I’m Catching Up With Myself
When the parts of yourself you lost in divorce return
I’m a pie in the sky kinda girl. I embrace sugar and spice and everything nice. I relish every word of Louis Armstrong's What a Wonderful World. I believe absolutely anything can happen and that miracles are faith’s way of reminding us why we are here.
And love is the most wondrous drug in the world.
If I’d written these words a year ago, I would’ve felt like a liar.
Like I was pretending a gone girl still existed. When she didn’t. Those who know me would shake their heads. They would whisper to one another, “She’s not that person anymore,” “Who’s she kidding?” “The core of her no longer exists,” or “She used to be great.”
But I’ve been catching up with myself.
My inner being is resurrected. I gave myself away and I took myself back. It wasn’t easy. It wasn’t quick. It wasn’t painless. It was complicated. It was gut-wrenching. It was insurmountable.
Divorce comes in different shapes and sizes. Some put a scratch in people. Others a dent. Some total an individual who didn’t quite see the collision coming.
I envied people who got a quickie divorce. A year or two of suffering, battle, and depletion. Not the extended trauma of a five-year escape. They bounced back more quickly. Or so it seemed.
But for me…I found myself entwined in the words of Emily Dickinson…
“I am out with lanterns, looking for myself.”
That girl…The girl whose cup was so full she poured a bit of hers into others. Who basked in her gratitude and blessings. Who pinched herself because of the people who graced her life.
Who got a thrill out of saying ‘I love you’ or announcing ‘a beautiful day.’
Who thought every single problem could be solved.
The dreamer who thought fantasy could become reality. She suddenly found herself in mid-life believing her beginning had been rented and replaced.
But it hadn’t.
It was waiting in the dark for the light of lanterns. It was screaming for the girl who left her behind. Not the woman who had walked away from herself. But the little girl who birthed her.
Who grew up in the country outside of metropolitan Washington, D.C. Who jumped over logs and fell into creeks on purpose. Who followed horses through fields and caught box turtles.
Who belted out tunes from a vacuum microphone and a fireplace perch.
Who spent her days singing and catching fireflies. Who talked too much to excel at school but read so much that one subject found her. The youngest of five who waited feverishly for her four older siblings to return home and all be right with the world.
I’m catching up with her.
