Fresh Page

When I was little, I imagined life-altering events in the story of a person's life were like turning pages in a book. As life went on, paragraph melded into paragraph, until an event was cataclysmic enough, like someone died or got married, and an entire section arched. Then, at the close of that section, a page turned, and a fresh blank one awaited the next part. Life went on. A whole new episode to write from which to draw endless possibilities. Beginning anew.

I'm not little anymore. We live, things happen. We try to write the story our own way, but effects linger. Sometimes, we achieve a well anticipated and planned milestone and are happy to incorporate the related perks into our lives; other times, less desireable events happen with an apparent randomness that can leave us breathless. Either way, there's no "starting over," wholly. The new pages incorporate with the old, life as eternal revision. Either we absorb changes or over time, happy and pleased, or we can be downright reluctant as they seep into our cells and become part of us, no matter how we feel about it.

When I was divorced, I hoped it would be a simple matter of ending that episode of my life and beginning fresh on a new page. Turning that page took over three years, over seventy previous blog entries, the endless patience of my friends, two attempts at relationships, and a whole lot of fear. Now that it's turned (not that I can't swear I won't go back and reread portions of what came before), I find that I don't know what to write.

I'm 35 years old, single, and living with my cats in the suburbs. To admit that I'm an English teacher is almost too much of a cliche. To admit that I like my life as it is is tatamount to blasphemy between my American-of-Italian-descent family who believe in cleaving and even the most liberated of my friends who maintain that "everybody wants to share her life with somebody." Yeah, I can't say that I wouldn't enjoy a date. Having a nice man pay attention to me for a sustained amount of time and appreciating the effort I make to be a pleasant companion sounds nice. Fun.

But my attempts to write a love story on the blank pages before me are cursory. I guess I want to date again. I feel like I do... I long for romance, I long for someone to touch me; nobody touches me anymore. But my attempts to find someone are mired in the previous pages that I can't stop from running through my mind. I don't really want someone, not really. "People are where they want to be," someone wise once said. I want to be alone. I WANT to want someone, but right now, I want to be alone.

It's a contradiction that I do want a relationship that fulfills me, but I don't want to deal with a relationship. I want someone who cares for me, but not to have to care for someone. I want romance, not routine or regularity. I've worked hard to build this life for myself, as I told my aunt. It's a life I built in the wake of my divorce, when it was important to get to know myself single and what I would be like alone. I've done a damned good job! I've turned my singleness into something that makes me proud. I have friends. I have a social life. I have a job I like. I have a calm, comfortable home. Before I let someone into it, I want to enjoy it! If I find someone, I very well could be attached to him for the rest of my life. This is a chance to have peace. Stability. To relax from the tension from divorce and graduate school and ill-fated attempts at relationships. Time simply to enjoy what I've created, until readiness if not outright boredom drives me into someone's arms.

The temporary price for this peace is a man who might be good for me. But he won't be good until I'm ready for him to do some good, and until then, there is indeed some touching to do. Namely, embracing! I need to embrace someone important, myself, a while longer. The love story in the coming pages will have to wait until I write sufficient exposition.