Torn Between the Two / by Rebecca Tillett

Mike,

I wish you could read my mind. I wish I could somehow catch you up with everything without having to rehash...everything. I wish to relive absolutely nothing at this point. I'm just relieved to make it through each new day. Every night, I'm so happy and content to crawl into bed, hide under the covers and escape into unconsciousness for a few hours. Every morning is a reluctant peeling of myself off the mattress or couch cushions. This morning was no exception. I awoke feeling completely overwhelmed with melancholy hopelessness, a yearning for the familiar, a burning desire to return home and forget these last few months, settle in comfortably back into my life with Adam and smile at the triumph of conquering another rough patch, another jesus-I-can't-believe-we-made-it-through-that-but-we're-stronger-because-of-it patch. The reality is that I'm not home with Adam at the moment, smiling at our triumph. I'm in Austin proving something to myself, running desperately away from home, seeking time and asylum in traveling. And the friends and family I have scattered all over the southwest have audaciously come to my aid. Never have I been more thankful to have so many people who love and care about me spread out like a blanket across this country.

And while I'm torturously imagining my life without the only partner I've ever had, imagining a life in which I can't just pick up the phone and bother Adam with a random question but also in which I don't have to re-live the same fights and arguments we seem to have over and over and over, always begging him to spend some time with me, I'm also timidly imagining my life as a single woman, completely alone and coming home to no one every night and then blissfully imagining my life with this other man in some distant perfect future. (Unrealistic expectations I realize...meaning I'm likely bound for disappointment unless I get my shit together and my life in some kind of meaningful order in which the latter imagining isn't the ultimate goal.)

Reconciling the highs with the lows.

I'm trying to keep my feet planted firmly on the ground while my mind seems to gravitate toward the clouds. And my heart feels torn between the two.

Every hardship I've endured in my short lifetime has had me playing the part of Victim. And that's what makes this time-around so much more difficult. I've proven I can muddle through when I'm target practice for flying loads of shit but when I'm the one throwing the shit? And someone I care about is standing in my clear path of shit-throwing trajectory? Sleep isn't easy to come by.