Who Get’s Custody of the Music?

The question of division of assets comes-up every time a relationship ends. What people often forget about are the shared experiences and memories, who get’s those? I like to claim ownership of all my memories, but today I was reminded of one of the casualties of separation: Music.

I was sitting in the Travel Office with the clerks (tweedle dee and tweedle dumber) and there was old school hip-hop and R&B blaring. While I like this music, I don’t like having anything Blaring while I work. This was more than annoying though, it became emotional torture. Each song made me miss D like crazy, the memories flooding in.

Now, I am very blessed that D is still part of my life, but listening to “his music” or “our songs” felt like having a serrated knife nonchalantly pulled through my chest. This shock of sentiment made me realize that this is something I have been unconsciously avoiding. There will come a time when I can listen to these songs without them breaking my heart, but for now, Hip Hop is dead to me. I wonder if he has had to give-up any of his songs. I somehow doubt it, music is in his soul. I think to him the ownership goes without question, they are all his.

Funny how something so seemingly innocuous can sneak-up and punch you in the gut. I have made a great effort to keep certain things, certain city blocks and restaurants, but this I cannot fight, this will be his until the wound heals. I look forward to the day when those songs can make me smile, fondly remembering. D is a good man and I will always love him, but someday it won’t hurt to do so.

Dreams

I had a strange dream last night. I dreamt that DeShon was getting married and I had to go. The wedding was either going to be in Atlanta, Puerto Rico or New Jersey. An old woman from my church in Tennessee was telling me all of this and when I acted put-out by the whole thing, she said, "Well, it's a good excuse to go to the Caribbean". I was relieved to find out it was going to be in New Jersey, though I was not happy that it was happening.

I found him in New Jersey. Everyone was there in a shabby house that felt like a home. His brothers and my brother. After I found him, we snuck conspiratorially into a bedroom and started kissing. People kept opening the door, and as they tried to wander in, I screamed at them to get out. He smiled down at me as we lay on the bed and told me it was us who were getting married. He then mentioned that I had better take a shower. I rolled my eyes as I looked down at my discheveled clothes.

I looked at the clock, it was 8:35am. I asked what time it started, knowing it would be sooner than I would like; I hate rushing. He told me 10am. I was annoyed. "Why do we have to start so early?" I asked. He said "Because my best friend of like 50 years, Roger, needs it to be at 10am". I asked, "What is he allergic to, 11am’s?" I thought to myself, “the wedding can’t start w/o the bride”, but I knew I did not have a say, Roger had changed his schedule to be there. I looked at him and told him in a pouty voice, “this is not going to be the wedding I wanted". I was still smiling a bit, I knew in my heart he would make it up to me. I felt pretty good, though a bit disappointed things would not be exactly how I wanted them to be and that other people were still more important. I felt good though.

I woke-up perplexed at this strange vision. I had a dream that Steven got married right after we broke-up, I felt crushed. And it actually happened. This was different, it was like the dream sequences you see in movies, the ones that have some meaning your subconscious is trying to push through.

I don't know what the dream meant. I know that I miss him like crazy, but another part of me knows that even though he might be the right person, now is not the right time. Again, it is like a movie, two people whose lives continue to brush past one another's, but cannot connect until later. I haven't heard his voice since he left for Vegas on Sunday. It's only been a few days, but I know that he is probably doing something of a "Fi Detox". I understand. He needs time to sort through all this the same way I do. For now, I will have faith and stay the hell away from Facebook!

After spinning I headed-off to work. I spoke to my mother briefly and told her that I had been wait listed at CUNY's Journalism Graduate School. She was thrilled. I must say, her excitement was catching. It is not the worst back-up plan in the world. I know I am going to write. I have to keep telling myself that I am already a writer. Who knows how I will make the jump from being a writer to a paid writer.

The possibilities washed over me, filling me with the feeling you get when you meet a new lover. Not the blind, carefree feeling of falling in love, but the quiet anticipation of potential. I suppose you might call it hope. Funny how intoxicating that can be. The tentative, guarded joy that things yet to come can give you.

Reading Ruth Reichl's books have made me fall madly in love with her, and give me a watercolor-like image of what my own future may hold. When I started the experiment I wanted a life of friends, adventure and interesting conversation. Though I still want those things, I have another desire to add to the list: I want to create something. I don't want to edit or manage or assist. I want to create something from nothing. Perhaps that is what draws me to writing. I am not a painter or a musician, but I can take people somewhere new or somewhere familiar with my words. I can invoke laughter and tears with words on a paper that was once blank. This is what I want to do, hopefully I can find a way to do it and make a living!

I had an idea the other night. I was out with Em in the Lower East Side and we had just tried the new bun restaurant BaoHaus. It did not come even reasonably close to living up to it's hype. Disgusted, I went on a critical rampage, ending with the comment that "David Chang shits on BaoHaus". Through fits of laughter, she begged me to become a food writer. She said that the way I write and the perspective I have is beyond entertaining to her. I chuckled and told her, "You tell me where to start, and I'll go full speed ahead!"

Later that evening, I was lying in bed reading Chelsea Handler's newest bio "Chelsea, Chelsea Bang, Bang". The outlandishly unruly woman has softened a bit since finding herself in a monogamous relationship, but is still one crazy, hilarious bitch. "I wonder if she would like a food commentator on her show?" It is clearly an insane idea, but hell, we have hilarious social commentators, such as herself and Joel McHale, why not take the same sacrilegious approach to culinary review? It may be a silly idea, but it is surely going to be a bizarre niche that will land me the success I crave. Perhaps I am insecure, but my history has shown me that I am much better at forging new paths than competing on the road more traveled.

Dreams, dreams, dreams. Funny how you can have them while sleeping and while wide awake and in both cases you end up with nothing more than vague watercolors to follow or interpret. Thank God for faith, without it life would probably be one big nightmare.

Winter's Last Throws

I have been bracing lately, waiting for the punch of reality to come down on me. As with most things, I believe that waiting for this particular ax to fall is the worst part of the experience. See, I know D and I ended it, I know it cognitively, but my heart has never really learned the art of letting go. Due to this fact, I knew that in the end it would still be him who would walk away.

In 2010 technology has taken the place of telepathy. We no longer have to wonder what other people are thinking, all we need is an internet connection and the online stalking tools of facebook and blogger. I was in the mood for a little self-mutilation, so I logged-on and looked at his facebook page. There it was. Flashing across the screen; "updated status-It's complicated to Single". Ok. I knew it was coming, but seeing it, knowing everyone else was seeing his departure too, that really drove the punch home.

It's going to hurt like a bitch when he comes home, packs his bags, and physically walks away. Once again, I cognitively knew it, but now I feel it too. Damn.

I suppose this is all just part of the process. I know that things are going to happen just as they are meant to. If we are meant to be together, nothing will keep us apart. If we aren't, well then, I suppose that will be okay too, I just haven't really been able to face that one yet.

I think I am going through the grieving process, entering into the anger phase. On of my EWI members sent a request to the group for input on which restaurant he should take a date to. The thought and effort he put into the planning and reservation pushed some serious buttons for me. I began to think about the fact that no one has ever made a reservation for me. This boy's actions flew in the face of all the male excuses I have heard before as to why date planning and reservations were always left up to me. It left me feeling cheated. It then left me wondering if it was my fault. Maybe there is something about me that makes putting in too much effort seem unnecessary.

Well, my anger is waining. I sent D. a curt message about his "new status". It was childish and unfair. He did not do anything wrong. He is going through exactly what I am in his own way. I suppose he is just doing what men do, he is turning the page. As I mentioned, this is not my strong suit. I guess I just never really was able to wrap my head around the love thing. Not the beginning or the middle, but the end. In my mind I suppose love does not have an end, and this is not so much the end as the evolution. Still, I guess I have not learned how to make my mind and heart come together on this point.

What I do know, in my heart and mind, is that this is going to hurt like hell. I have not changed my relationship status, I don't think I can right now. Though we are not together, though I suppose I am single, my heart is far from open, my heart is far from available. I still act as though he is waiting just around the next bend, I still hear his voice in my ear, I even still write as though he is reading every word.

I have emotional anesthetic pumping through my veins at the moment, but I am not foolish enough to think that it will be any match for some of the things yet to come. There is hurt on the horizon, but just over the peaks I know there is something else coming. There is a peace, a calm, a glorious moment when I will be neither hurting nor numb. I can't see that ray of light yet, but I know, I just know it is coming.

I wonder what that will feel like. I imagine it will feel like the first real day of spring. That day when you walk out of your door and don't have to flinch at the sting of a cold air, the day that you walk languidly down the street feeling everything fully, a gentle breeze that soothes rather than torments. That day you feel so lucky to bask in perfect climate,free of the anxiety that comes from waiting for the next chill to strike though your bones. Yes, I imagine that is what it will feel like.