The name of this site comes from John Lennon's Across The Universe. It seems a perfect desciption of life--fluid, with happiness cascading over you. But when the waves of joy recede--and they always do--you're left with pools of sorrow.
I must be living in a low-lying area, metaphorically speaking, because I can't seem to get these pools of sorrow to dry up.
It's been exactly four years since my wife and I split up. We were only together for five years, so we've been apart for nearly as long as we were together, yet she continues to dominate my life. Or maybe it's not her so much as the illusion of her, the perfect person I saw in my mind, as opposed to the flawed, all-too-human person she actually was.
Or maybe it doesn't even have anything to do with her. What weighs so heavily on me is that I took a chance with her, I fell in love with her and surrendered my heart, and was willing to follow it anywhere. I rode those waves of joy no matter how rough they were. We were two volatile people, and things got ugly at times, but I was convinced we were meant for each other. We'd always be together.
And then we weren't.
Forgive the overwrought imagery, but the pools of sorrow I fell into at that point nearly drowned me. I attempted suicide, and have the permanent damage to my body to prove it, but the damage to my psyche was far worse. For the longest time I was convinced it was my fault, that I didn't deserve happiness, that I didn't even deserve to live. (Hence, the suicide attempt.) Then I entered the bitter phase, when I was convinced it was all her fault, and that her wretched soul should writhe in unimaginable circles of hell forever. This was followed by wallowing in nihilism--there's no joy ever and what does it matter?
These says I'm in a state of almost-acceptance. Despite being seperated for over three years, we didn't even divorce until last September. She's planning on getting married again next spring--as you can imagine, that makes me feel EXACTLY like Paul Giamatti in Sideways--and I've dated a series of unstable, neurotic or just plain fucked-up women, relationships that are safely doomed from the start.
I certainly haven't met anyone I could fall for as I fell for my ex. That's probably a good thing. The more I think about it, the more I realize she herself doesn't dominate my life. It's the brief happiness she represents, a joy I both long for and dread. If absolute bliss carries with it the promise of overwhelming sorrow, you wonder--is it worth it?
