Ghosts in the room.
The hardest part about love lost is that the love isn't really lost. Love's ghost remains. It lingers in the room. The remnants and reminders of a lover past. The stray hair discovered on a pillow. The photographs that tease and torment you from your mantle or desktop. The empty space that someone beautiful once filled.
You quickly forget the frustrations and the fights and remember the way you used to feel. When you would drive twenty miles just to send her a text message. When you would call her at two in the morning, just so that the last voice you heard in the night was hers. When two weeks in an exotic and beautiful land wasn't nearly as exotic or beautiful because you were two weeks and several thousand miles away from where you really wanted to be.
When she leaves, she doesn't take only your present, but your future. The places you planned to go. The things you hoped to do. It's not the empty space today, but that continuing emptiness into the future.
I used to think that hope was something tangible. I used to equate hope to something narcotic. The pill you take to keep you waiting, withering. Wasted.
Now I'm not so sure. I think hope is more like a lens through which you view your future. When love is in your life you stare expectantly and anxiously into a future with her hand in yours. But when she leaves, the shock of that loss can keep you staring at that now darkened place. You fixate and sit still. But hope could also be focused on a new future, on new opportunities and new horizons.
Sometimes I think it's the fear of these new horizons that keep people focused on a faded future. It's easier to sit in solitude and melancholy than to face an uncertain and unexpected future. There is a strange and sad comfort in what you know, even when when what you know is painful.
Comments
"It takes a lot of courage to release the familiar and seemingly secure, to embrace the new. But there is no real security in what is no longer meaningful. There is more security in the adventurous and exciting, for in movement there is life, and in change there is power."
- Alan Cohen
I think I got this quote from you.
Posted by: Jami | March 14, 2006 10:04 AM
Jeez, Jimbo, I come by to catch up, only to find everything is upside down. I'm sorry about that. I won't leave you any advice, but knowing you through your blog, I know you'll land on your feet and be extremely happy when the next chapter starts.
It takes the shitty times to recognize the good ones.
Take care my friend...
Tan.
Posted by: NetChick | March 14, 2006 01:47 PM
People come into your life for a reason, a season or a lifetime. When you
know which one it is, you will know what to do for that person.
When someone is in your life for a REASON, it is usually to meet a need you
have expressed. They have come to assist you through a difficulty, to
provide
you with guidance and support, to aid you physically, emotionally or
spiritually. (or for you to offer the same FOR or to THEM). They may seem
like a godsend and
they are.. They are there for the reason you need them to be.
Then, without any wrongdoing on your part or at an inconvenient time, this
person will say or do something to bring the relationship to an end.
Sometimes they die. Sometimes they walk away. Sometimes they act up and
force you to take a stand. What we must realize is that our need has been
met, our desire fulfilled, their work is done. The prayer you sent up has
been answered and now it is time to move on.
Some people come into your life for a SEASON, because your turn has come to
share, grow or learn. They bring you an experience of peace or make you
laugh. They may teach you something you have never done. They usually give
you an unbelievable amount of joy. Believe it, it is real. But only for a
season.
LIFETIME relationships teach you lifetime lessons, things you must build
upon in order to have a solid emotional foundation. Your job is to accept
the lesson, love the person and put what you have learned to use in all
other relationships and areas of your life.
It is said that love is blind but friendship is clairvoyant.
Thank you for being a part of my life, whether you were a reason, a season
or a lifetime.
Posted by: anonymous | March 14, 2006 04:14 PM
This is truly a beautiful post that really spoke to me. Especially that last paragraph. I'm presently sitting in a pool of uncertainty. No way to know when and maybe even if I'll see Kieran again. I'm moving North and he seems to be moving South. It's hard. I need a pill, man.
Posted by: melly | March 14, 2006 04:14 PM
You captured something here I think few realize. Yes, that is exactly why that place is so dark, that lonely place. It sucks losing that vision of plans in the future.
tori
Posted by: castarlet | March 14, 2006 04:19 PM
that's one of the better anonymous comments i have received.
Posted by: the mighty jimbo | March 14, 2006 04:39 PM
Anonymous copied and pasted that comment, but yeah, true nonetheless.
Posted by: the patriarch | March 15, 2006 08:04 AM
jimbo, you've had a tough run here lately, but i can't help thinking that your relationship issues are easily correctable. stop being so tom cruise crazy everytime you meet someone. i've told you this over and over, bro. next time, let the woman go crazy first. they want to - hell, they need to. that's what they are. crazy.
it may not be the most poignant advice you'll ever get, but it's true. it's hard for us to watch you consistently meet someone, fall curiously in love with them, proclaim the you've hit the woman lottery, then have it all wash away in the span of a couple of months... it's not good, dude.
i appreciate your eagerness to be in love with someone, but feel that you will do much better if you simply let the game come to you.
for what it's worth... and i am a LIFETIME person. oh yeah.
Posted by: SEAN | March 15, 2006 08:32 AM
I know how you feel, Jimbo. You need a hug.
Posted by: April | March 15, 2006 09:32 PM
I've been reading your site for several months now. Originally I kept coming back because I was so completely blown away by your pictures. You have a great eye for detail. I hope to develop half the talent you have for taking pictures. I also came back because you have such a zest for life. You have such a gift at explaining what you mean so that those of us "out here" can totally relate to what you are saying. That too is a gift. Then today I read this post and realized that I come back here so often now because you are so real. You fascinate me. Not in that stalker, freaky girl kind of way. :) But in the "wow, he has such a full life; great friends and family; wonderful sense of humor; I would totally want to be friends with this guy" type of way. :)
I said all that just to tell you that I'm sorry you're having such a difficult time now. Nothing any of us will say will make what you are dealing with any easier but remember that you have a great, full life and this has just been a small piece of it. You are so much more than this and you have so much to offer the one that does turn out to be "the one".
Plus, you're pretty cute. :) Keep your chin up, it will get better.
Posted by: BJ | March 16, 2006 05:56 AM
hugs work. i will rarely turn down a hug. i'm lucky to have a dog that wants to give them about every ten minutes.
Posted by: the mighty jimbo | March 16, 2006 08:49 AM
buggery bollocks. i am so sorry jim. consider this comment a big squishy hug from me and by all means take advantage of the canine hugs. pets help.
xo
Posted by: jenB | March 16, 2006 02:54 PM
shit. I been trying to find a way to express that feeling. four months in and i finally get it. thanks.
Posted by: WindyLou | March 17, 2006 11:52 AM
Love you kiddo.
Posted by: Malisa | March 17, 2006 08:35 PM
so sorry, man. thank goodness for furry companions.
Posted by: becky | March 25, 2006 07:09 PM