better

Dear Diary,

I like the whole better thing.  I know that it is unsustainable for every day, but it is high on my oh-please-just-let-me-grow-the-hell-up list.

So, the birthday party was fine.  M loved her gifts and cake (cheesecake, dark chocolate cakey bottom layer, raspberry something on top, covered with a very nice two-layer ganache and good buttercream all around) and her sister was there and, gosh, after yesterday's day stuff, it was just nice.  Dinner was great, too.  Did not have to cook or clean up.  Nice.

Being social on just about any level is still difficult and I am wondering why. My brain says, quite confidently, that the worst is over and that I should (not can or might or it could be a good idea, but should) be moving forward more quickly.  And, yes, I know that the residue of decades of all of that crap is not going to just pick up its filthy, disgusting sacks and go somewhere else.  It just seems that I should be having more forward movement in so many parts of my life and it simply is not happening.

So, I go back into therapy this week.  Not like backward-back, just a return.  I left because, well, because talking about anything was more than I could handle with all of the other stuff.  So, I quit.  I am a quitter, or maybe I was a quitter or maybe just about therapy.  During the bad times, when it was bad, I used to tell myself, sometimes out loud, just to make sure that I was listening, that I was not a quitter.  I stuck there through the good times and it seemed as though it was only right or fair or decent to stay through the bad times, the dangerous ones. 

I used to say, "J, you are not a quitter.  You can stay here and figure out a way to fix this.  If you just did the right things at the right times, none of this would be happening".  It was easy to believe that, that if I could only figure out what to do and how to act, that nothing bad would happen.  It, that whole construct, was what someone who is not me would tell me.  Afterwards.  If I would just do what I was supposed to do, then everything would be fine and I would not get into trouble all the time.

Except, no one could tell me what that was.  You know, the right things.  I could not figure it out myself, and someone who is not me would tell me that if I were not so stupid that I could figure it out and that I needed to try harder.  I did try harder.  I tried harder all the time.  I really did.

Now, with the perspective of being out of there for the past several months, a bit more than seven months now-can I even believe that, I can see that I never had a chance, that no matter what I did it would never be right because I never knew what the rules were and whatever I did would be in violation of rules that were fluid, changing to make sure that I always violated whatever the hell they were.

Or, it occurs to me right this moment, maybe there never were any rules, just opportunities, excuses, to do whatever he wanted. 

Anyway, I am safe now and healing as best I can and making great decisions and enjoying this new life of mine.  None of this happened in an instant and I guess the residue does not disappear in an instant, either.

That actually helps me to feel better, somehow.  Or, perhaps not 'somehow' but because I earned it, this right to feel better and not worry so much.  I keep saying everything in its time, and I mean it when I tell myself that; it is just, oh, I do not know, I am impatient.  As though I waited all of this time, knowing that I would die there and never have any kind of peace or safety, and here it is and, fuck, I do not know where any of this is going. 

Clearly, therapy is a serious need right now.  I just really do not want to start all of that damn crying again.  Tissues are expensive, hankies are gross and I already get enough weird looks without walking around with a roll of toilet paper hung on a ribbon around my neck.  So, not going to do that again. :)

I am having lunch tomorrow with a friend, maybe two if the other guy does not have plans.  I do not have many friends in this new town and the few people I know have all-day jobs and do things at night, which I do not have or do.  Being out after dark does not make me weirder or totally freak out or anything, but it feels uncomfortable, so I do not do it.  Lunch should be fine.  At least until Daylight Savings ends.  Then, I might be able to do only breakfast. 

What else.

I guess that is that, then.  Fiber club tonight.  I have begun one of those knit hats with the ear flaps for one of my grandsons.  I have yarn to make one for the other sweet baby, and am hoping that I can follow that pattern and finish them before their heads are too big to fit the hats.  I am looking for time to knit at home, but that might be compromised when I finally get the Internet next Monday.  Yippee!!  Typing with a keyboard.  Being able to format paragraphs, and insert pictures and share stuff.  Totally cool.

I think I will bake bread tonight as an apology present for one of tomorrow's potential lunch people.  Nah.  I will get home...after dark...hungry and tired from a long day and I will make popcorn, have a soda and watch television whilst I play on my phone.

Maybe I am not a quitter, but I am a slacker.  Of sorts.  I like it, this being a slacker.  It is nice to not have to do anything.  I like it a lot, and so does CoolCat.  Maybe we will have hot dogs.  He likes those.