So, anyway, there I am, just talking to my daughter. She called me, which is nice, because she rarely has a moment to herself, dealing with those two, little, alien creatures we fondly refer to as alien creatures. Her sons. Babies, really, but now that the little one is fully mobile and verbal and has learned the rudimentary physics of throwing tiny cars at everyone and everything, I have to admit that they are, not-so-simply, little boys.
I remember being thrilled when the ultra-sound informed us that the first baby was the little boy for which I wished. Then, later, the second happy surprise with his brother. Other stories there.
So, then, we are talking and the reason for the call was not to simply chat, but to ask my advice on something. She asked and I advised, but it was regarding a request that she would be making to someone who is not me and was about a resource that I do not have, which if I did have, she would not need advice about discussing this with someone who is not me, but would have just asked me and I would have said yes and that would have been the end of that.
I knew that the discussion with the person who is not me would not go well. She did, too, but asked anyway and I suspect that she also knew that I would not say anything negative about someone who is not me, but that is the kabuki dance we perform in order to survive this whole fucking mess. And, it disturbed me, the part about knowing that she would, once again, be disappointed. This sort of thing breaks my heart every single time, over and over again and it is just not fair that hearts can be so damaged by assault after assault, and still keep working so that they are ready for the next heartbreak.
It did not go well and there was the added benefit of being the recipient of a verbal attack on the premise that I knew about the request and did not prepare someone who is not me so that he would not be caught unawares by a simple request from someone who he is supposed to love and care for, neither of which he has ever provided evidence of doing. Yeah, we sure do have fun over here.
I am not new to this process and I had a good idea of what was going to happen. But, it must have rattled me and I did not notice and a bit further in the original conversation with my daughter, we were talking about the recent art thing and we chatted a bit about the process of one of the new pieces and how it was facilitated by being able to live in the gallery building for a couple of weeks and...then it happened. I shared that part of what I did when living in that gallery space, in that city, was to continue to look for a small place to live.
That is when it felt like the air was sucked out of the whole damn room. You have been there, that stunning moment when everything stops. Silence, the void where nothing exists for that moment, not sound, not air, not breath, only the knowing that the conversation went where it was not supposed, not intended to go. And, it is too late. You cannot take back the words and the message they carry. Too late.
Then, when there was air again, she asked me how long that had been going on and I told her for a while now. And, she never broke stride and asked me how the search was going and I told her that the only two places that I could afford had too many steps to climb and she said that they were wrong for me because of that and how could I carry groceries up all those stairways and then she started talking about how a city very close to her has reasonable rents and how if I lived in a particular part of this city that I could walk to everything I needed and that I would only be ten minutes from her.
Another moment, but this one had air and I realized that even though I have never spoken a syllable to her about any of the things that happen here, she must already have some sense of, not it, but something of something, just like some people have been telling me. Important stuff. It was not until much later, when our conversation had ended, that I realized that her first thought was that if I was going to move that it should be closer to her.
This changes some things. Not totally and completely, but it alters the direction in which I though I had to move. I have options that I did not have before. I will not have to lose my ability to see her and her family. However, that one aspect, her suggestions about moving close to her and being able to walk to the grocery store and pharmacy and doctors and the rest tells me that she knows that leaving here will mean walking away with what I can carry, that the process will not be the dream divorce that everyone insists will happen. I still feel hopeless about any degree of fair settlement. I am trying to feel hopeful about other things, but I am also feeling shame about not having been able to keep all of this out of any conversation that I would have with her, but most particularly one in which she was asking advice about making herself vulnerable to another disappointment concerning someone who is not me.
I need a clean slate. I need a safe place to live. I need to get off of my fat ass and get rid of the rest of this stuff and just move forward in some way. I need the Universe to bestow a whole shitload of cash and other resources on me. Well, that last one is a 'want', not a 'need', but I want it anyway. At the very least, I need to hold on to some reasonable dreams. I need to breathe.
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