Sounders Game

August 25th Sounders game with the largest soccer crowd ever in the Great Northwest and the third largest soccer crowd in the world on that Sunday. That is some cool shit. 67,385 people at Century Link Field and I was one of them! Joined Roslyn peeps for the show!

It's a gift

It's one of those strange summer rains, cool and yet humid. The type of rain where you just cannot get a happy medium on the vent system while driving in the car and the windows have fog condensation that you are not able to get rid of.

But... I don't care. The stereo is on loud and playing the CD I burned for myself. I'm leaving town and heading over the rain soaked pass to my sisters. Shocking how getting on the freeway can free your mind and lift your mood.

My mood was good to begin with, but it has been a long week emotionally. I'm at the end of my 30 day grieving period and going to start dating again. Even got a date yesterday with the neighbors hot son for some future moment lined up.

Last night I was weak. Even said it aloud.. for the right reasons I would take him back.
What was I thinking? I have come so far.

I just finished reading a book by Nora Roberts, called Whiskey Beach. In it the character Abra tells Eli "I love you." He at that point doesn't feel the same. She is okay with it though. And says, "Take the gift and you don't have to balance the scales. If I gave it to soon or wrapped it in the wrong way it can't be helped. It's still a gift."

I blame the weakness on that line. It sucked me in. While good words, it made me think I could settle.

Internal warfare

The sounds of warfare filter through my house, my baby boy is living here again. He is good company. I love his quiet soul. He loves warfare and the sound of him playing war online is oddly comforting.

The week has been good the days get easier and easier. But I had to read my happy post and other posts to remember why I'm putting myself through this. Kelly has been my biggest supporter and I would have never made it through this without her.

The other day I was wishing I could find a man that met all the criteria. Well I have one in mind but he is not yet back in town. He is supposed to call when he does. I have a saw that belongs to the house he lives in and he is going to help me move it. And I just want a man, right away. I have been grieving but just ready to go back out there and try again. But how does one find one really?

On Tuesday I walked outside to water the garden and right in my neighbors yard was a hot guy. Marilyn the neighbor says. "Shannon, I'm so happy to see you! Come meet my son Matt." So I did, and he was so damn cute and I was so damn attracted to him I blushed and lost my words. 

The following morning I'm outside watering the garden and a hot guy walks down the alley stops and says Hi. Apparently I can just grow them in my garden. Internally my heart is still broken and torn. But I will win the war against myself and a man that doesn't love me.

Hootenany

It's the aftermath. I have good days and bad. But the good days are no longer alternating they have become steady and recently had three in a row. I miss him. I miss the good moments. I miss the Nick that courted me.

Happy

This morning this first word from my lips was happy. I rolled over in the big bed alone and smiled at the ceiling and said it out loud. "Happy!" And I grinned with joy because I was me again. That happy person I know and love.

Why... I no longer have the rage from that woman stalking us. I no longer have the stress of alcoholism. The fury from him not hearing, understanding or listening to my worries, insecurities and fears are gone.

She is no longer sucking my happiness and joy. He is no longer sucking my happiness and joy.

It has been coming day by day as I get my life and my house back and as I get used to it being just mine again. He texted me Friday evening and it shocked me and sent me in a tailspin. Right back in that place of worry and stress. I believe he had the wrong person or that she sent it, because no one ever responded to it and that also stressed me out.

And this has taught me something: as yesterday was all quiet on the western front in my world and from theirs.

It is better not having them in it.

Pieces

'Thinking spot'

The sound of pressure, water pressure echoes through my house while I write. I'm watering the garden we planted together as I force myself to take a timed thirty minutes to write. My Eire cup is filled with almond tea and the summer sun lights the front porch in odd angles. I woke early after a late night out and today is already a tough day emotionally and tears are being squeezed back forcibly.

Yesterday he was a douchebag. Today I can only remember the good sweet moments and that is what I miss the most, those sweet moments. His face when freshly shaven and he looks so sweet, his quick grin and happiness in his eyes. Cooking and dancing together. The times I would come out on the porch and find him sitting in his thinking spot smoking and having a beer.

Woman own every feeling in a break-up and I'm on it. I write all the time. I cry when I need to.
Men are so different and baffling. Nick was moved into another woman's house in about four hours or less. But is so spitting angry with me, he will not speak with me.

What I don't miss is the stress I was constantly under. I don't miss when he was mean and unreasonable. I don't miss the stalking of Sheila. So I try to focus on those moments. But once in awhile a day sneaks in on me and I have to own the good sweet times too.

This week I finally understand and get what Jim always meant by "You love me, but you are not in love with me." At a barbeque last Saturday we had a talk and shot of tequila by the side of his truck and he said it again to me. "You love Nick, but you are not in love with Nick." I shook my head, and replied "I can never understand that comment, I just don't get the difference." He tried to explain it again. So for a couple of days I mulled on it and then asked his girlfriend Kelly over cocktails to explain it again.

"In love is when you want to be with that person no matter what happens. You don't want to lose them or ever have them go away. You want to be with them all the time."

I finally get it and of course Jim is right and maybe that is where I have fucked up. I was always walking out, away or removing Nick from my life. So now I ask myself do I want to be in love with him?

'Pieces'. Today I woke with that one word on my mind and right now I cannot give away pieces of myself. 'Pieces of my heart, pieces of my soul.' The words from Gary Allen's new song cross my mind with the thought of the word pieces.I know what I mean, when I say it but trying to explain it is difficult.

Nick said recently he would be worried about me if he left, and he explained why and so this morning I have my answer for him. When I'm grieving after a break-up there is no way I can share pieces of myself with another man. That is the difference between us... men and women. I turn something off during this time and shut it down.

And today being such a bad day I cannot decide if I it's him I miss or just the thought of him  the piece of sweetness that I miss so much.

'Pieces'

I’ve been broken, torn and scattered
I’ve loved holy, I’ve loved sin
I was rolling on the wind
It didn’t matter

I was so sure of who I didn’t want to be
Every smile and every fear
Every laugh and every tear
It was all mine, it was all me

Chorus:
Pieces of my heart
Pieces of my soul
Pieces that I’m gonna be
I don’t even know
I gave a lot to lovers
Gave a lot to friends
Everything I took from them
Made me who I am
Pieces

We’ve all been lied to
We’ve all been liars
Nothing’s perfect in this world
Everybody’s been burned by the fire
Guess I’m learning
That what breaks you, makes you grow
But I’m not hiding where I’ve been
Gonna let the light shine in
What I don’t need
Gonna let that, let that, let that go

Chorus:
Pieces of my heart
Pieces of my soul
Pieces that I’m gonna be
I don’t even know
I gave a lot to lovers
Gave a lot to friends
Everything I took from them
Made me who I am
Pieces

Pieces, the good and the bad
Pieces, the happy and sad
Pieces, the wrong and the right
Pieces, that’s my, that’s my, that’s my life

Chorus:
Pieces of my heart
Pieces of my soul
Pieces that I’m gonna be
I don’t even know
I gave a lot to lovers
Gave a lot to friends
Everything I took from them
Made me who I am
Pieces

Pieces, pieces

Ready..set..go

You can do this!

As time goes, this is just a pinch.

Tough weekend.

Suck it up buttercup.

Happy Endings

I just want my own happy ending.

Plain and simple.

The other night it came to me suddenly that I did not want to live like that anymore. The constant worry and the building anger. 'Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.' This thought often comes to mind lately. I just don't want to live like that anymore, enraged with fury over a woman so toxic she borders evil. An insidious evil that Nick refuses to comprehend or contain.

The alternative is to swallow and digest it. I can't and won't. Because the alternative is that it continues and I settle. I'm better than this. I deserve love and respect.

I set it up to leave, to be inaccessible for some time. To grieve and make myself stronger to walk away from this and yet then he texts me good news and I waiver. Because I miss him so. But I swallow a beer with a bitter pill and ignore it. Because it would be giving in and up and I can't go back to the way it was.

She won't stop, this i know.

in·sid·i·ous  

/inˈsidēəs/

Adjective Proceeding in a gradual, subtle way, but with harmful effects: "the insidious effects of stress". Treacherous; crafty: "an insidious alliance".

Synonyms sly - treacherous - guileful - crafty - perfidious