Disclaimer: This one gets a
little emo. The End Of Silence
by the Rollins Band came off the shelf during the writing
process for this one because I had some things to work out. You've
been warned.
After more than fifteen years of radio
silence, a hand grenade from my past was lobbed into my phone from an
unknown number over the course of three days. Luckily, I have been
too busy over the past few days to get caught in the hurricane of
shit that this has stirred up even though I had put this all firmly
in the rearview or just plain forgot most of it with the passage of
time.
Between dental procedures and other
running around that I've had to do over the past week, there haven't
been too many quiet moments for the wreckage to catch up with me. I
know it's there and it will eventually give me a stern talking to but
for now I still have photos to edit and writing to get done so that
wreckage can get in line behind grocery shopping, yard work and
laundry.
I had already come to the conclusion
that I am not going to respond to this person for multiple reasons. Mainly, I have nothing to say to someone that seemingly went out of
their way to set my life on fire and then offered me kerosene to put
it out.
We were only kids in our early
twenties when everything went to shit so neither one of us really had
a clue as to how to act toward another human being. And I'm not
blameless in the whole thing because I know I'm not the easiest
person to be around which is why I've learned to stick to myself.
After this relationship and my
experiences with the family court system from another, I've
discovered that I'm alright on my own. I need to protect myself and
my mental health in order to be there for my kid. I no longer have
the time in my schedule to get spun out over a relationship that goes
south.
And after living a streamlined life
out of necessity, I have learned to enjoy it. There are moments when
the loneliness creeps in but I have found that easier to deal with
than the wants and needs of another adult. That's what the Ramones
are for. Typically, I'll feel better by the time I have to flip the
record over to side B.
There was a moment a few years ago
that I had wondered what this person might have been up to but that
lasted for all of five seconds before the awfulness started coming back to me.
“Forgive and forget” can only exist in a vacuum. Sometimes, some
good old fashioned “Go fuck yourself!!!” is needed in real world
applications.
I'm really trying to figure out what
this person could possibly want from me. I surely should not be on
anyone's “The One That Got Away” pedestal which is what was
communicated via text message. Dwelling on what could have been
limits forward progress and what's next. I can't go back and don't
want to go back because I have too much other stuff to get done.
My propensity for bullshit has
diminished with age so trying to play nice over coffee and some sort
of catching up conversation is not something I would have the
patience for. That bridge was incinerated so I could not bring
myself to give a fuck. And I'm sure that we have both lived very
different lives over the past fifteen years so it would be like
speaking in two different languages. Sitting there politely, nodding
and smiling would feel insincere and dishonest so I'm not going to
put myself anywhere near a situation like that.
The most upsetting thing to me in all
of this is that I don't know how to use my phone. After the first
message, I tried to block the number but I guess I did it wrong
because the messages kept coming. I should have asked a young person
or queued up at the Apple store with the other coffin dodgers to
figure it out. I can hear Abe Simpson's voice in my head saying,
“I'm old and don't like to be bothered. How do I block a number on
this thing?”
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