Freedom

I don't think I have ever felt this free in my life. I just put most of my possessions in a storage cube, and the rest are in my 2003 vw beetle.

It has been the most difficult and painful last three months of my life, as my relationship of 4 years crumbled around me. 3 months of wondering and confusion and a continual barage of barely masked lies. He kept saying we just needed a little time apart to appreciate eachother and that he wanted to concentrate on his music and his work and get to know himself. Meanwhile, he was fucking someone else. We discussed breaking up over and over, but he said he didn't want to be broken up yet. What a lying sack.

He said he was going camping by himself to think things through and then we'd go mountain biking in the morning. I assumed he'd be back somewhat early since you get up with the sunlight when camping and we had plans. He doesn't come back til close to noon, and then he says he went out to breakfast. Where? Downbeat cafe. Why there? You went camping in Malibu and you've only been to downbeat like once in your life. he gets all defensive and angry "Do I need to have a reason? I just did." Only later I discover his new woman lives in echo park only a block from there. What did you do while you were camping? "I read a lot" and he shows me a steinbeck book he clearly just picked up off the building's castoffs bookshelf. Then he opens it to where he was reading -- page 8, which is actually only 3 pages into text. Funny how you can read all morning and only be on page 3. But he gets defensive and angry so I am left with just doubts and confusion. So many of these.

Friday night when we're all hanging out at the cat and the fiddle pub, and then he says he has to go meet with Kate to go over music for the dance performance which is still 2 months away. On a late friday night. I didn't even suspect then really, I trusted him so much. We had been having millions and millions of conversations about things, and he said he just wanted to be alone, and he didn't think he would date any of the people around him, even though I had brought her up as a possibility for a future love. All of those "Rehearsals" where I waited up for him at night, thinking that he's just so busy and if I could just be around for him when he wasn't working on stuff we'd still have time to share things and not grow apart. But it didn't matter how late I waited up, he always came home later. And now I know he was off with someone else. If he had JUST TOLD ME it would have been so simple. When I was preparing to leave, I could have had my kick ass starting over ipod playlist instead of my bittersweet I love you but we need to be apart and will be together again some day playlist. I could have not sat home wondering why he snubbed me when he invited me to see his music/dance performance. I get SO ANGRY when I think of all that needless suffering, all the lies all the wondering why he wasn't picking up his phone or answering my text.

I texted him late on a different late friday night "rehearsal" a kiss -- "mwa" . I felt bad he was so busy and working so late. He texted me back "mwatofu"-- a kiss for me, tofu being my pet name. And he was fucking her that night and didn't come home until the next day . mwa?!?!?! I think he really had to be a pathological, sick human being to be able to lie so constantly and completely for 3 months, staring into my eyes and telling me bald faced lies. I will never never never trust anything he says again. I just hope I can trust other people some day.

But. Finding out was the best thing that ever ever happened to me. I am so glad I get to start this new chapter of my life with an open and free and unencumbered heart. Seeing the text messages that he had been sending her telling her that he couldn't stop thinking about her and was going to come over to fool around the same day he took me out to a Valentine's Day dinner and gave me a present and said we were going to be able to work things out, we just needed some time apart finally made me able to let go. To know he was onlying toying around with me, trying to keep me on the line and not allow me to really be with other people, even though he was.

Now I am free! I've dreamed of moving to portland since before I've known him. I've wanted more than anything to put everything in storage and be free floating. And it's all coming true. After a night fueled by tears, hysterics, sugar free redbull and vodka, packing most of the night and morning, I finally got in my acr at 2pm, and at about 4 pm, I started to smile. I called my friends. I reconnected with people. I had long conversations and saw the sun set over the hills and knew that people cared about me and I'm about to have the best adventure of my life. So so so so infinitely much better than if it has gone as planned before I read his love letters. If I had been in that car next to a silent and distant eric, feeling sad over the loss and wondering what was going on, it would have been miserable! Instead it was liberating.

Through all the tears, there was one moment that night that stood out and made me feel like I was strong and could move on. Eric and I were in tears, staring into eachothers eyes, and he was finally present, and being honest (I think? who knows really at this point) He was supposed to stop by and bring me the 60$ that I insisted he pay me back for the flight he was gonna take down from sf after he drove up with me, and he was suppoosed to leave before my friend susie arrived at 8:30. Susie showed up, and he said "I don't want to leave, tell her to go away" and I didn't want him to leave and I was almost ready to do it. And then I gathered my strength and I said "No. You have to go. My friends will be here for me, and you won't. Tommorrow you'll be with someone else and I'll be alone. I'm not going to push my friends away for you. You have to leave." and then I collapsed into tears on the floor because it was so so hard to push away this person that all I wanted was for him to love me. I opened the door and susie saw the tears in our eyes and said "should I leave you two alone?" and I said "no I'm going to need you tonight." and she said she'd come back in a half hour. Susie is amazing, a true and wonderful friend. After a half hour of tears and him starting to go back to veiled eyes, I called and told her to come back. That is my new paradigm. Choosing my friends and not liars.


Oh man. So much more. But the point is, that was the first time I was able to really be strong. To know the situation, to know where I stood and to be able to make a decision for myself. After 7 years of back-to-back long term relationships, I need to be me. Even with my biological clock creeping up on me, I do not want a man in my life for a good while. I want to be solo and know what it is to be alone. I guess that what these last three months have prepared me for. 3 months of having someone in bed with me who mainly wasn't really present has shown me that having someone in bed with you just for the sake of having someone in bed is not worth it. I would rather be alone and warm my own covers and sooth my own nightmares and know where I stand. All that love and passion and friendship down the drain. All our mutual friends tell me to concentrate on the 3 and a half good years, not the last couple months of bad. But I just can't. It's all colored by the lies and the doubt, and wondering what else he lied about over the course of our time together.

For this next couple months, I am going to do yoga every day. I am going to write every morning. I am going to engage deeply with my friends. I am going to be myself. And I am going to love life.