There has been a lot going on around here recently.

I broke things off with Tom the week before last… we had been dating for 11 months, but this has been coming for awhile.

Ironically enough, I left on October 1st My 5th wedding anniversary (Ryan and I are still married, but approaching the finish line towards our divorce.)

Tom and I just became unhealthy. We fell into bad patterns. I love and care about him, but I also realize my limitations. I can’t lose myself in someone else. I can’t quiet myself down. I can’t be anyone but myself.

It just didn’t seem like there was enough space within the confines of our relationship for empathy, support or encouragement for what was going on in my life too.

I felt absorbed… if that makes sense.

My car was totaled last Wednesday. I am fine. The woman in the other car, And her four kids, were fine too. She was driving a Buick SUV ran a red light as I was turning left and nearly broadsided me.

Luckily, I saw her, slammed on my brakes, and turned to my right some, out of what, essentially, would’ve been a head on impact or being t-boned.

Insurance adjuster determined it was totaled. The whole front end of the car is displaced ¾" it’d cost far too much to fix it. I can get a check for it this week.

The caveat is, I can’t go out and buy/finance a car until I get the house refinanced.

I’ve been waiting on Ryan’s legal camp to accept an offer to buy him out of the house.

We finally agreed on a number last week and our separation agreement is finally being drafted up.

So I can push forward with the refinancing on the house once that’s signed. I was also waiting on getting my taxes done this week (I deferred until the fall.)

In the meantime, My family is letting be borrow a car for the next few months. A Dodge Stratus that was my brother in law, Will’s, car. Emily got a new car, and gave her husband her Geo Tracker.

My dad is getting the Stratus running, tagged, and insured for me until I can transfer insurance later this week. Hopefully, I will be able to get it tomorrow.

On a positive note: My former wedding anniversary ACTUALLY turned into one of the BEST DAYS I’ve had in years. I spent the day laughing so hard that my eyes were puffy from tears the next morning and my belly ached from too much laughter.

I know I’m strong enough to step away from something unhealthy now… That’s a HUGE revelation in my world. I always went down with the ship. But not now…I can’t anymore.

A lot on my mind with the divorce arrangements starting to get sorted out, and with the new shop opening in about 3 weeks.

I sold my wedding rings on eBay two weeks ago, for far less than I paid for them (that’s right, I paid for them.) I just hope that they have a good second lease on life, and bring joy to someone else’s relationship. That they get to represent a couple’s unwavering love for each other.

I feel like I am going through a more introspective time and don’t have very many words to share sometimes. I feel clouded and my wit hasn’t been able to be expressed very easily without it seeming really forced.

Maybe it’s the all the purging and redefining things going on. I still cry. I still feel jilted. I still mourn the loss of the human I fell in love with 10 years ago. I still wonder if I’ll ever be able to truly trust someone that much again, because I went ALL IN. I started losing him less than a year into our marriage, in 2012. It breaks my heart going back and beginning to see where it all went wrong, how I had ZERO clue what was going on, and how lost and alone it left me feeling. I’m not trying to garner sympathy, by any means, just trying to get this out of my head and heart. There is so much to the story that hasn’t been told or expressed. It may never all come to light, nor do I feel the need to drag it out for the whole world to gawk at, because it won’t change what’s happened, but those who’ve been around (who choose to!) can see through the smoke in the mirrors.

I feel like I’ve been drained of energy for most of this past year… I feel sucked dry of inspiration.

I’ve had some major urges to nest, and major urges to reinvent my surroundings (probably to keep the past from infiltrating too much,) but as far as tattooing goes, I’ve struggled.

I’m far more critical of myself, and my work now, less inclined to take photos of pieces I normally would be very happy with. I feel like I’ve done SO WELL in some aspects of this rebuilding process, but tattooing is the one that matters most to me. Followed by being physically healthy, and I’ve sort of failed at that too. However, I am working to get that back. Mentally and emotionally, I have made huge strides…I know that those things are at the base of what makes this whole thing work. They are foundational.

I’ve focused so much on building a strong network of support around me, but I often feel unworthy of it, because I feel like I’m unable to bring the things I used to to the table. I felt broken, but far more in control when I traveled in 2013, right before I left BST. It was a very false sense of security, I overlooked glaring inefficiencies in my life, in my marriage, in my work environment.

I know my friends love for me is not contingent on those things, on how much I make, on how I look, or the quality of my work, but as far as my self worth as a maker, a do-er, this is VERY hard to get past.

Trying to get the mental/emotional/physical balance back by doing yoga 3-4 times a week and going to the gym 3-4 times a week as well. I’ve started running at least 3 miles each time I go. I need it.

It’s one of the most tragic things in life. Falling in love with someone’s potential. Who they COULD be instead of who they ARE…

—–

I promised her that I am.

I really wanted to tell her how wonderful a lot of the aspects of my life are, how happy I am, how much I’ve grown, how much I’ve accomplished…

Friday, Ryan began moving the remainder of his belongings out of the house.

I had pushed him to move things out sooner because I knew the longer his stuff remained here, the harder it would be when he finally moved it out. On the other hand, I also wanted to avoid having it happen, at all… This delayed gesture of finality was, inevitably, going to be disruptive to the progression of my healing process, no matter how much I tried to prepare myself for it.

Over all, I’ve felt fairly optimistic about the future recently…I’ve hoped that would act as a buffer to the gravity of this to no avail.

I stayed up until 6am on Friday cleaning and packing his things…feeling so out of control emotionally, I often cope with stress by compulsively cleaning. My bathroom has been under construction, and I also wanted to minimize the crossing of paths between Ryan and Brian (who is doing the construction,) as much as possible.

I packed up and set aside boxes of photos of his. Gifts I had given him over the years, handwritten letters, notes, birthday cards, ‘I love you’s’ scrawled on post its. I looked through it all, as if the whole process wasn’t torturous enough as is. Photos, spanning the 32 years his life, the last ten of which included me in some way.

I was supposed to be on the way to Asheville for the convention by 8:30, but my heart and mind wanted to forfeit. Emotionally, I wanted to give up, to just lay in bed and pray for some sort of sweeping solution to the problem.

This was one of the biggest hurdles… Change of this magnitude is so hard. It will undoubtedly be years until I stop finding things of his around the house. Nine years together, and our lives are intertwined as much as can be without having human children.

Katie came over and had to help get me out the door. It took us a few hours, but we made it to Asheville late in the afternoon. I wasn’t permitted to work by the health department until Saturday morning, but Justin Weatherholtz also flew in and had to be permitted that day too, so I don’t feel like SUCH a douche.

The rest of the weekend was good. I struggled a bit here and there, but it was nice to leave town.

We left around 6 and made it back by 8. I didn’t stay at home last night. Katie dropped me off at home, and while the shock of seeing Ryan’s missing belongings did hit fairly hard, I had other things on my mind. …like the bloody handprints on my arms and legs I had left on me by a friend from grasping at me after happening upon an accident he was in.

On the way in, pulling up on Parkwood, traffic began backing up and merging into one lane. We saw a guy laying in the street who had been hit by a car. We looked over, and realized it was our friend Joe, so we pulled into the murder mart at Plaza and Parkwood, and ran to him. He was coherent, and called my name when he saw me standing there, so I knelt down and held his hand, tried to keep him calm and still, and talking while a passerby administered first aid. He gave us his birthdate, and other vitals to relay to medics and tried to get us to call his mom (his phone was smashed, but we were able to get into contact her.) I reassured him that he would be just fine, that he was in good hands, and that he was being taken care of, as he began to ask questions as to what happened. EMS arrived quickly and got him strapped to a gurney and taken to CMC for trauma treatment and emergency surgery.

At the very least, he has a severe compound fracture in his left leg, and one on his left hand. I don’t think I can say that I’ve ever wanted to see anyone’s bones sticking out of their body, let alone a friend’s. I know he had had a compound fracture in that leg before (because it damaged a tattoo that Teddy Safarian did on his shin when they were roommates.)

I am glad that I was able to talk to him and be there for him during the aftermath of that. I know that all that I would want under circumstances like that would be a familiar face to arrive, comfort, assure me that things would be okay, hold my hand, and to keep me calm.

Waiting to hear more later today about how his surgeries went.

The driver who hit him was apparently charged with a DUI, more details about that will arise with time too.

I am not sure how much else I can take this week. I am okay…but it’s just, a lot right now. I am, however, reminded in the wake of yesterday that I should be thankful for my health, and that things could always be worse.

**UPDATE** Joe, unfortunately, has had to have 4 blood transfusions, his left leg amputated (no clue as to how far up,) he has fractures in his eye socket, right knee cap, lumbar and a few other places, there is some bleeding on his brain, and he severed the artery in his left hand. He is in a medically induced coma and on a ventilator to allow his body to heal for now.