In Writing

I have every diary I’ve ever written since I was twelve years old.  Today, looking for a missing cheese knife for a party I’m hosting, of all things, I found one from 2006, separate from the rest of the stash.  It was from a period when my marriage was starting to unravel for real. (I think the diary was in the dining room because I was trying to put things in unusual places so my now-ex-husband wouldn’t find them. It was way in the back of the sideboard). I’ve transcribed a bit of it here to remind myself that when things seem like they’ll never change, they do.  What a difference these last nine years have made.

At home things are as bad as they could be. I feel like I’m living in a war zone… no place is safe. He is throwing away my things randomly, just to be hurtful and spiteful, innocent things like the candleholder my mother gave me.  {Note from my 2015 self: I have zero memory of this}. Why do that? It is so disrespectful, like I don’t deserve to have the things I choose to have, the things that make me feel happy. {note from my 2015 self: this could explain the more than 20 candleholders, diarylanterns and gazillions of candles that adorn my house these days and which I light all the time. Now I have all the things that make me feel happy, and then some}.

Nothing is sacred. He breaks things, takes them, reads what I write (if you’re reading this, F*$& YOU). {Note from my 2015 self: I am not nearly as mad at you anymore, dear ex-husband. I like you a lot more now that I don’t have to live with you.  I’m sure I made you unhappy too}. The most basic human dignity, a right to privacy, is denied me.

I think I deserve better than this.

Oh my god. Wow. It is hard to remember every living with such unhappiness. Also interesting to note that through every moment of my life, good and bad, I always sought out the written word.

I love noting the passage of time, especially observing “bad times” and seeing how far I’ve come since them. I am always one for feeling like a hard time will last forever when I’m in the midst of it. It is good to be reminded that nothing does. And now, in a strange way, I am grateful that things got as bad as they did. I was so averse to getting divorced that if it had just been without intimacy and passion, I might have languished in a loveless situation indefinitely. The really ugly times gave me the courage to make a move, even though it was petrifying.

So deeply grateful for the life I’ve built for myself. So proud of all I’ve accomplished.

 

 

 

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