Cool Night Air

Driving home from work tonight I left the windows down. There had been a light mist of rain throughout the evening so the air smelt damp, and had a crisp chill that circled my bare shoulders and grazed my ears. This place has always been home. I know the roads like the lines in my grandmothers hands. I have memorized faces, can recognize voices like dreams from my childhood. This place is my comfort, and it's been my sanity for as long as I can remember.

I am beginning to feel like the arms that once rocked me, and kept me safe are now the arms that are strangling the life out of me. I find it hard to breathe here, I find it hard to grow.

I want new roads, new voices, new faces, new landscape.

I really want to start over somewhere. I feel like I need a new beginning. I need a new start. The past gripes my arms like vines, controlling every move I make, all meticulously picked words in every carefully selected phrase. I can dream of buying an old jeep, and moving where the air is dry and cactus's thrive in the heat. Or dream of owning a little used bookstore on a boardwalk where my soundtrack is seagulls and you can taste salt in the air. I can picture me freckled from the sun, hair damp and curly. Evelyn dancing in the sand and gawking at the starfish.

I need an escape. I just can't keep spinning my wheels here. The longer I stay, the harder it is for me to get out.

Right on Schedule...

It's been 4 months. I have been waiting for it to all kick back into place. His mood swings are like clock work, but oh so predictable.

I keep trying to, but I realize I will never understand what would really possess a man to WILLINGLY walk away from their child. And for what? What is the price of missing out on a life you created?

It makes me sad.
And it makes me feel sorry for them... the men who really don't care.
And it makes me worry for the children who are getting tormented by it.

Luckily for me, Evelyn isn't old enough to know any better yet.

Someone Who Gets It.

"So here's to you social life (as I hold up an empty bottle toasting God who just shed his grace on me in the form of an infant son fast asleep) you used to mean a lot to me, but now? You've lost your luster. I will long for these days of social divide, where my friends separated from me just enough so that I could see how much being a Friday-Night-Nobody makes me the someone I've always wanted to be." 

-This Wise Mother, I could learn a lot from her-

Disarmed and Dismantled

I mentioned the other night that the sheer presence of my ex was both disarming and intoxicating. It is almost impossible to not be drawn in by his witty banter and boyish grin. I tried today to resist it, but I found it pointless. What can I say, it's difficult not to be a little dismantled in my loathing for the man when I watch as he makes Evelyn cackle when he tickles her, the way he closely watched her as she played or the way she would nuzzle into his neck when she was lovingly hugging him goodbye.

In those moments, it's difficult not to love some part of him.