It’s a nice little fantasy.

And I don’t mean I want to go have an “Eat Pray Love” experience – I literally want magic and knights and color.

It’s sustaining me for the moment to watch the trailer for Brave over and over again… thanks to Exercising Monsters, who reminded me about the movie when he wrote a post about his daughter and the tragedy of “Pink Princess Idolatry” that many films endorse.  Brave seems to turn that idea on its head and say “Here!  A woman who does for herself, is skilled and able and determined and likable!”  and I like that. A lot.

I’ve always been strong-willed – a little stubborn – and full of my own ideas… but I’ve never gone racing off on horse to face some scary evil and danced with some whisp of light in the midst of Stone-hedge (When I was there – on Summer Solstice – the only thing dancing inside the circle were hippies)

It’s nice, today, to imagine something more like that than the reality of trying to decipher this week’s heartbreak whilst juggling lesson plans for three different classes and also remembering to eat.

So, maybe I’ll pick up a few movies to watch this week – silly, lighthearted, adventurous movies about women who kick ass or magic critters who change the world… just anything to escape this world for a little bit and relish in the magic of story.  In the meantime…

Two key players who have a lot of self-sorting to do now that the show is over and maybe, hopefully, some breathing can be done.

I’m transitioning into numbness and analysis.

I don’t know if that’s a good thing.

Lots of people are telling me lots of things – the ones coming from good places have been more impactful than those coming at me from assholes like this:

What he’s/she’s referring to are a series of cryptic messages I received when Cason and I started dating.  They were delivered with the same kind of sarcastic anonymity – although that’s apparently metastasized into pure nastiness at this point.  And if this idiot doesn’t think his/her note wasn’t one of the first things I thought of when things started unraveling, they’re wrong.  It was.  But the content of the first message was so strange and twisty and rude, and the content of this one is so malicious, that I don’t wonder why I gave it so little weight when first it arrived.  I’ve never been a fan of anonymous messages, and I get some good nasty ones on here from time to time for various “LOOK AT ME!!” reasons.  I wasn’t going to discount everything I knew about the man I was getting to know just because some anonymous someone told me to.

Does that mean I deserve to be hit up with the above kind of abuse as a result?  No.  It does not.

But I’m the one talking about my life online – and that invites voyeurism and (occasionally nasty) comments along with the connection it provides.

I’ve also received a lot of supportive and loving messages (that far outweigh those like above) – and I received them because I was sharing what happened online.  Because I moved away from a major support network when I left LA last year and I miss them and need them.  Being able to reach out to my friends through Facebook and this blog has been a lifesaver this weekend.

Some of these friends even wound up being in town this weekend, took me out Saturday night, got me good and drunk, and made me feel a little more alive.

I’m so thankful for that.  I’m so thankful for them.

So now what?  What do I do… I don’t know.  I’ve been numbed.  I’m tired.  I’m glad I don’t have to hike up on stage again this week and pretend everything is alright.

But it’s way too soon to even think I can make any sense of anything – as much as I want to.  It’s way too soon for me to try and create a new plan, as much as I keep saying I just wish I could come up with a fucking plan…

I think I just need to get out of town and breathe.

I wish that we had then been able to stay friends – while you figured out what you wanted.  We wouldn’t have been super close, but we might have been able to keep working together.  You mightn’t have destroyed The@trics so totally and irrevocably.  We might have even found ourselves missing one another too terribly and been able to find our way back to one another… eventually… because you mightn’t have taken our love for granted if I had been gone and you free to roam in the wilds… without shame.  Without deceit, I might have been able to understand and to forgive you.  Without deceit, that trust might not have been broken.

I wish you hadn’t been able to so easily pretend everything was the same.  I wish you’d had more guilt – hanging around your neck like an anchor – that led you crawling to me with the truth before the truth became habit and the habit ruined us.

I wish I could think about you without thinking about you.

I wish I could sleep without missing you.

I wish I didn’t miss you.

I wish my heart would start beating again… I still don’t think I’ve caught my breath.

Get up.

Stare at the wall.

Eat cereal because I haven’t been able to eat anything for 36 hours and cereal sounds easy.

Unpack.

Unpack the memories I ripped from his apartment – get rid of the pillows, throw out the shampoo (why did I grab the shampoo?), throw away the gifts I had given him, put all the clothes in the wash.

I will have to buy all new underwear.  I don’t want anything he saw against my skin.  I look in my underwear drawer and think of all the times I wrapped myself in something pretty for him to take off.

Check my email – check Facebook (intermittently all day)

Weep at all the wonderful love and support coming at me from friends both close and distant – people I haven’t seen or spoken to in years sending me notes of encouragement on how they’ve been through similar, and he didn’t deserve me anyway.

Stare at the wall some more.

Think about doing laundry – think about how much energy that would take – realize I need to eat more than cereal if I’m going to ever do laundry again.

Try not to cry or break something every time I think about how I have to see Cason tonight and this weekend for the YP Festival.

Take a shower.

Get out of shower, look around like a lost soul – What is that sound? – Realize it’s the water.

Ssshh, shhh, shhh…

I want to crawl into the water and float away to some magic place where people are people who don’t do this to people.

Turn off the shower.

Write some more.

Stare at what I’ve written…

Wonder if this is where the term “Writing like mad” came from…

But it’s time to recount what happened.

Wednesday night, my boyfriend of 16 months, who (I thought) loved and adored me as much as I did him, and who had recently had his license suspended due to a DUI, got into his car (with one headlight missing) and drove 45 minutes away to meet some chick he’d just met on OK Cupid.com

I didn’t know all of this – all I knew was that his mother was irate with him for leaving the house – she’d driven by to talk to him about the current show they’re working on and both he/his car were gone.

So I got worried too – I mean, he’d texted me sweet things and that he was tired and going to bed – what had happened to make him endanger himself like that?  If he were to get caught, he could go to jail.  So after about two hours of neither one of us hearing back from him, I meet her at his house to help her wait – both of us hoping that he’s alright and not out at a bar or something reckless.

Which is when we thought, maybe he got an email or FB message about an emergency?

Which is when I saw the FB message about OKCupid girl.

(I think this is about when I stopped breathing… It’s definitely when my heart started to crumble)

They were supposedly meeting in Jerome, so his irate mamma pulled me into her car and we headed up the hill together to… I don’t know what – find him red-handed?  Take back his keys and let him walk home?  Prove that we were wrong, that it was all some kind of horrible joke, and that everything was going to, Please God, be okay?

But either their plans had changed and they met somewhere else or he had already headed back to Prescott, because he was not there.

So we turned around and went back to his place to wait.

Which is when I looked to see if there were more messages, and sure thing – there they were.  He’d been carrying on an affair with a married woman (with child) that works at the PCA as well.  That took some time to absorb.  Enough time, in fact, for him to log onto FB from his phone and delete the rest of his messages – he knew he was caught, he was trying to erase the evidence.  I can only imagine what other messages were there that I didn’t have to read.

By the time he called his mother back, I had cleared all of my stuff out of his house.  All but the vintage typewriter… I will have to get that back.  And he was distraught, hanging out in Dewey, wondering what he could do/how he could spin this – manufacturing all sorts of bullshit to spin.

She went out to get him lest he drive any more on that suspended license, brought him back for me to confront, and left.

I don’t remember all that was said – I know he finally admitted that the affair has been going on intermittently since August.  I know he created the OK Cupid account a short while back.  I know he is ashamed he got caught… I don’t know if he has any comprehension of the pain he’s caused me.

I do know none of this is my fault.

But I feel like I want to disappear into the ether where there can be no pain because you are but a whisp.  If I were able to do that, I might lift myself from the planet for a century or two before returning to my body… that’s how long it feels I’d need to let this heart heal.

I loved this man so much.  We started a theatre company together, we had grand adventures and even grander plans.  We laughed, we snuggled, we said ridiculously funny and sappy things to each other…  and now I’m left to wonder how much of that was even real?

How can a person love you and carry on in such a deceitful manner?  How can they be such a magnificent liar that your friends and family all believe in him?  That they believe in the two of you as a team?  And how could he disrespect all that we had built so much that he would not only throw it all away for cheap thrills, but also not do you the smallest kindness of at least telling you he would rather fuck around than be in a committed relationship?

Sadly, I think it’s because he’s a user.  He liked all my attention.  He liked all the work we did together.  He knew I was a good thing – no, great thing – to keep hold of.  He just didn’t respect me.  He doesn’t respect me.  He doesn’t see me as an entity deserving honesty.  I was just a thing to keep him happy.

And I can’t change that.  He might not be able to change that.  He may not want to change that… seeing people as “things” is a lot easier… It makes it easier to push your way along in life without having to feel responsible for your actions.  It helps you get ahead by any means.  It helps you consume… like a locust… whatever you want.

And he wanted to get caught.

You don’t act as recklessly as that without some silent need to show the world you’re not as good as everyone thinks you are.

He wasn’t driving to Sedona or Cottonwood, or wherever the fuck they wound up, for love.  The affair wasn’t some passionate answer to a lack of passion in our lives.  It was something else entirely… something I don’t understand.  And it’s sick.

I did make copies of the messages between him and the affair-chick.  She contacted me yesterday with this bullshit:

I hope she knows that I don’t believe for a second she told her husband what she’s been doing.  I don’t know if I’ll be able to give him a copy of the messages… what does one do?  If I don’t tell him, he’ll have a great time seeing them onstage together soon… and the thought of anyone having to go through this unknowingly – when others know what is happening… well what a cruel woman she is.  No wonder she and Cason fed off of each other – they’re the same.

So why am I sharing all of this on my blog? Because the only way for a narcisist to feel is to damage his mirror.  Cason is a user and a brilliant performer.  It would be very easy for him to slink off silently, with naught but our closest friends knowing what he had done.  If I thought for a second that he felt remorse for his actions instead of feeling bad for getting caught, I would not be so public with all of this.  I would lick my wounds with red wine and write semi-poetic and non-specific blog posts on the cruelty of the fates instead.

But that’s not this story – this isn’t some one off transgression that could be processed that quietly.  This is a sickness and a disease.  And he won’t change unless he really wants to… if even then.

So I air it out.  I’ve told the story.  I will try, from here, to get back to life and blog postings about life (and probably quite a few more about the pain of all of this) but I will not tell this story again – it’s here, once… which is enough.

And I hope he knows, that no matter the lack of true comittment he felt for me, I did love him truly.  I would have fought dragons for him.  I was the engine behind our theatre company – no part of that was without my hands on the wheel – and I was devoted to him and the possibilities before us.

And now that is all gone.  I am no longer his fan, his supporter, his touchstone.  I am no longer a believer.  I am me… strong, independent, fantastic, and fiery me.

And it’s time I get back to fighting my own fucking dragons instead of sharing my magic with him.

]]> http://www.awdsandends.com/2012/02/what-happened/feed/ 4 http://www.awdsandends.com/2012/02/please/ http://www.awdsandends.com/2012/02/please/#comments Fri, 17 Feb 2012 00:13:13 +0000 admin http://www.awdsandends.com/?p=2162 Two hours of sleep, one shower, and a gazillion (mostly) sympathetic facebook messages later and I still sit here stunned.  Tears falling, as they know they should, without the accompanying heaves because, let’s face it, my body is beat.

My heart is beat.

I want to pummel him and I want to curl up next to him…  Isn’t it cruel? That the arms you’ve run to for comfort these past 16 months could so badly wound you, and yet, perversely you crave them – with the caveat that they make it all go away.

Make all the bad stuff go away.

Please.

Who is this person?

Certainly not the same man who I wrote a lexicon with… created a theatre company with… dreamed big huge, delicious beautiful dreams with…

Yet, the skin is the same.  And those eyes – eyes that I trusted – looked back at me with … nothing.

Who is this person?

I’ve cried a bit.  I’ve yelled a bit.  I’ve not quite allowed myself to accept that this is really happening yet.

I need to lay down and let my body rest.  It’s been shivering and quaking and holding itself tight so that I could pack my things, speak the points, and get home before I unraveled.

Such a sweet little story we made… such a happy little, romantic, productive pair.

It wasn’t real.

It was a show.

A damn good one… he had everyone fooled.  I imagine the other woman may be the only one not fooled – she knew about me… she knew what she was dipping into and helping him destroy.

Sleep… sleep… I surrender… and I pray, beg, plea that when I awake, all of this was but a nightmare.

I know it’s not though.  My senses are too sharp to hold out that hope for much longer. My eyes too raw, my soul too shaken… in dreams you can scare yourself to waking.. but I am terrified, and the sun just keeps coming up around me – my eyes already, harshly, unbearably, cruelly open.

This weekend I got to go back to the city I never called home, to see all the friends I grew to call family.

It was lovely (except for the killer migraine I had to contend with Friday – GRRR!!!) and I’m so glad I finally got back over there… I hadn’t been back in nearly 18 months – WAY TOO LONG.  But life, as it often does, just seemed to take over my calendar this past year and a half, and I was so busy, I didn’t realize how much I needed to take back control of my calendar and drive.

Drive to the land of golden statues and thirst and endless sunshine… to be with people I love and respect and adore.

It was honey for my soul to see my friends, but I felt no love lost for the traffic, the congestion, the smog… I love the sunshine and the ocean breeze, but that city and I never did bond as tightly as it does with some.  Navigating its mad, lonely streets this weekend hit that point home; I wasn’t all that happy to see it – just the treasures it holds.

And by treasures, I mean friends, their new babies (wow!) and also my favorite restaurants… Yumm, yummm, YUMMMMM.  :)

In any case, it was a very quick visit, but one I hope I can make again in the very near future – because (in case I didn’t say it enough already) my dear, dear LA friends are the cream of the proverbial crop, and I can’t wait/need to see them all again soon.

It’s hilarious!

And, more importantly, it’s another great example of what you can do if you eschew all good sense/logic/naysayers and just go with your gut… then you take that gut out and get other people to trust in it, do a crap-load of fundraising and buckle down and shoot the dang thing.

(It helps if you’re super talented too)

Anyway, I couldn’t be prouder of Jessica and her team.  Not only did they dream up/write/and create a fun, quirky little series – they worked their asses off,  did a fantastic job, and got it on Hulu!

So now you can click on over to HULU and get your giggle on!

You sit.

You wait.

You cringe and chuckle and sweat.

And at the end of it all, you sit and listen to your fellow observers (though you are now center stage) – an exhibition to ask questions of, offer advice to, and seek story solace from… all in the hopes of helping you make the play better… all under the guise of shared responsibility to help you “develop” your script.

And if you’re lucky, you write enough of what is said down so that you can look at it later… when you’re alone… back in the comfort of your unobserved work space.  And you hope that it will somehow help you solve your act break SNAFU, a character aberration, or some other detail that’s been bothering you (or your readers).

You hope that anyone present with the ability to advance your career liked your play enough (or your comments/laugh/shoes enough – you’re not picky) to remember you and maybe invite you to play at their theatre somehow.  You hope that if this damn play gets read enough, the next theater that tells you they like it will do something more than just present it as a reading, because really, you’ve already put this play through 10 million (or 6) of those already and isn’t it about time someone started putting productions where their compliments are?

Because you’re a playwright.

And Playwriting is messy, public business.

And you can’t wait to get into a bigger, more public arena, with new actors and directors, where you are once again rendered helpless in the back of a (bigger) audience as the curtain rises…

Sweating even bigger bullets.