from 2/1/2012


I think I actually felt him leave.

it was 2ish on Sunday as the girls and I were cleaning up the cookie mess. we were running late to the extended 2pm dropoff at craigs. I was supposed to drop them off at 12 but the baking was taking much longer than we'd planned. I had a handful of crumbs and a bread twist tie and some colored sugar bits in one hand and a papertowel or three in the other, I pedaled open the garbage can he gave us earlier this year. The one that fits perfectly against the kitchen counter because of it's rectangularness and it's shiny brushed metalness that matches the fridge and the stove, the one whose lid bangs into the countertop overhang when we press on the pedal too powerfully. And as it banged open loudly and I sprinkled the contents of my left hand into the bin

something heavy left my body.

At the moment it was just a sense that my life was so much simpler without a boyfriend. It was that brief and breezy. Just: "this morning was easy, no drama, no pressure to be more than cookie baker threesome." And then an exhale of sorts. And then it passed and all noise and chaos resumed in the cleanup.

When kate was born i experienced the same feeling. at the very second she was lifted from me, i felt her spirit leave my body like a thousand birds escaping. everything went briefly silent in the experience of that second, and then all the bright lights and noise of the nicu going to work on her resumed and the feeling was gone.

the sense i felt on sunday was far less intense, but a similar sensation. an exhale of great measure, a feeling of relief--and then sugar cookie sorting and ziplock baggies and crumbs underfoot and girl voices resumed their positions and their need for attention.

I've realized for some time now, that I needed to end the relationship for good. To stop trying to talk him into believing that I loved him, and to instead accept that he was not able to accept the relationship for what I needed it to be right now...love, but from two houses. A family, but not under the same roof just yet. He wanted us to be married and live together in one home and even consider having another child. I kept reminding him I'm forty one. He kept telling me I looked 30. It is hard to break up with someone who keeps telling you how beautiful and young and strong and smart you are. But something inside me kept me wanting this to go very very slowly, and he felt that and fought against it every time we had a disagreement. A discussion about meet up times could easily turn into another conversation about marriage and why he wanted it and why i didn't. If I changed plans or said I needed a night to do laundry and regroup after single parenting all week, he would insist that i didn't love him enough. So I knew that this wasn't the right relationship right now, for a girl still trying to recover from a broken marriage and a broken heart, yet I hung on to save both of us from the sad and lonely.





We had broken up the day before. Well, broken up the way we had a few times in the past. He said he didn't think I wanted to be with him as much as he wanted to be with me. He wanted to marry me. I wasn't ready. He wanted promises, which I felt like I gave him in every other way possible...we loved him, we invited him to just about everything we did, we included him in holidays and our upcoming christmas plans. I had birthday things planned for every night last week. Tickets to David Sedairis, tickets to a broadway show, plans for tilles park carriage ride, even chuck e cheeses was on the list. And I hate chuck e cheeses, but he'd mentioned wanting to try it. But Saturday he said: maybe I'll stay in tonight, I'm just not feeling well. He had canceled our plans the night before too. And on Sunday afternoon he died.