I am over Matt. Really. Despite having bought a ring and plans for a future with marriage and kids and the whole thing, he dumped my via email in early September, and wouldn’t even give me the courtesy of a phone call for closure. My reaction was intense. We’re talking an emotional response so severe that physically my body and mind started to break down. My roommate found me prostrate on the floor more than once. My friends were worried about me because I was not myself.
He broke me.
But, my friends put me back together. A couple of nights of karaoke with an amazing friend singing Wrong Baby Wrong, which was perfect. And the karaoke dj dedicating Brick House just to me, also perfect. The legal principle of abandoned property and a roommate that convinced me that his DVD player needed to be smashed by a sledge hammer. Friends who could get great use out of all the craftsman tools and brand new clothes he had left behind. (FN: As one insightful acquaintance put it, I was dating a “carny.” He had no home and worked on the road, what he didn’t want to carry lived in my basement.) A completely unserious rebound that lasted for most of October that was just enough to show me that real men do exist even if this one didn’t particularly capture my heart. And, I was feeling like myself again for the first time in a long time.
The biggest tragedy here is probably not the two weeks that I needed medication to counter the occasional panic attack, but that this guy was not good to me most of the time and the relationship was one trigger that lead to a depression more than a year long.
But, sometimes we hold on to those brief happy moments just a bit too hard, and we forget how every fight is my fault, and we forget that if there is a compromise to be made it is mine to make. I failed to take notice that the single most important person to Matt, was Matt. Despite having an elementary school age son who never got to see him. Matt made choices that kept him far away and unable to even get to him, yet thought he was being a good dad. Who knows what his definition of “good boyfriend” or “good husband” would have been, but yeah I am so much better off without him. And, I completely realize that.
So, why on earth did I have a random memory from a mall food court in Montreal last night? The one cool thing about my relationship with him, was that because of his carny status I had an excuse to go to places like Montreal, Monterrey, Seattle, Las Vegas. If he was in a cool city and I was free, I went. The Montreal food court was a happy memory from a day off. If it’s possible to know less than zero words in a language, that’s about my proficiency in French. I needed him to help me answer questions like, “What would you like to drink?” On this day, we were smiling and laughing and really close. As we meandered through the mall, occasionally he would grab me just to give me a big bear hug and tell me how happy he was.
Even the drive to Montreal from London, Ontario was fun. Police cars in Canada have construction company like arrows that rise up from their roofs to direct passing traffic to stay away. There are pictures of me in pig tails (all pictures of him have been removed from my computer), and we had some traditional Canadian fare at a random truck stop on the way. He could have flown, but he chose to take the car ride with me.
Yet, he ended things by telling me to “never contact him again.” I didn’t do anything. We didn’t have a fight. I didn’t cheat, or call him a name, or do anything that would have made him angry enough to say that to me. But, he called me childish, and texted those exact words: Never contact me again; I mean it. Two months later when he told me to mail him his stuff but not to call him, his property was gone. Not in my possession any more. I actually did not expect to ever hear from again. The text read: I need my[stuff] ASAP. Don’t call me.
Classy, right? We sent some exchanges. I told him I never expected to hear from him again, and that the way he bowed out did not make me want to do him any favors. I asked that he delete my number. He called me an emotional cripple and a C***. Dodged a bullet, right? Right.
Which is why it bothers me so much that stupid GOOD memory would pop into my head six months later. Seriously. I got as much closure as one could get out of the situation, but being reminded that everything wasn’t bad does make looking back all the more confusing. I am not emotional about this today. It didn’t reopen any wounds. Those are all more or less healed. But still. A friend and I sometimes talk about the subconscious and how weird it is the stuff that pops up in dreams, or when you least expect it. I’ve always bragged about having a good memory. And, I wouldn’t trade that for anything. But still.
See title.
