Nothing to See Here…

I’m home.  I’ve had three trips back to back and I’m damn glad to be home.  My own bed, my own shower, ice cold milk in my refrigerator.  Stupid American television.  My house, my family, my life.

My life…. well, that’s a work-in-progress, huh? 

Most of the work is still focused on the marriage.  We’re still doing the  counseling.  I’m not sure we’re getting anywhere.  For awhile, it seemed we were.  It seemed the work we had done was producing results.  We both felt confident we were headed for safe waters again.

Remember how it used to be
When you were you and I was me?
When we were we?  Remember then?
I want to become us again.

Since that time, that armistice, we’ve had some set-backs.  And now I feel, once again, like a weary and bedraggled soldier who still believes in what he is fighting for but is just too damn tired to fight anymore.

It’s like this…

At one time, we were ballroom dancers, he and I.  Masterful, graceful, and amazing ballroom dancers.  People would stop and look and wish they could do that - wish they could dance together the way we did.  We knew we had something special.  We knew people were in awe of us.  But we didn’t dance for them - we danced for ourselves.  We took great joy and satisfaction from our dancing.  We knew we were meant for this - this dancing.  It was what we had always wanted and it felt good to have achieved it.

Then somehow over time, we forgot all the steps.  We forgot how to dance, really.  We couldn’t seem to move together anymore and we were treading all over each other, trampling each other’s feet.  We lost it - the grace, the mastery.  Somewhere we lost it.  And it hurts that much more having had it and knowing exactly how valuable this thing we lost was.

I’m tired and sore.  My feet hurt.  I just want to stop dancing.  I want to go sit on the bench and just stop for awhile.  Take a rest, a break, a breather.  I want to move away from ballroom dancing altogether and perhaps take up some solo hobby such as kite flying or fly fishing, something where my feet would be safe and my success wouldn’t be dependent upon the coordination of movements between two.

But there is no bench, and while fly fishing might look attractive at the moment, I am able to recall how much I had always wanted to ballroom dance, how much I loved it when we were at our peak. 

And I want that back.

I want to become us again.