The Breakups
Or: How To Do It, When Life Shows Up
When I was 22, I got dumped twice in a row.
The first was by college (okay, I graduated, but I really didn’t want to), and the second, shortly after, was by my boyfriend. On the side of a hill. At a party. (cute!)
That first week after The Breakups, I hid under the covers for approximately 50% of my time. It would have been a higher percentage, but - inconveniently! - I had to work my restaurant job, so I somehow dragged myself to my shifts, weeping all the while.
At one point, my friend AnneMarie (God bless you, AnneMarie) came over, built a blanket fort with me, and we watched every single extended edition of The Lord Of The Rings. That is twelve straight hours of Hobbits, Orcs, Elves, and other assorted creatures.
As lovely an escape as this was, it did not solve my conundrum: I felt lost, alone, destabilized, and without any idea of direction or purpose. I was floating, heartbroken, and had no idea what to do.
Ah, but of course: that is not the end of the story.
What do we do with our moments of heartbreak? With our tenders, our toughs? When life shows up with gnashing teeth and fisticuffs?
What do we do when things crumble down around us, and we can’t remember which way is up? When a relationship ends, suddenly. A job gets pulled out from under us. A project goes awry, a friendship, a dream -
What do we do when life is not as we wished - or as it seemed?
Not long after the Great Elven Marathon of ‘09, my quirky coworker came in to our shared shift with a gift. He plopped a black journal on the table in front of me, a micron pen taped to it with blue painter’s tape. I find this helps, he said.
I began journaling voraciously. Vividly. Any time it was slow in the restaurant (and it was often slow), I would draw. I would express my emotions through comics, words, images. It brought me slight, if momentary, relief. And that - was something.
There is so much we cannot control in this life. People come and go. Friendships - and friends - live and die. Family, too. Jobs arrive, depart. Things end; things start. Loved ones, lovers, places, pets - the only constant is change. We know that. We know that - and yet -
We resist. Isn’t it funny, this? Isn’t it just achingly, ridiculously - human? Isn’t it such a curious part of our existence?
We plug our ears. Squeeze our eyes shut. Clamp our hands across our chests. Yell. NO! I DISAGREE! I DON’T WANT THIS!
Life, though - it cares little for our temper tantrum. It smiles, gently. Squeezes our arm. And says,
But baby… this is how it is
Slowly. Ever so slowly. Inch by inch. I began piecing my heart, and life, back together.
I took a drawing class. I hid under the covers a little less. I went to therapy. That therapist - a matronly woman named Dr. Barnes who took clients in the basement of her suburban house - changed my life. She turned me on to mindfulness, to different ways of seeing.
I dated people. I cried. I kept moving.
A year after The Breakups, I moved my things back into my parents’ house in Florida, and two friends and I embarked on a cross-country road trip.
That trip completely shifted my trajectory and began me on the path I’m still on now. A path which includes - perhaps you noticed? - lots of comics, words, and images. (Thanks, coworker!)
A path that would not have been available to me - or at least noticed -
before The Breaking.
So, then: what do we do when life shows up with the toughs, the snarls, the weeps, the gnashes, the fisticuffs?
Well, friend.
We do the hardest thing in the world,
and we turn toward.
We sit down. Right there.
Right there. In the middle of it. In the midst of the heartbreak, the unswept floor, the dishes in a heap in the sink. In the stink. The weeping, the wailing.
We open our hearts to all that shows up, as courageously as we can.
(We evacuate sometimes too; this is understandable; this is necessary)
We remember that we are not alone here. Millions - millions - of fellow humans stand beside us, facing shattered dreams.
We remember our ancestors, who sailed myriad rough seas, and
We trust: this is not the end of our story. It may even be a beginning.
But for all that flowery prose - before lesson, before learning -
(that will come in time, and only in time, and there is no way around time,)
Our task is just to be there,
Allowing life as it shows up -
Even when we can’t stand it -
And. Breathe.
That’s all for this month, friends. As ever, if you’d like, you can support me on Patreon; buy something from my store; or share this e-mail with a pal.
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