A Geographic

Posted on by stilllearning2b

Brock has been busy lately. Very busy. So when he had to drive to the other side of town this morning to drop something off for work, he invited me along for the ride. That’s life – sometimes quality time comes from a romantic evening out and sometimes it comes in the form of an hour plus on the highways of Atlanta (which even have traffic before dawn on a Saturday morning).

It was a quiet ride for the most part. The comfortable companionate silence between two people with nothing to prove who simply enjoy each other’s company. But it was also a journey to the past for me, as we drove from where we live to the area where I spent ten years of my former life.

I make that drive once a month or so to visit with friends or to attend some event. But usually I am either the driver or the sights are hidden beneath a shawl of darkness. This morning was different. The soft morning light had just brightened the sky when we made the turn into my old stomping grounds and, as the passenger, I had endless opportunity to peer between the trees to see what had remained and what had changed.

We drove by the street that was home to my first Georgia apartment where we served breakfast to the family who came into town to celebrate our wedding. We passed by my old library, where I checked out endless decorating books with the intention of turning our house into a home. I saw the biscuit place that my husband loved and the Costco where we went together every Saturday. We pulled through the drive through at the Starbucks where I met dates and sought public solitude after my divorce. And I caught a glimpse of the Gold’s Gym that was my sanctuary where I rebuilt mind and body.

I first heard the term “a geographic” relating to a need to pull up roots and start over somewhere new when I read Stephen King’s Duma Key. At the time I read the book, tucked securely in my other life, I didn’t understand that drive.

A few years later I understood it too well.

Once the reality of the end of my current life had set in, I felt an overwhelming need to escape. To run. To get away from every reminder and every location.

I wanted a geographic.

If I was going to be forced to start over, I wanted it to be fresh. Not built upon the dunghill of my former life.

Necessity kept me local for that first year; my job and my support system were nearby and needed. But that whole year, I felt restless. I no longer belonged. I needed to move. I was planning on a move to the West Coast, as far away as I could get in the continental U.S. But then love happened, and I cut my planned move short by about 2100 miles.

But it was far enough. As our morning drive took us through the streets of my old life, it felt like another world, another lifetime. It was distant yet interesting. I was curious rather than anxious. It held no pain, only far off memories. And it certainly didn’t feel like home.

I am feeling the pull for another kind of geographic right now. This semester has been way too frantic. I’ve felt pulled and prodded, trying to balance too much for too long. I feel the need to get away. To run. Not to another life, but to the woods for some quiet and simplicity. Life pared down to its most basic. Where the morning fire is often the most pressing item on the to-do list.

Peace. Hopefully without frostbite.

Sometimes we need to get away. Maybe for a few days. Or maybe for a lifetime.

Sometimes a geographic can help cure what ails us.

In My Other Life

Posted on by stilllearning2b
Duma Key
Duma Key (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

In my other life, I never used to listen to audiobooks. From a practical standpoint, my commute wasn’t much more than a mile each way so I wasn’t in the car long enough to tire of the radio. There was another reason, as well. I am a visual learner. Big time. If I see it, I remember it. However, I have always struggled with auditory input that is passive in nature, such as lectures or, yes, audiobooks. When I tried to listen, even to a familiar story, I would get lost and frustrated with my inability to keep the characters and narrative straight.

But that was my former life. I turned to audiobooks from the library first out of desperation. I know spend about an hour in the car each day and the antennae on my 14-year-old car chooses to rise only occasionally. In my old life, I used to say that I can’t comprehend audiobooks. In my new life, I was willing to learn. My commute is now one of the highlights of my day as I work my way through my library’s selection of books on CD. I use the time to explore genres and non fiction topics that I would usually pass by (inspired by the necessity of a limited collection) and I “reread” favorites from my past.

I am currently on a Stephen King kick. I’ve read everything that man has published, much of many years earlier. The high quality of the narration on his audiobooks makes it a distinct pleasure. I find myself completely pulled into his world as I travel to and from work each day. It’s interesting how his books resonate differently with me now than they did in my other life.

My current selection is Duma Key, a book primarily set on an island in Florida that follows Edgar, a man who took a “geographical” after a tragic accident cost him his health and his marriage. There, he meets Wireman, also drawn to island after catastrophe. I was drawn to a particular line, uttered repeatedly by both men throughout the book:

“In my other life…”

Both men suffered great losses. Edgar, formerly a contractor, lost his arm, his mobility after a hip was crushed and experienced head trauma after being crushed by a crane. While he was recovering, his wife filed for divorce. Wireman, a lawyer,  lost both his daughter and his wife and, as a result, attempted suicide, the slug taking his vision as it traveled through his temple. Those losses were stark, a clear delineation between their past lives and their present.

I am drawn to the matter of fact way they accept their new worlds. They don’t spend time bemoaning their losses, although, especially in the case of Wireman’s wife and daughter, the pain is evident when they talk about it. They work within their new limitations to make the most of their new lives without trying to recreate the old.

That is what I have tried to achieve with my own life. I have had to accept that my other life is gone and is beyond reach. Rather than spending time nurturing the loss or trying fruitlessly to recreate what I had, I try to focus on building the best life possible now. I now talk matter of factly about my other life, as distantly as if I was discussing a character in a book.

Some of the changes between my former life and now have been dramatic. I never used to write. I was a private person. And, I always made decisions very conservatively, planning for an imagined future. I have a new name, a new city, a new beau, a new job, a new dog. A new life.

Some of the changes are slight, and strike me as funny.

In my other life, I never rolled the toothpaste tube. This drove my ex crazy, even though we didn’t share toothpaste and it was stored out of sight. Now, I am a dedicated roller.

In my other life, I never used to finish any beverage, always leaving a quarter inch of fluid in the bottom of any glass. I now enjoy every last sip.

In my other life, I hated asparagus. Now it is one of my favorite vegetables.

At a cellular level, our bodies are constantly renewing themselves, shedding the old cells as they die and replacing them with new. Sometimes we need to shed our other lives so that we have room for the new growth.

My other life was lived by an other me. And now I have a new life that fits the new me.

Who Is He?

Posted on by stilllearning2b
Who is that masked man
Who is that masked man (Photo credit: Aoife city womanchile)

The search engines have been busy the past couple of days answering queries about the identity of my ex-husband. I get it. You’re curious. It’s human nature. You want to scan his face and peer into his eyes looking for clues into his actions. I know, because I have done just that. Perhaps you want to know his name or his image as a warning, the one to stay away from. Unfortunately, this would be a false security, as is he but one person and not the only one that capable of deceit.

I know his name. His face. His birthday. His social security number. His family. Yet I still do not know who he is. However, I can tell you who he was. He was my best friend. My lover. My confidant. He was the man who built a toy chest for our friend’s son’s birthday. He was the man whose scent instantly calmed me and whose arms held me like they were molded from my frame. He was a voracious reader and he devoured science fiction and fantasy novels. His favorite series was The Dark Tower, by Stephen King. He hated tomatoes and loved Sweetwater IPA. He preferred dark clothes and refused to wear V-necks. He wore his watch on his right wrist, the face to the inside of his arm. He was the man who patiently built me an office and then rebuilt it for me when I grew weary of the desk where I spent hours writing papers. He was a quick learner, but a poor student in school. He was a fan of Apple, Banana Republic, and Alice in Chains. He was never athletic due to bad knees, although he started to work out once the pounds encroached with age.  He was the man who stayed up all night for a week with our third puppy who came to us with kennel cough. He was so confident that I would win Teacher of the Year, that he ordered flowers before the votes were announced. He was the man I turned to for advice and comfort. He was my everything.

He was all of these things, yet he was also the man who left his wife of ten years with a text message. He was the man who hid debts and stole money from accounts. He was the man who wooed an innocent woman, told her nothing but lies, and married her although he was already wed. He was the man that locked the dogs in the basement and drove off, not knowing that they would survive.

I do not know who he is. I don’t think he knows either. He is a man that has been consumed by whatever demons reside within him.

I have chosen not to reveal his identity for several reasons. First, it feels vindictive to put him out there. I am not his judge and jury, nor do I want to be. He has faced repercussions for his actions and, if he continues to live dishonestly, he will continue to see consequences. I don’t need to aid that; I’m confident he’ll do fine on his own. I also worry about the safety of his wife. I know they were together at the time of our divorce, eight months after the text, but I do not know her current situation. I want to protect her. I also don’t know his current situation with his parents. They have suffered enough; I don’t need to add to that. Finally, his identity does not matter. His eyes, even the dead ones in his mugshot, hold no answers. His name does not reveal any hidden truths. They are as much of a facade as everything I thought I knew about him.

So, to answer your question – who is he? He is a man. A man that was once loved deeply and who perhaps loved back. He is a man that took the wrong path at some point and chose to hide rather than seek help. Maybe by not knowing his name, you will be better able to recognize elements of him in those around you. Who is he? A man that can teach us the importance of asking for help, the value of truth, and the power of acceptance.

And, for those of you asking Google how to get away with bigamy? Just say no.

More Information: Where Is He Now?

A related post: Why I Choose Not to Play Criminal Pursuit

Done Bun Can’t Be Undone

Posted on by stilllearning2b
Hot Buns - please pre-order
(Photo credit: ecstaticist)

I have always been a huge fan of Stephen King. He has a magical way of delving into the wonderment and wisdom inherent in the ten-year-old’s mind which paints a world we all remember yet no longer are privy to as adults. He carries this slightly off perspective through his adult characters as well, showing us a perspective we all know yet seem to forget.

His book Insomnia was published my junior year of high school, during that grey period where you simultaneously straddle the worlds of childhood and adulthood. One line from that book stayed in my mind for the entire year, most likely due to the sing-songy quality with which my internal voice read it.

Done bun can’t be undone.

I never really thought what that line meant until just recently. Literally, once the bread is baked, there is no going back to the dough.

How much effort do we waste in our lives trying to undo done buns? How often do we lament “the way things were” and we try to navigate back to them? How much time do we spend replaying past decisions and mentally taking new paths?

I find it interesting that the book was released the same year I began dating my now ex-husband. Those fateful words were spooling through my head during our courtship. Done bun can’t be undone.

Rather than fight against the past, I have learned to accept it. Would I do it over again the same way? It doesn’t matter. I don’t have that option. Instead, I try to take the past as a starting point.

A done bun can’t be undone, but it can be enjoyed with a pat of butter and a hot mug of tea.