Licking my wounds.

Whoever said, “The more things change the more they stay the same” was full of shit! Sometimes they change for the better; sometimes for the worst. Most of the time they change when you least expect it. Change hits you like a speeding freight train and when change happens things are never the same again.

Some of you may or may not have heard that ‘The BF’ and I are breaking up. It was totally unexpected but it was a long time in coming. The break up played out as usual, some one did the breaking and the other one fell apart. It’s not important who did what to whom, there was no infidelity or tension between us, which caused our split.

There is quite a gap in our ages (fourteen to be exact) and the x-BF was extremely shelter. He needs to live out in the world for a while to learn how it works first hand. I've seen how it works and there is only so much I can teach him. I understand this is something that has to be done but you can't help but feel empty knowing the person that you've spent the last three and a half years with won't be around anymore (or at least not in the same way.) We just reached that fork in the road where we had to take different paths. I guess for me though it was more like I was riding bike on the path, looked away for a moment and didn’t see the tree. But I will eventually dust myself off and get back on my bike but next time I’ll keep my eyes open and be on the look out for other trees.

At first it was a lot to take one time, it seemed like the life I had known and thought I would have for years to come all came crashing down at once. One friend left to go back home to her native country, leaving her husband behind and the rest of us not knowing how that story was going to end. Another close couple temporarily split up to see if wanted to stay together. While other close friends moved away to the suburbs. Granted they are only 12 minutes away by car but sometimes it seems as if they’ve moved to Paris. I was trying to start a new career with no success to date and I was staring down the barrel of forty. Needless to say, it seemed as if my whole world was crumbling and I couldn’t catch the pieces fast enough to put them back together or the glue to make them stick.

With the universe caving in on me, the toughest part of the break up was yet to come. I had to tell my friends and family the x-BF and I were no longer going to be together. The thought of reliving that moment again and again was extremely painful and in some cases I put it off as long as I could. But with each telling I began to heal a little bit more. Some got an email, others I told in person. The response varied, some cried, some refused to accept it, some instantly began looking for my next BF and others drank to my new found freedom. But all in all I was thankful my friends were there to hold me up and to let me know everything will be OK. One friend in particular provided some sound advice, “For now, just revel in the company of you. Eat insensibly. Bunker yourself in with Netflix movies. “

Well, I had the eating insensibly part covered. I've spent the last few weeks in an ice cream, donut, pizza and potato chip induced coma. It was safer than drinking myself blind and more productive than spending three weeks in bed watching reruns of ‘The Golden Girls.’ But I'm pulling out of that now. I’ve started walking out into the sun again and decided life (in one form or another) has to go on. So it will be an education for me to re-learn all things I have forgotten about being on my own and to begin to grow again. It will be rough for a little while but it won't take me long to come up to speed of relying on myself. I will revel in the company of me, riding my bike with a firm grip on the handlebars and keeping watch for any trees on the path.