Novocaine For The Soul

"Do you know what it's like to fall on the floor

Cry your guts out 'til you got no more?

Hey man, now you're really living"

- Eels

There was a terrible slump there for a while and every now and again the downhill is exceedingly slick making it a difficult struggle to climb back to the top. Thankfully, as of late, the top is more of a plateau as opposed to a pin point which allows for much longer durations of time there. I can settle down, lie on a blanket while looking up at the clouds, and contemplate a new future.

"I believe you have one shot at true love and if you are inaccurate in your first attempt, you correct the angle, fix the trajectory and try again. I had my true love. My Cupid’s arrow was true and I am now left holding the bow along with an empty quiver. The wood of the bow is worn now and it no longer serves Love’s purpose but it has no reservations at filling the skin of my fingers with splinters, little reminders of moments passed. The string is frayed and broken in the middle, hanging in two separate pieces that will no longer hold hands and would rather carry on with their backs to each other. My Cupid has long left, his wings sit in the corner covered in a thick layer of dust and a note that reads 'Best of luck, my work is done here!'"

I wrote that above paragraph during one of those low moments.

I had to let go of the person I loved and adored for seventeen years. There is still much I would like to say to her, and do with her. My arms miss the feeling of being wrapped around her body but those days are gone and I'm left clutching air in the circle of my embrace. You can't escape into another room, shut the door behind you, and remove yourself from those feelings. They are ingrained in you; imprinted on your soul, embedded in your heart, and silk-screened on your mind. I acted brave and strong and faced the days but the evenings were spent reliving and rehashing those memories and in those moments you would find me crumpled on the floor, unable to get up, with tears pouring out of me with each passing thought of her.

"Hey man, now you're really living"

Never did that lyric make sense to me as it does now. I am not saying I wasn't living then as that would diminish my love for her and tarnish all that we accomplished together. But it was a main course of surviving with a healthy side of living. My thoughts were always with the hurt that I had caused. With the anger that I had caused. With this whole mess that I had caused. I thought of myself in terms of liar and deceiver and ungrateful. Ungrateful; because her love saved me. I felt defective and undeserving and I was in a terrible frame of mind when she opened her heart and let me in. I had trouble shaking the idea that this was how I was thanking her for that love.

I had to refocus my attention on my own aching and face that the space she kept in the jacket pocket of my heart was now empty. The seams are worn and there is a permanent impression on the surface of the pocket, a faded ghost of her memory. The deflated look of the pocket serves as an indication that her own feelings and emotions went along with her and that I no longer have any capacity over them. Dwelling on what I imagined I caused was preventing me from getting up off the floor. It was with the numerous tears I shed that I began living.

Lately, I have been incredibly busy, always having something to do and I enjoy those moments. The terrifying parts are those scarce times of solitude which feel incredibly lonely and they are deepened by the realisation that no one is coming home to relieve me of this feeling. No one with whom I can share my stories of the day, or who could just wrap their arms around me and erase the loneliness with their brush of comfortable togetherness. The prospect of finding love anew is daunting. I find myself at the beginning and frightened that my past history will make love unattainable.

Despite that, I believe I am ready to try.