The Spiral

Healing is, for me, a spiral and not a line. I mean, progress spirals back on itself repeatedly, making ground and losing ground, rather than demonstrating steady improvement. These last two days I have felt myself on the inside loop.

When I am on the outside edge of the spiral I am far away from you, far away from us, who we were and I am looking at us with enough distance to say, yes, I am right. This is right. When I am on the inside loop I am too close. Close in such a way that I start to miss you. Not who you are, because I realise that I don't really like much of who you are. But close enough to miss who we were when it was new. That's when I lose ground and start imagining things I could say or do that would make things different.

All this is about choice, for me, now. I have the option of going back there and wandering around feeling abandoned and lost and angry forever. When I'm on the inside loop I am tempted to do it, and wish it wasn't my choice. But not having choices is like staying sober while you live inside the Betty Ford Centre. Big deal. I am trying to make right choices even while I'm floundering, and hoping the spiral turns soon.

I think it's sad that when I look back on our history, I realise that I never fully trusted you, even at the best of times. So I wonder if I sabotaged it by expecting it to fall apart, or if I was just being sensible. But, if I was truly sensible, would I have entered into something so nonsensical to begin with?

The meanest thing you ever said to me was show off. If we became friends again, I would never forget that you took something you pretended to understand and made me ugly with it. Just like an actor-ego. Those things hurt the most when you're afraid they're true.