Being in a relationship takes up a LOT of time.
I feel like I knew that or I should have known that, but for some reason, I didn't really think about it when I was with him. I was so happy to spend time with him, to be with him most nights and to talk on the phone for hours--I didn't realize that he occupied a large part of my non-class, non-job time. We saw each other almost every day and talked on the phone at least once or twice a day.
It's no wonder that I lost sight of who I was and what I liked to do. What I like to do? Spend time with him! Who was I? His girlfriend! Heheee! Whee!
I'm not entirely unrelieved that I'm not like that anymore. As much as I liked being in a relationship and feeling wanted and loved and desired, losing sight of who I was was one of the scariest revelations of my life (second only to realizing that he was capable of pure evil).
Having time on my hands is a blessing and a curse. It's given me time to rediscover who I am. This is what I have so far: I'm a girl who will tear through a book if I think it's good (and so far I do NOT think Twilight is good, which is why I haven't gotten past the first chapter in two months). I'm a girl who is journaling her healing process and becoming a better writer in the process. I'm a girl with creative ambitions that don't always pan out, but somehow always manage to impress someone, which makes me think I'm even more creative than I give myself credit for. And I'm a girl who will willingly watch hours of Sex and the City and Scrubs reruns because she has time on her hands, which is the curse.
A benefit to this time and to figuring out Me 2.0 is that I have a chance to recapture some of the things that had been "ours"; things that I want to be mine again. Things like Anchorman which I had loved before I met him but somehow it had become "our" movie with inside jokes. I was relieved to watch it the other day and not associate anything from the relationship.
And things like messages in bottles. I love them and think they're some of the closest things we have to fairy tale moments and so I shared that with him and we threw one out on our vacation. I still associate them with magical moments, but to distance the thing from him I wrote a story about my heartache and threw it into the only place that made sense--Lake Superior, the place that saw so much growth from me.
And even things like lingerie. He had given me a sheer black slip that, admittedly, was really comfortable. After the break-up, though, I balled it up and left it in a basket with the intent of burning it or something. My friend found it digging through the basket because I said the words "free clothes" and she saw that the slip had potential to be a great 80s costume. And thus, with a belt and some big, crimped hair, I no longer look at it and think of him, but rather see potential for some cute costumes and outfits.
I'm getting there...but I'm not there yet. There's still at least one thing I need to recapture and it might be the hardest: Valentines Day was a special day for us and three weeks before the holiday, I'm not sure how I'm going to deal. Maybe I'll be ok. But maybe I'll be a mess because it is a day where society celebrates couplehood and love and all that shit. It's too soon to tell. What I do know is that I need to do something to recapture it solely as mine. Because the chapter with him and I closed long ago. I'm writing a new chapter and I want a happier ending this time.