on the radio and he told me it was 'our' song -well it truly was Tommie's song - and it describes him to a T - no pun intended my dear - you are still missed...to Tommie - who never really surrendered.


"The Pretender"

I'm going to rent myself a house
In the shade of the freeway
I'm going to pack my lunch in the morning
And go to work each day
And when the evening rolls around
I'll go on home and lay my body down
And when the morning light comes streaming in
I'll get up and do it again
Amen
Say it again
Amen

I want to know what became of the changes
We waited for love to bring
Were they only the fitful dreams
Of some greater awakening
I've been aware of the time going by
They say in the end it's the wink of an eye
And when the morning light comes streaming in
You'll get up and do it again
Amen

Caught between the longing for love
And the struggle for the legal tender
Where the sirens sing and the church bells ring
And the junk man pounds his fender
Where the veterans dream of the fight
Fast asleep at the traffic light
And the children solemnly wait
For the ice cream vendor
Out into the cool of the evening
Strolls the pretender
He knows that all his hopes and dreams
Begin and end there

Ah the laughter of the lovers
As they run through the night
Leaving nothing for the others
But to choose off and fight
And tear at the world with all their might
While the ships bearing their dreams
Sail out of sight

I'm going to find myself a girl
Who can show me what laughter means
And we'll fill in the missing colors
In each other's paint-by-number dreams
And then we'll put out dark glasses on
And we'll make love until our strength is gone
And when the morning light comes streaming in
We'll get up and do it again
Get it up again

I'm going to be a happy idiot
And struggle for the legal tender
Where the ads take aim and lay their claim
To the heart and the soul of the spender
And believe in whatever may lie
In those things that money can buy
Thought true love could have been a contender
Are you there?
Say a prayer for the pretender
Who started out so young and strong
Only to surrender

Artist: Jackson Browne

Can't sleep

And my mind is so very crowded with so many things. Worries and niggling doubts that seem to hide themselves rather well by daylight manage to creep into my awareness in the dark of the night.

My son is in the hospital tonight after having had a 3-hour-long surgery to repair an elbow that had been messed up for two years. He's going to be fine but still my mommie 'thing' is on high alert tonight.

I've had so much to write lately and so little time and I don't want to neglect this forum, this diary. This has been part of the glue holding me together for so long now.
Every now and then I just want to collapse and fall apart. Is that OK? I somehow feel I need someone's permission to fall apart. I have been taking care of other people for so long now. Everyone else but me....

Why do we do this? We as women, as mothers? My mom was the same way - she suffered so much for the sake of us kids. It drove her to an early grave - of course as did my dad's infidelity and here I am walking in her same shoes. Oh Rose Marie (mamma) where are you when I need you most? I am not sure if you were here you would even be of any help. You'd probably tell me to lie in the bed I have made. Suck it up. Stay married. It's your upbringing - it's your being that good little Catholic girl - it sucks Mom! (sorry).

I want to rail at the world so much sometimes but I know it will do me no good. I need to be there for myself and one of these days I swear I am going to - but not now - not while my son needs me - and there it is - the tender trap. The role my mother trained me for - by being a co-dependent woman she made me into her own image. I swore I would never grow up to be her and here I am.

I would never ever do anything BUT be there for my kids. Somehow though I have always ended up 'being there' for the men in my life too - too much - a born care-taker. My kids they needed me - the men?? That's sort of questionable. And the confusion comes from not knowing where to draw the line. Just what does for better or for worse, in sickness and in health mean anyway?

All we all doomed to repeat the same mistakes as our mothers? I wonder. There has to be a way to take care of you while you take care of those you love - it's such a hard balancing act.

I guess eventually I will find a relationship where someone for a change might want to take care of me - let me relax for a bit. I guess deep down we are all 'waiting to exhale'.

From my friend Auterrific

I can always count on Linda for her kindness, wisdom, and her wicked sense of humour - here's a really funny item she sent to me - I was laughing out loud.

This comes from a post located at the following site:
www.upsaid.com/eurotrash

Thanks Linda!
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"Closure" is not necessarily a bad thing just because it's American.

Hey boys, want to know the secret of eternal life? Or something almost as valuable?

Listen in.

Here's the Eurotrash guide to chucking a woman painlessly, irrevoccably and without her ever 'bugging' you again. The trick is to ensure that the words you speak when you ditch her reveal your true personality at last. By removing her blinkers, so to speak, you will guarantee a pain-free separation, mainly because she's finally so embarrassed she ever slept with you, let alone went out with you for God knows how many years, that she will never ever honestly want to lay eyes on you again.

It's called "Eurotrash's Infallible Instant Pain-free Closure Method". I have trademarked it, so watch out.


Tell her it's not her it's you. Make sure you sound whiny and self-pitying when you say it. Ensure the entire dumping conversation is all about you, you, you. A couple of days later, write a letter repeating the conversation and tell her all about YOUR pain. She will be so bored reading it that all feelings she ever had towards you will vanish happily in an instant.


Tell her you love her like a sister. Tell her you love her so much you've moved beyond being able to sleep with her. She'll know you want to fuck someone else and she'll be so disgusted at you patronising her that she'll move straight to the angry phase (which comes just before the indifferent phase) without passing Go or enduring the abandoned, sad, needy, and crying phases that usually come first.


Tell her you're just a stupid fuckwit who knows he's throwing away the best thing that ever happened to him, but he's so fucked up right now he just can't handle her perfection. Emphasise over and over again how stupid a fuckwit you really are. Cry a bit. She'll head straight out for drinks with the girls and end up laughing over what a twat you really are. Oh, and just for the record, she also knows you really just want to fuck someone else, by the way.


Dump her by email. That's an instant, irrevoccable turn-off. Once she's finished reading your cowardly self-justifications, she'll vomit you out of her system once and for all. After having forwarded your trite outpourings to absolutely everybody she knows for a good laugh, of course.


Tell her she's too good for you. After she's stopped laughing she'll undoubtedly agree with you. This little baby will ensure no post-break-up shags, as she'll be too busy recoiling at the thought she ever let your penis anywhere near any of her precious bits. She'll have long baths for a few weeks.


Tell her you're leaving her for another woman. Then come back after a week or so and admit you were wrong. If possible, cry when you beg to be taken back. The weeping, self-pitying "I-was-wrong-so-wrong" tone you adopt is one of the world's most effective passion killers. Accompanied by tears, it is romantically lethal.


Tell her that although she's beautiful, funny, clever, sexy, adorable, loving, kind etc etc, she's just not "THE ONE". Ah yes, that old chestnut "THE ONE". That'll be "THE ONE" that exists only when you're going out with someone and you get a bit bored and you want to fuck someone else. That old "THE ONE". We know all about that. And when you come back later, having failed to fuck the latest object of your affections because she just laughed at you and suddenly you realise we're the best you're going to get you miserable piece of shit, we'll just laugh and kick our Manolo-clad heels up at you.

You missed us the first time round, moron - you don't get another chance. There is no "THE ONE", there never has been and there never will be. There's only who you're fucking at the moment, sweetheart and if you don't realise what you've let go, then you're probably not clever enough to recognise "THE ONE", even if she did actually exist and stood in front of you and whacked you around the head with a shovel, while screaming, "I'm your fucking '"THE ONE"', dickhead!"

The boys of summer

I just had to mention that I was asked to go to a fund-raiser last weekend for a men's Gaelic Football team - what a blast it was. Loads of Irish lads to look at and listen to - with authentic Irish accents. Fun - just a nice afternoon. Got to hang in out a pub with them afterwards.

One of these days I need to visit the land of my ancestors...

Thansk to my dear frined Colleen for the invite - I will gladly go again anytime.

Of longing and desires...lost

This is something I wanted to post. Sometimes I think we have all had a love in our lives that we feel this way about. This is from one of my favourite poets, Pablo Neruda - he writes the most beautiful poetry I have ever read.
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SADDEST POEM
I can write the saddest poem of all tonight.

Write, for instance: "The night is full of stars,
and the stars, blue, shiver in the distance."

The night wind whirls in the sky and sings.

I can write the saddest poem of all tonight.
I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too.

On nights like this, I held her in my arms.
I kissed her so many times under the infinite sky.

She loved me, sometimes I loved her.
How could I not have loved her large, still eyes?

I can write the saddest poem of all tonight.
To think I don't have her. To feel that I've lost her.

To hear the immense night, more immense without her.
And the poem falls to the soul as dew to grass.

What does it matter that my love couldn't keep her.
The night is full of stars and she is not with me.

That's all. Far away, someone sings. Far away.
My soul is lost without her.

As if to bring her near, my eyes search for her.
My heart searches for her and she is not with me.

The same night that whitens the same trees.
We, we who were, we are the same no longer.

I no longer love her, true, but how much I loved her.
My voice searched the wind to touch her ear.

Someone else's. She will be someone else's. As she once
belonged to my kisses.
Her voice, her light body. Her infinite eyes.

I no longer love her, true, but perhaps I love her.
Love is so short and oblivion so long.

Because on nights like this I held her in my arms,
my soul is lost without her.

Although this may be the last pain she causes me,
and this may be the last poem I write for her.

- Pablo Neruda

Awash in emotions....again

There is nothing more for me to do here...with us.

I have watched the best and worst come out in both of us for I don't know how long. I have become numb.

I am always dealing with everything. Everything reminds me of what you did with her....everything. There is not a day goes by that I don't think of all of this and, you know what, a counselor isn't going to take that away or ease it - only time will.

You seem to find a need to constantly constantly lie - I don't know why. What counselor is going to teach you something you never learned as a child, not to lie to anyone - unless your life depends on it or you are saving a child from harm and I don't think either applies here.

I have needs too. Like now, I need everyone to leave me alone. Everyone wants a piece of me - but I've nothing left to give to anyone anymore and I don't know if I ever will again.

I don't know why you want to see me - do you want to see me so I can tell you to your face I don't want you in my life anymore? Why do you need that? I don't want to fight - I just want things to end - quietly - the way they began between us. There was no earth moving when I met you, there was nothing more than two people meeting. It was not spectacular - it was not the most important day of my life unless you count harbingers of destruction.

I don't want to put things out into the universe that are mean or angry - but somehow I have done just that - guilty as charged.

When I DO spend time with you all I can think about is what you did - I want to ask you questions so I can try and sort through it all but you 'conveniently' forget the answers - my how safe life must be for you...not having a conscience - what a relief that must be for you. And if we were to go for counseling as you insist we should - what would you say to them? To me? You would not have any answers - you would not be able to 'remember' what you did or why you did it - and then the question becomes how do we get past things if you can't remember them? I mean does that not damn us to keep repeating this same pattern?

I am just not up for this anymore. I'd like to say it was fun while it lasted but other than the times I can count on the fingers of my hands, you weren't all that much fun...you were too busy being 'sick', depressed, angry, hurt, arrogant, indifferent, indignant, a chip on your shoulder, like the world owes you something, and those qualities are all so very telling on a person. I can't remember a time in recent memory where you were truly happy - can you? Even if these attitudes are righteous on your part - why drag them around with you? They are like lodestones around your neck and they certainly don't belong in any relationship.

Because you were constantly acting like this - I had to develop techniques for dealing with it - so I became angry, mean, pushy, bossy, bitchy, not-fun, naggy, confrontational, upset, sad. I apologize for being that way - not just to you - to everyone out there that I hurt with this - I am so sorry.

I don't want to live like that anymore. If I have to be with someone, I want that person to be an agent for bringing out the best in me - I want to bring out the best in them. I don't want it to just be a wish (like you and your occasional 'I want to be a better man for you' where'd you get that line, from Jack Nicholson?) - I want it to be a reality. A marriage of equals not a knock-down, drag-out battle of wills.

Can you understand this? Do you get it yet? I really hope so - because it becomes tiring after a while explaining things - especially to someone who does not hear what I am saying. In the end you never heard what I had to say - I don't think either of us were ever listening to the other - we were too busy trying to avoid that big white elephant.

Sex with a proper stranger

OK - now that I have your attention (don't you hate stuff like this?).

It's a question that begs to be asked. When we meet that person (and I am not talking about gratuitous sex here - I mean I know it still happens (if you are an idiot!)- but for the most part, the 70s and disco and Club54 that's all over, right?) - when you are dating someone and enough time passes, you are pretty comfortable and there is heat -I mean how well do we really know that person when we decide it's time. Are they not still really a stranger? Is that what makes it so - well hot? Is that what turns couples off to sex with each other, is the familiarity with their partner? And, is that why people have affairs in the first place, to 'spice' things up? Or are they just tired of trying over and over again and getting nowhere with their significant other? Obviously these questions intrigue me as I have been on both ends of the equation. I know when my marriage was ending and I met my current husband and had an affair, that I was pretty fed up (no excuse, though), I was at wits end and I had tried everything to get my husband to go get help with me...it did not work. You get tired of being alone. I don't think that was the case with my current situation - and some of you know the situation and can attest to what was going on - I know he has his 'side' but he did not try with me not at all because I would have saved this marriage. Enough of this prattle....

There is a man out there - I won't mention any names - I doubt if he, when or if he reads this, would know who he is - heck I doubt he would read this. I don't really know him all that well. There are people that I have 'met' through this blog. Suffice it to say that he has befriended me through all of this. We have never met, we probably never will. There is something there - a friendship but more than that. Perhaps it's because I feel close to him, perhaps it's because I have bared my soul and he has stood by me and given me comfort and not looked away (a lot of you have been there for me through this as well, but not quite like this). This has all happened over the internet - this has all happened since I broke up with my husband. It has been gradual and not rushed, it has been slow and almost a dance in it's very nature. He has lived through the same thing and it's like we speak the same language. In a way, he gives me the insight I need and the courage, to understand, to some extent, what my husband did and why.

I am not excusing affairs - anyone reading this please know that they hurt people - lot's of people - not just your spouses. I would never do this to anyone else's marriage. But I DO understand why it happens. On an adult level there is just sometimes, someone out there who 'gets you' better than anyone else.

It's like those romances that were sparked merely by a correspondence with another human being - in the days when writing letters was still a fashionable thing to do - oh how I mourn the passing of the written letter - it's an art form.

Or perhaps it's like the Edith Wharton story 'The Age of Innocence' you knew those character's felt that heat but they dare not act upon it - with the exception of a man bending his lips to touch them to a woman's pale wrist, half-hidden by a white glove...or perhaps one brief but passionate embrace (not even tainted by a kiss) and then no more...because it just wasn't proper back then.

Sometimes perhaps the worst affair, the most scorching love, isn't borne out of physical passion, it's emotional -it's a closeness that can't be defined by physicality, it's something much, much more. It's why I feel so betrayed - because he ultimately was closer to her than he was to his own wife. Probably she 'got him' better than I did...

To these types of relationships I want to leave you with the words of a song that I think of when I think of that kind of passion. (I know a lot of people think it's 'cheating' to list lyrics of songs). Sometimes song lyrics, like poems, are just so apropro...and this one, although the artist may have been thinking something totally different, and, although it does talk about being physical, seems to me to describe that kind of feeling, that longing, that nearness - so close that you are almost one with that person. Even if it is just a very close friendship.


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Listen as the wind blows from across the great divide
voices trapped in yearning, memories trapped in time
the night is my companion, and solitude my guide
would I spend forever here and not be satisfied?

And I would be the one
to hold you down
kiss you so hard
I'll take your breath away
and after, I'd wipe away the tears
just close your eyes dear

Through this world I've stumbled
so many times betrayed
trying to find an honest word to find
the truth enslaved
oh you speak to me in riddles
and you speak to me in rhymes
my body aches to breathe your breath
your words keep me alive

And I would be the one
to hold you down
kiss you so hard
I'll take your breath away
and after, I'd wipe away the tears
just close your eyes dear

Into this night I wander
it's morning that I dread
another day of knowing of
the path I fear to tread
oh into the sea of waking dreams
I follow without pride
nothing stands between us here
and I won't be denied

And I would be the one
to hold you down
kiss you so hard
I'll take your breath away
and after, I'd wipe away the tears
just close your eyes...

Artist: Sarah McLachlan
Album: Fumbling Towards Ecstasy
Title: Possession

Just a nod to my viewing audience

A lot of us who blog list other blogs on our blog (geez what a sentence *laugh*). It's a nod to other bloggers. It's a way to tell other people where your mind-set is, what politics your practice, what religious affiliations you adhere to, what books you read, what your sexual preference is etc....you get the idea.

I just wanted to take a minute to 'plug' some of my friends out there locally and in the Blogdom. My friend Liam and his blog: Liam's Odd Musings. This man is brave and wonderful. He has been one of my best friends through what I am going through now and throughout my past and I just want to say I love him and I am honoured that he considers me his friend.

Linda from Auterrific and her blog: Auterrific
What can I say - this is a woman that I met through my husband's blog - almost by accident - of all things he was doing, he had also been talking to her and all I have to say is Thank God for Linda, and God bless Linda for her tenderness, for her common sense, for her caring and her insight - she has also helped me immeasurably. Please, please, please go visit her blog - NOW!!! She is one of the brightest, funniest, and wisest people I have ever had the pleasure of reading and hearing from.

Last but not least there is Gurustu and his website: Gurustu.com This gentleman should win awards for his work and for his never-ending positive attitude. I am humbled by his attnetion to me and by his caring. Again a website I highly recommend to everyone.

I have also received a comment from Da Goddess. Her blog: Da Goddess is wickedly funny and totally irreverant and I love it. Go there often.

There are others I want to thank - like Heather (I love you sweetie *hugs*), and Salman (my Jaan). Just thanks to everyone.

I try not to make this blog too full of other things. I do believe in simplicity but when I visit other blogs and they 'say something' to me I just feel the need to share.

This has really been a wonderful experience for me and perhaps that's why this happened to me - it would be nice to think something positive came out of all this sorrow and pain.

Until next time I remain as ever,
Colette

Um......OK

I really despise the little Blog Ads that appear at the top of your blog. So because I made a comment about the Catholic Church refusing communion to Gay-Right's Activists I just noticed that the latest ads were:

Is Jesus really God?

and:
Is Jesus both God and Man?

Um give me a break, OK?

Due to technical difficulties....

As some of you might know or not - I am not the most techno-geek-type person on the planet. When I decided to exact my revenge (*wink*), by putting together a blog about MY feelings concerning what my husband's philandering was doing to me, little did I know what the foray into the Blogdom would entail. So needless to say this has not only been a way for me to therapize myself by blogging, it's been a lesson in putting together an on-line work of art - OK so it's not all THAT great - but still, I had never done anything like this before.

With that said - I want to make a comment about some of the changes we have done here at Dancing on Colette's Grave. I recently changed my look and in doing so, decided to use the Blogger commenting system - the problem with that, as some of you know is that in order for me to reply to somebody's post, they have to blog. That sucks - I mean why should someone have to use blogger so I can talk to them? So I went back to HaloScan - which is great but I did not wish to lose the old comments that some of you had so thoughtfully posted. So now what you see is not one BUT TWO commenting systems in place, Blogger's and HaloScan - please try to use the Haloscan system if you don't mind. I have tried copying the comments that had been left on the Blogger system into the HaloScan but it presented problems that I am still working on. Please be patient as I overcome these technical, 'Colette is not a web-design geek' difficulties. I promise to try to make it less confusing.