Showing UP for Sophia: Love in the Last Lane

Karma is only a bitch if you are.

I thought we were rolling steady, though slow. Until I noticed he seemed ready to get off the road. One tire in, one tire out? Dangerous, exhilarating, and exhausting. I had to decide if I was ready to ride or die. I wasn’t down for either, until I was.

After he decided to leave me in the dust and drive back to his hometown with our daughter, I picked up my bags and have been crashing on my Mom’s couch since mid-February. When I met him five Februarys ago, he was living with a longtime friend, sleeping on his couch.

Karma is only a bitch if you are.

Over the past few weeks Venus in retrograde has done a number on me and I’ve been taking inventory on relationships like never before. Especially those I claimed to be “in love with” or “crazy about”. What was the difference? Was there one? I needed to know because I was determined to flip the script.

What I discovered is that the stories, patterns, and problems surrounded me because I chose to surround myself with them. When I was a child I didn’t have a choice. My mother taught me early on that I was “good for nothing” and couldn’t “do anything right”. She was right, I couldn’t. So I didn’t, and if I did, I somehow had to sabotage it, whatever it was. Projects, jobs, relationships. If I was rewarded or recognized as being deserving of good, I pushed it away. Of course I didn’t know I was doing that, until inventory.

Being with the stories and feeling whatever showed up helped me to see what I was missing. The parts of me I shamed away and silenced. The Inside Kids I left within who thought they deserved to be hurt so whenever anything good happened, they had to reject it before it was taken away. Because ultimately it was. Good news — here’s the hitch. Bonus received — unexpected bill. My rationale was, “Shit happens.” So it did.

Until I decided I didn’t want it to and took a look at my shit. As you might expect, it was messy and gross. I was messy and gross. I have days where I still am. Thankfully not as often or severe because I’ve learned new stories and how to receive what makes me feel good, knowing I’ve always deserved it. No matter how messy and gross I’ve been.

Talk about tricky — finding new ways to create safe spaces between people who have individual intentions. Considering I wasn’t allowed to cry in front of my parents without fear of shame, being able to trust another person has felt like a dead end. There have been detours and construction that goes unfinished. I don’t want to travel like that anymore. I choose drivers and passengers who know where they want to go and know they want to go with me. I’m not tied to time, but deserve respect. Unsurprisingly, I used to demand it but rarely got it.

Karma is only a bitch if you are.

While taking inventory, I had to be real with myself and question my time with John. Did I miss him? Why? Would I always? My Inside Kid popped out wanting to be heard. She told me his little was my friend, lost in a world John didn’t want to be part of. Maybe not now, maybe never. I cried wishing I could reach my friend. Wondering what I could do to get through to him. My Inside Kid asked me how I would want him to show up for me. I was embarrassed but admitted I wanted John to tell me how much he missed me and that he loved me and was willing, once and for all, to try and make it work.

Tell him.

I told her I had tried in many ways for weeks. I sent text messages with apologies and songs. When he first arrived in my life, he wooed me with other people’s words. Every day I received a new tune that made me feel special because he chose them especially for me. This time around I heard songs, sometimes for the first time, that spoke to me and therefore through me because I didn’t know how else to reach him.

I debated for days whether to bare my soul and tell him yet again what I felt I had made clear months ago. Until I got real with myself.

I regularly meditate with music, starting my sessions by setting intentions to be open to the messages received. I listen while bringing awareness to every word. Most songs find me, whether through playlists or mixed cds or tapes from loved ones. Music and me go way back.

So I put on my earbuds, hit the play button, and listened. Before long I was bawling to songs I hadn’t heard in decades.

They were maps to my safe space, a place where I could trust another. My Inside Kid sang out lyrics she used to cry to the sky, wondering how I got lost and asking me to follow her lead. I almost stopped in my tracks, making marks on the road, “Do you even know how to drive?”

Probably better than you.

So she drove and told me what to text. I was scared shitless but took a deep breath and hit send.

It was 1am where he was. I wondered if he was awake, assuming not. The next day he admitted he was, but there were no other confessions.

He called and asked what I meant. I took another deep breath and asked my Inside Kid to come back out to help. I remembered what she said, but didn’t want to fuck things up for us again. She showed up and spoke out. I mostly stayed out of the way taking notes. She was fearless, and got everything we’ve been discussing off our chest.

He said little and made a beeline for a conversation about co-parenting. He didn’t talk about love or loss, but acceptance of what was, what is, and that he was still rooting for me. It was hard to hear, especially the parts he didn’t say. I wanted to believe they never were. He never did. It’s easier to be mad and convince myself that he is incapable of loving anyone. But my Inside Kid hugged my heart from within and reminded me that if that were true, it would be true for me too, and did I want it to be?

I didn’t. I don’t.

“I’m glad you showed up” I said, imagining myself holding her hand.

I’m glad you did.

The rest of the day was spent focusing on a future without John in it beyond Sophia’s Big Guy. I thought I had already done this, but not like this. I still had hope. I hadn’t realized it, and I was initially ashamed because I’m not the type to want anyone back. Not to say I’ve never gone back to someone, but I’ve never initiated, at least not in romance. I couldn’t believe I did. Especially being afraid that he didn’t want me and having it confirmed by him talking about friends wanting to set him up and him not being ready “yet”.

Hello knife, have you met my heart? Oh… you have.

This morning I told John I needed a rain-check for my online “visit” with Sophia. I wasn’t ready to see him and visiting her involves seeing him, if only for a second. Not wanting my funk to effect my day or future visits with our daughter, I decided to meditate.

While sitting quietly, I called on the teen in me to tell me what happened, “Why are we afraid to be loved?” My phone buzzed and I tried to ignore it, “I’m meditating.”

More buzzes. More attempts at ignoring the noise, until I couldn’t ignore it in my mind.

Check your phone.

I looked and saw messages from loved ones but none compelled me to read. I went to my home screen and stared at the apps, focusing on Facebook. Immediately upon opening I was given the option to review the memories that had previously been posted on this date. Lately I’ve stayed away from the memories because they fuel my fire and I find myself going down back allies with potholes that bump up what I left behind — faces and places I no longer visit but miss.

I scrolled all the way down to the start. Ten years of my life posted for friends on Facebook. Friends. I couldn’t help but laugh at the irony. Were we friends?

A memory caught my eye. Remember?

I wished I hadn’t, but it is imprinted on my brain. Luckily I know now how to look at it without becoming it. Still, the memory answered my question. Why would I trust romance after that?

I was fifteen. He was a marine. I had a crush on him and he crushed me. He wasn’t the first or the last. But he was the start of me fearing any type of safety with a stranger, especially a man. The memory reminded me of how John was the first man who I strangely loved because I trusted him completely. And now he doesn’t want to go my way. No regrets. I said what I needed to say to flip the script.

Karma is only a bitch if you are.

Slow and steady wins the race? What race? The finish line is death, and I’d rather live. So I’ll gladly take the wheel and trust in us, me and my Inside Kids. We’ll get there, when we get there, cruising along this highway of life with solid tunes and good company. Beep beep, bitch… Marcella’s back!