10:42 p.m. - 06/15/03
it's not an end - it's just a start.
Eight messages in my inbox just now and only two of them are spam. I love you guys.
My status for the third time today: ...erm, uncertain. As usual, I find myself facing something entirely strange and wholly familiar. The grief I recognize. The grief makes sense to me. I know how to cry and pick at things and obsess over what will never be. I know how to distract myself, how to manipulate my mind when I can't face its true thoughts. I know every step of that denial, anger, bargaining, sadness, (and so forth) dance, and I can do it with uncanny rhythm. It's the lack of death, actually, that's strange. It's the uncertainty, the invisibility of what I'm grieving. I don't want to think my family's really broken...so...what am I upset about? I don't have any idea how our lives will change because of this, so how do I respond? It only seems obviously painful sometimes. The rest of the time, I'm confused by the statistics, by the fact that this happens to most families, by the reality that so many people I know have gone through it. My other grief is startling. It's something that's not supposed to happen. And I don't know with divorce; I don't know if that's not supposed to happen. I live in a scheme of thought where I'm not sure marriage is supposed to happen (and don't you wonder where I got that), so why upset myself over the opposite? On the other hand, that's entirely naive. I mean, I don't want to have a child; if I ended up with one, and she died in my arms, the fact that I didn't plan her wouldn't be much comfort. I don't want to be married, but I do want my parents to stay married. And they aren't going to. And no one has told my why.
Irreconcilable differences. Impasse. That means what exactly? You've been polar opposites since I was born; you never divorced before. Impasse. Impasse is just another word for giving up; say choice. Say, we've come to a choice. Give us that much.
Sarah's biggest question is whether or not they still love each other. This will sound crazy (probably), but the thought didn't even cross my mind. I guess that might be because I'm not in a relationship myself; she made fleeting references to her own partnership, saying that it didn't make her doubt if she should be with him, but it raised all these questions, just the same. She said she wanted to know if they still love each other, and if they don't, exactly when it changed. "When it became bullshit." I just sort of nodded along while she talked (which isn't very helpful over the phone), and told her they were good questions. I hadn't thought of them.
I don't really want to hear that my parents don't love each other anymore, but it seems impossible. Listening to my dad talk on the phone today, I could hear the tragedy of this. They aren't screaming at each other; they didn't give up early in the game. They've been in therapy so many times, they've tried so many things, they've stood by each other even when they didn't recognize the person next to them, and after all that effort, they're giving it up. After fighting so hard for so long. And I wonder, if you spend over 25 years married to someone, how you can possibly stop loving them. Maybe I'm stupid about this because I've never been in love, but I don't think you can hold that kind of history, hold five children and 25+ years, and not love each other in some way. Still. Maybe that's just what I want to believe. Maybe it's my myth. I think of love as motivation to develop or maintain a relationship, not as the sole factor. I think you can leave a relationship you love because the work has become too hard or because you feel you've exhausted every "solution" and no longer know what to do. I think, even if you love each other, and even if you've been together for forever, the work of that relationship can still mean you have to live. Maybe I just need to think that their decision is something more similar to that than "they just don't love each other." It makes more sense to me, but who knows how similarly my parents and I think about this? How similarly do we think about anything?
My mom mentioned a joke that's running through my siblings. It goes - 1st Sibling: The last thing I want to do *ever* is meet "Mom's boyfriend." 2nd Sibling: Or Mom's girlfriend. She said she'd assured a couple of my brothers that this was not the case, that this was so not the issue, that indeed (I could not believe she used this phrase), she "didn't swing that way." By that point, I wanted to hit her (again - I go from weepy to violent over and over, a few times an hour at least.) Instead, I walked away a little and made it clear that what she said wasn't so "comforting" to me. I have to wonder what she thinks, but I really don't want to know. My sensitivity about this, all the questions that have been posed, more seriously regarding me than they have regarding her...it must make her wonder. I suppose I'd tell her if I knew. But I have very little information to go on, and I've been in enough science classes not to draw a conclusion without all the facts. Though the lack of them has me wondering...maybe I can't figure out where I fit because we've made the categories too tight. Maybe it really is people over gender, for me at least. Maybe the reason I can't imagine my parents falling out of love and possibly wanting to be with other people is because I don't see my dad as loving women and my mom as loving men. I see them as loving each other.
You'd think I'd be used to not understanding anything...
This song was playing in the cafe when my mom told me about the divorce. I was going to share it with my siblings, but when I looked at the lyric again, I really feel like it's just for me. That's why my mom didn't recognize the vocalist and my brother didn't even hear a word of it. That's why it was on a mix tape I received just days ago, so I'd know it, so it'd grab my attention, so I'd have something to hang onto - to tell me that I didn't break the world; in fact, it hasn't broken, in large part, because of me.
The World's Not Falling Apart
Dar Williams (as transcribed here)
Welcome to the golden age of speed with grace
Waiting for the angry gods to smite our race
I logged on to Africa for just one day
I opened a door and that's OK.
It�s not an end, it�s just a start
Not an end, it�s just a start
(three two one)
Chorus:
And the world�s not falling apart
The world�s not falling apart because of me
And the world�s not falling apart
The world�s not falling apart because of me
I have seen the kids who make their scenes
And I have seen the riot grrls who print their zines
They write the word, they raise a thought
They say who they are, they try what they�re not
'Coz life is such a changing art,
Life is such a changing art
And the world�s not falling apart
The world�s not falling apart because of me
And the world�s not falling apart
The world�s not falling apart because of me
Because of me.
Bridge: Wooaohoaoh (As only Dar can.)
The closest thing to God that I have heard
Is when I knew I did not have the final word
You say the world has lost its love
I say embrace what it's made of
I�ll snake a camera to your heart,
I�ll snake a camera to your heart
And the world�s not falling apart
The world�s not falling apart because of me
And the world�s not falling apart
The world�s not falling apart because of me
Because of me
(More wooahhs to end)
...
My life, my world. I keep it from falling apart. I create it. That continues to be true. And my parents and my family are integral, and they aren't going to disappear. I did cry after calling my dad today, the way I cried after hearing it from my mom. But I still love them, whatever the status of their love is. And I don't yet know what this means. So I can feel and not feel as necessary, and wait, I guess.
Focus on me, and try to quit thinking I'm not being productive enough. I think I'm allowed to call my life work for now, and wait a little while for that real-world job. This world, right now, is real enough to keep me occupied.
chordling
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