Lately

I was going to fascinate you all with a bunch of dazzling pictures of what we've been up to lately, but then I uploaded what's on my camera and realized it's all just pictures of our dinners....and then my dad asked me why I photograph my food...am I making a cook book or something?

NO.

But I might have a problem.

So I decided instead to just bore the shit out of you with my words instead of in pictures.

Lately, Bill and I got back together. Woah, I know. I promise though, I won't write a chapter of our love story for every single little change that occurs in our relationship. In fact I think writing that shit is bad luck at this point anyway.

So no more love story.

Just updates.

Lately, Jackson has been unruly as all fuck. We are officially in the Testing phase, I think and he is desperately trying to see how much shit he can get away with. The answer is zero.

FUCKING ZERO.

Lately, I'm pretty sure Lainie is in the puberty zone. Either that or she just hates me to death. Whichever one it is it's scary as hell and between her and Jackson it's been straight crazy cakes up in this bitch.

Lately, my Saturdays have been 100 percent consumed by kid shit from 7 am to 6 pm. Baseball, ballet, birthday parties, bad behavior and other things that start with B. I'm tired, and I'm busy, and if one more person at work says "you look really tired" I am going to round house kick them in the funny business.

Lately, I sunk to a new parenting low and put Jackson's bed in my room next to my bed. It was a last ditch effort to at least get him out of my bed if I couldn't get him out of my room altogether. So now one whole wall in my bedroom is just all bed.

I roll on it when no one is here.

It's actually kind of awesome.

So that's our lately stuffs.

I'm sorry about my sporadic as shit posting.

As you can tell I've been buried in children and covered in stress and very busy photographing every single thing I put in my pie hole.

Oh well if you're gonna twist my arm, I'll show you all my food pictures too.

I know, I just snuck that picture of Jackson in is baseball uniform in there like nothing happened.

I couldn't help myself, he's even better looking than food.

Our Love Story: The Final Chapter

This is the part I honestly thought I would never have to write.

This is the part that I believed, truly, would never come.

But it has.

Bill and I broke up.

Again, and I think now for the last time.

He came to my house, always a gentlemen, not making me come to him and not doing it over the phone, and he asked me, as kindly as possible, to let him go.

We held each other for a long time.

We said goodbye in as many different ways as we could think of.

And we made promises to stay best friends.

Because in the end, he's always been my best friend.

He's been the person who understood me. Who laughed at my jokes, and knew when my jokes were really masking something deeper, something I couldn't say, and in those times, he held me. He's the person who was always there. For drinks, for support, for help and for countless other things. And while it lasted, he gave me a deep and beautiful love, that I will not forget.

Not in this life, or the next.

He taught me that true love is possible, even if it doesn't last forever.

It can move you, it can heal you, and it can awaken in you a capacity for forgiveness and acceptance and hope that you didn't think you had.

For that, I am forever grateful.

After a lot of tears, and even some laughs, and so many hugs, I walked him to his car.

I tried to be brave and not cry when I said goodbye, and I stood on the corner and waived as he drove away.

I made myself stay upright until he turned the corner and disappeared, and then I hit my knees and cried on the sidewalk. No, I wept.

I wept for all the things I thought we would have someday together.

I wept for all the places we won't see together, and all the things we never got to do.

All the things I never got to say.

All the goodnights and good mornings and hello kisses we never got to share.

I wept because he's always been mine, in one form or another, and now I have to let him go, and accept that at some point he will become someone else's. And when that happens I'll know that that person is living the life I wasn't able to have. The life I never made it to because I couldn't stop tearing this apart. No matter how badly I wanted it.

After I stopped crying I sat in my driveway and smoked my last cigarette, staring at the street he'd just drove away on, and tried not to hope that he'd come speeding back, saying he'd made an awful mistake and he couldn't let me go.

I made myself get up and go inside.

I let myself say goodbye to him one last time in a text, and then I forced myself to sleep.

Maybe it doesn't seem like this chapter should be part of our love story, but it is because I still consider our story a love story. We had it great, and perfect for a while, but it wasn't built to last. Relationships that change your life, and change you as person, don't come a long every day.

What no one ever tells you is they also don't always last forever.

But they were still real.

It was still love, and it's still a love story even if it ends without a happily ever after. 

And I am so glad that I got to live that kind of love for the time that I did.

And maybe now we have a new future ahead of us, and we'll finally find the right place for us in each other's lives.

Whatever role we're meant to play for each other, I have hope that we'll find it.

And I am grateful for every single second I had as his girl.

Every moment that I possessed his heart, and he possessed all of me. 

But now it's time to say goodbye to that chapter of our lives together.

Where we go from here, I don't know.

Hopefully toward an amazing friendship.

Beyond that, there is only what I wish for, and whatever it is we're meant for.

An Anniversary

Three years ago today, I met Bill Becker. 

On some skeevy corner in downtown Tempe, where we had our very first date at Macayos.

It was the funnest date I've ever had in my life. 

Later that night, in that same Macayos parking lot, we had our very first kiss.

And I've very much enjoyed every single kiss we've shared in the three years that have passed since then.

Our Love Story: Part Eight

Part 8! The Happy Ending.

As I stood there in Bills hallway kissing him with everything that I had, for the first time ever, I felt him kiss me back with all he had too. I melted into his kiss, I blurred into his edges, I dissolved against his skin like chalk on the sidewalk in the rain. I was swirling paint, mixing with him, I was cloud shapes morphing into a smear of gray and white. 

We kissed for so long, I couldn't breathe. When I realized he had me pushed against the wall, I pulled away and asked for a drink. I still had a lot to say.

We moved into the kitchen where he poured me a shot of Patron and cut me a piece of lime. I drank the Patron quickly, and asked him, breathless and feeling warm already from the booze, if he knew what I had done before I came over.

No, he said.

He smelled like alcohol. Not Tequila. He'd been drinking.

I saw a movie, I said.

He didn't see what a big deal this was. 

I went on to explain what movie I saw, and why it was important, and as he stood there wide eyed, watching me have a mental breakdown, I said this:

"The point is, when we ended things in that daycare parking lot back in April, I was fine with that. Yous aid you didn't want me, and I walked away. Then, you came after me. You chased me. And we got back together. And when you broke up with me, that was FINE, because you said you didn't love me, and if that was true then you should've gone. It was the right thing to do. But then last night, you laid in bed with me and told me you LOVED ME?! If you love someone, you fight for them, You don't let them go, you don't leave them, you DO NOT let them marry other people. But you did. So what that means is that either you didn't love me enough to fight for me, or you're just a coward. And I can't live in a world where either of those things are true, so I need you to tell me you don't love me. Ready, go."

And I stood there, holding the edge of the counter, bracing myself to hear that he didn't love me. But instead, he smiled.

He moved toward me, took my face in his hands and said quietly "Oh is that all?" I nodded as tears filled my eyes.

"I can't do that." he said. And then he kissed me.

We stood in that kitchen most of the night hammering things out. We said we loved each other probably 100 times, we kissed until my lips hurt, we drank until my eyes blurred.

And we agreed to take a chance. 

One more time.

We were finally both in love with each other, and we got back together.

I wish that I could tell you that it was all a piece of cake after that. 

It isn't.

It's taken a lot of hard work and uncomfortable self awareness for me to learn to accept that Bill really loves me. It's a struggle every day to remember that things are different now, and that I can trust this to last in a way that it never did before, because we're both really all in it this time.

In the process of learning and retraining myself and trying to undo years of damage from him, my childhood and what I've inflicted on myself, I've made a lot of mistakes. 

I've hurt him.

I've hurt us.

I've hurt myself.

But I'm trying. 

I'm learning.

I'm not giving up, and I'm not walking away.

I'm loving him every day, and doing everything I can to put our love and my commitment to him and to us, before my pride, before my anger, before my need to be right, before my restless wild impulsive nature.

I'm not perfect.

I don't get it right every day, and some of the mistakes I've made have left permanent scars on our relationship.

But we love each other to forgive, to heal, to take care of each other and say I'm sorry, and try to move on. 

We keep at it. 

We keep loving each other.

Because this is my home. This is my destiny. And there is nowhere else that I could possibly belong other than in his arms.

This is our love story, and it's far from over.

I love you more than the air that I breathe, Bill.

I always have.

I always will.

Our Love Story: Part Seven

This is part seven. Read the previous six parts, or expect to have no fucking idea what's going on.

That is all.

I knew when I got back from San Diego that I needed to talk to Bill. I knew he knew now for sure that I was seeing someone else had gotten engaged to someone else, and I knew he was mad, if not hurt and upset. We started emailing back and forth, and he laid everything he was thinking and feeling about me, us and Neil on the line. He was sad, he was confused, and most of all he was misguided. He thought I had started seeing Neil before he and I had broken up, which wasn't true, but I had hid Neil from him so completely that I knew why he would feel that way. I just couldn't tell him about what was happening. It was too painful to tell the person I had loved for so long, that I was trying to love someone else. It felt like if I told him that, then it was final. It was really over, and I would never be able to tell Bill that I loved him ever again.

I hid so much, from everyone.

I hurt Bill. I hurt Neil. I hurt myself. 

I made so many permanent mistakes.

For three days we emailed back and forth, him trying to explain how hurt and upset he was, me trying to explain why I had hid things, how I was feeling, and why I had moved on so quickly. Neither of us got anywhere, and each email hurt more than the last one.

One night I opened my email to find a message from him that said he couldn't be a part of my life anymore. I had moved on, and he needed to let me go because it hurt too much to see me happy with someone else.

I broke down. 

I cried as I read the email over and over, and I got that familiar feeling of panic in my chest that I used to get when I was little and I couldn't find my Mom. I felt like she had somehow disappeared forever, and I felt like he was disappearing and I couldn't stop it. I called him, no answer. 

After I caught my breath, I typed out an email. 

With tears streaming down my face, I told him goodbye. I said I understood why he couldn't stay, but that I would miss him and love him and think of him forever. For the rest of my life I would wonder where he was, and if he was ok, and if he missed me too. The words seemed so incomplete. 

How do you say goodbye to someone you'd loved so much for so long?

It's like being asked to say goodbye to half of your heart, and being expected to not notice the missing beats. 

I said goodbye though, as eloquently as I could, and I laid down in bed feeling shattered. I had lost him. For good.

The next day I was a zombie. I didn't expect to ever hear from him again.

That night, much to my surprise, I got one more email from him.

He said he was sorry, but he couldn't walk away from me forever. He had given me a piece of his soul and he wanted me to keep it. He wanted to stay in my life but he needed time apart to heal and get his shit together.

I would grant him all the time apart he needed, if it meant I wasn't losing him forever.

Days went by, then weeks. We didn't speak. We didn't text. I missed him like hell.

And then fate intervened. 

I got in a car accident.

Nothing major, I just kind of sort of rear ended somebody in the kiss-and-ride line at Lainie's school. Whoopsie.

I posted on Facebook about it, and that night, I got a text from Bill asking if I was ok.

And that was all it took.

We started texting. 

We started talking again.

And just having him back in my life, even in that simple small way, was enough.

I felt almost whole again.

When we finally hung out again, I went over to his house to see him. We were laying in bed talking, and I don't remember ever feeling that close to him before. It was like some layer of him had been stripped away, and he was laying there beside me more warm and open than ever before. I wanted to hold him. I wanted to lay in his arms and feel his heat for the rest of the night-for the rest of my life. 

I couldn't put my finger on it, but something distinct had changed.

He was vulnerable. Open. Honest. Real.

As we laid there talking, he wrapped himself around me, and told me: "I know you don't think I ever loved you, and I know I never said it, but I did love you. I do. I love you."

With my head held tightly to his chest, I was still somehow freefalling. I fell through the sky, through the clouds, I was spinning and rushing toward the ground, and the impact was going to kill me, I could feel it in my stomach. 

I was a crashing plane.

How could he love me NOW?! How could he say that NOW?!

I wanted to be angry, I really tried to be. But all I felt was love. Relief. Happiness.

Our story wasn't over. I knew that for sure.

The next night, we agreed to hang out after he got done going out with his friends. Before going to see him, Dave took me to the movies. We decided to see Crazy Stupid Love, thinking it was a funny, sweet RomCom that would provide some mindless entertainment and a few laughs. Just what I needed. 

It was not!

It was a two hour long kick in the emotional testicles, with a few funny moments thrown in there. But not even the happy kind of funny. They were the painful kind of funny that you only laugh at if you too have had your heart ripped out in some terrible way.

What touched me the most about the movie, was that Steve Carrel's character was divorcing his wife for cheating on him. Well, she had asked for the divorce because their marriage was beginning to feel like a sham, and she had cheated on him because of that.

And he was going to just let her go. 

Even though he loved her with all his heart.

Even though she was his soulmate.

He wasn't going to fight for her, or for their love at all.

His 13 year old son ended up being the one who reminded him that when you love someone, you don't give up. Love doesn't run. It doesn't back down from a fight and if you're meant to be with someone, Goddamn it you don't stop trying until you draw your last breath.

I sat there staring at the big screen with tears rolling down my face.

Bill said he loved me.

Then why didn't he fight for me?

After the movie, I practically ran out of the theater. I rushed to the car, sped home, showered and dressed, and headed for Bill's house. 

The whole way there I kept telling myself "when you see him, you'll know what to do"

It's sort of my motto.

I got to his house, rang the bell, and stood there shaking waiting for him to come to the door.

When you see him, you'll know what to do...

His dog ran up to the window. I heard music playing.

When you see him, you'll know what to do...

I could hear him coming to the door.

When you see him, you'll know what do....

The door pulled open, and there he was. He pushed the security door open for me and I tentatively stepped inside.

When I saw him, I knew what to do.

I threw myself against him, wrapped my arms around his neck, and kissed him.

I didn't stop kissing him. I couldn't stop kissing him.

When I saw him, I knew what to do.

Part 8, LAST CHAPTER I PROMISE, tomorrow! :)

Our Love Story: Part Six

There are five other parts to this story. Hence this being called part six. Go read them.

After seeing Bill on my birthday, and getting that birthday cake from him that he HANDWROTE Happy Birthday Sarah on in icing, I was so lost. I wanted to move on. He still hadn't told me he loved me. I needed to move on. I had told him no more chances. It was time to move on!

And there was Neil, who I genuinely liked a lot, and really felt like I might be falling in love with. I know now that I was falling in love with the way he was treating me, not who he was. What I did to him was wrong, and I hope he knows, wherever he is, that for that I am truly, truly sorry.

The weekend after my birthday, Meghan and I went to San Diego to see Neil. His sub was coming into port there for four days, and he wanted to see me. So, armed with beef jerky and a shitload of mixed CD's, Meghan and I drove 5 hours to see the guy who had been romancing me via the internet for 17 days. 

When we arrived at the naval base, and I saw Neil in person for the first time in 10 years, for a split second I wanted to throw the car in reverse and drive away. Not because of him, but because I felt like a teenager who had snuck out of her house. I needed to go home before something bad happened. I needed to go tell Bill where I was and what I'd done and I needed him to hold me. I didn't. I got out of the car and hugged Neil. I hoped he couldn't hear me screaming inside my head.

When we got to our hotel that night, he asked me to marry him.

I said yes.

The time we spent together was fun. I had an amazing time. We laughed, we joked and played, we napped. We went to the San Diego zoo, we saw the Nekromantix live, we watched Pee Wee Hurman. But on Saturday evening, as we were eating frozen yogurt and talking about what we were planning to do about our budding relationship, I got a text from Bill that stopped me midsentence. It was simple. In fact it said only this:

"I hope you're having fun in San Diego! We should catch up soon when you get back."

Oh Holy Mother of God. I had not told Bill I was going to San Diego. Neil had posted a picture of the two of us at the zoo on facebook. Bill had seen it. Bill wanted to catch up. Which meant he wanted to talk. Which meant he was hurt. I hurt him.

The rest of that night passed in a booze filled blur. I woke up the next morning and quickly explained to Neil that I needed to go to Starbucks now and I needed to go with Meghan, and he was not invited. I dressed, rushed downstairs and banged on Meghan's hotel room door. 

"Starbucks. Now." I told her, and ran to the car. 

After we got our coffee, we sat outside the Starbucks and I spilled my heart and soul on the table about Bill. I missed him. But I was so mad at him! He let me go, how dare he text me while I was in San Diego, trying to move on, LIKE HE WANTED ME TO, and tell me so clearly {in code} that he was hurting and upset?! 

HOW DARE HE?!

And how dare I be sitting here thinking that Neil was awesome, but if Bill showed up right then, and said 'Come on, get in the car and let me take you home', I would have gotten in. So. Fast. 

I hated myself for what I was thinking, I hated Bill for what he was doing {what was he even doing? Ugh. I was so irrational} and I hated the world for not giving me a sign, for not telling me what to do.

And then it did.

Holy shit. Our story is a long and complicated one to tell. Stay with me folks! Stay tuned {please} for Part Seven tomorrow, which {I hope!} will be the final chapter.

Our Love Story: Part Five

Do I really need to tell you to go read parts 1-4 before you read part 5? 

I hope not.

So, here we are in Part Five, and Bill and I are broken up again.

I know what you must be thinking: "These two are so fucked up, why the fuck do they keep getting back together?"

Let me tell you why-at least why I stuck around for so long.

Despite all the drama over trying to figure out what roles we would/should/could play in each other's lives, when we were together, we were the whole world. I don't mean just each other's whole world, I mean we were the whole world. We laughed at the shit we wanted to laugh at, we did what sounded good to us, we made terrible jokes, we made fun of each other, made fun of strangers {quietly}

We saw the world in our own way, and we made up our own rules for whatever we wanted. I remember walking through the grocery store with him one night, totally sober, looking for tea, laughing hysterically. I mean, we were walking around holding hands with the biggest, stupidest smiles on our faces. We made each other truly happy. We cared about each other. We made sense to each other.

Bill was the calm, quiet center of my crazy world. 

And he meant everything to me.

It was a million little tiny things that made me love him. The fact that he bought the tea I liked to drink in the morning, and kept it in the fridge on Saturday night. The fact that he designated one of his t-shirts as my night shirt when I stayed over there. The way that before we got out of the car to go into a restaurant he leaned across the center console, looked at me with his serious face, and motioned for me to come closer, then he'd kiss me. The way he didn't care that I went crazy at concerts, or that I was really loud when I drank, or that my hair looked like two raccoons mated in it when I woke up in the morning. It was the way he looked at me, the way he kissed me, the way he smelled, the way he tasted and the way being with him made me feel sane.

I loved him for a million reasons.

But we didn't have an easy path.

After we broke up again on July 25th, I was devastated, but I was determined to move on. I was not going to wait around, I was not going to keep sleeping with him, I was not going to mourn our relationship forever.

I was going to move on.

And boy did I try.

Randomly, I reconnected with a guy that I had gone to high school with on Facebook. Neil Klemetsrud. If you've ever  read my blog before, you know who Neil is.

We started talking on Facebook and at first it was totally innocent. 

Hey, what's up, how you been, long time no see, blah blah blah, catching up shit.

But we got along well. Really well. We started talking all the time. I thought we were forming a fast friendship. We weren't. 

The day that Bill and I broke up, Neil told me he liked me. He had started developing strong feelings for me, and as crazy as it was he wanted to be with me. He wanted me to choose him.

I could feel my heart disintegrating inside my chest. I had no words.

But Neil was nice. He was warm, he was affectionate, he was expressive and flattering and he spent a lot of time being quite charming.

He texted me all day long, he called me every single night. He told me I was beautiful so many times it embarrassed me.

It was like getting water for the first time after two weeks in a desert. 

I fell for him. Quickly. Irrationally. Without warning,  without thinking, and without knowing enough about him to say that what I was feeling was sincere. 

It was wrong, but I was hurt and bleeding, and he bandaged me up and carried me home. I was in love with the idea of him. 

But I wanted him to be somebody else.

I wanted him to be Bill.

While all of this was going on, Bill and I really weren't speaking much, if at all. I know we texted once or twice here and there, but we didn't have one single real conversation that I can remember. I missed him. I missed him like I would miss my right hand if you cut it off. I kept reaching for him, turning to smile at him, opening my mouth to say something to him, then remembering he was gone. And the phantom pains wouldn't go away.

When my birthday rolled around, I texted Bill to say I missed him. My birthday was coming up and I wanted him to come out for drinks with me and Dave, Meghan and Samus, like he did every year. I should've seen it coming, but when he said no it was like he had broken up with me all over again. He never missed my birthday. It was really over. I knew it.

Why did I still miss him?! Everyone said it would go away. I kept waiting for them to be right.

My birthday celebration arrived. He didn't come. I didn't want anyone to know I was sad, so I drank until I couldn't feel my face and I could hear my pulse beating in my ears, then made Dave get me nachos and take me home, where I cried myself to sleep with cheese on my face.

God.

On Monday, the actual day of my birthday, Bill said he would meet me for a birthday drink, and I am embarrassed to admit to how excited I was. 

I met him at Garcia's, and I was running late, of course. I walked in, and felt awkward looking around for him, but when I turned and saw him sitting at a little table by the bar, I remembered our first date so clearly it almost brought me to my knees. 

He was wearing blue. He looked so handsome. He was smiling at me. God I missed him.

We hugged quickly, and I sat down.

After a beer and a shot of Tequila, we started talking about us. I skirted the issue on telling him about Neil, because even though I didn't think it would hurt him to know I'd moved on, I knew it would hurt me to tell him I'd moved on, because in that moment I wished I hadn't. 

Well, I wished I didn't have to.

We talked for a while, and we laughed and I drank and tried to stop looking at his mouth. If I had any more Tequila I was going to kiss him.

Before we left, he told me "I just want to always matter to you, because you will always matter to me." I tried not to show it on my face, but those words lit me up inside. It was the closest he'd ever come to saying he loved me.

And then, he gave me the first birthday cake I had gotten in 10 years. 

If that's not love, I just don't know what is.

Yep. This is a doozy. Stay tuned for Part Six!

Our Love Story: Part Four

If you haven't read parts one two and three, go read them. Now. I'll wait. 

You done? K good.

When we last left off, Bill had texted me and asked if he could come over and talk to me for a minute. At like 8 o'clock at night. On a Tuesday. Something that was pretty much unheard of for him. 

I was pacing around, freaking out, letting my head fill up with thoughts of doom and sadness. He was going to tell me he hated me, he was going to say he never wanted to see me again, blah blah blah.

He arrived, we went outside and sat on the trunk of the car, and after doing his best to explain why he had never let himself entertain the idea of us being together before, he said exactly this:

"I do like you, I do have feelings for you, I have for a long time, and I do wanna be with you. I wanna make a real go of it and give us a chance."

In that moment, my heart caught fire. I was so excited. He wanted to be with me! It was exactly what I wanted to hear.

Well, actually, what I wanted to hear was that he was sorry for almost letting me go. He was sorry it took him so long to see that we were right for each other, and I wanted to hear him say he loved me.

He didn't.

But in that moment I was so excited, I didn't think about that. All I heard was him saying he wanted to be with me.

We kissed, we went to Wendy's and ate Frosties, we sat in his car and talked and laughed and it was like we were us again. I was back where I belonged. 

I burst through the front door and told my roommate Bill and I were together. Finally. At last. He squealed a bit and jumped up and down with me, and I felt like the luckiest girl in the whole world.

For the next day or two, I was walking on air.

I imagined us finally being together for real this time. I imagined him missing me, and falling in love with me, and making me a real part of his life, not just his Saturday night entertainment. I had never met his family or any of his friends and I had only met his kids a couple times. I thought all of that would change, and I spent entire days dreaming about what our life would be like together. 

And for a while, things were different. We talked more {and by talked I mean he texted me more}, we took a weekend trip to Vegas, which we'd talked about for a long time, he said he missed me, even if he only said it occasionally.

But something was wrong. 

He didn't love me, I know now that's what it was, but at the time, all I knew was something was missing.

I wasn't happy.

I wasn't satisfied with what he was giving me, and I hated myself for constantly wanting more. I could see it frustrated him when I'd ask for more time with him, when I complained that he never called me, when I mentioned that I still hadn't met his parents or his family or friends or anyone in his life. I felt guilty. 

I felt bad and selfish for wanting these things because he seemed to be trying so hard. Why couldn't I just be happy with the way things were? We were finally together, why wasn't that enough?

At the end of June, almost two months after we started dating again, I went on a 10 day trip with Dave and my kids to Illinois and Michigan. Something we'd been planning all Spring. We wanted to take the kids out of the state for the first time and Dave's hometown was like Mayberry. They would have so much fun in the country! 

But it meant not seeing Bill for a long, long time. 

He had his kids during the Summer, they had trips planned, he had two business trips coming up, and when we totaled it up, between my trip and his, we weren't going to see each other for 28 days.

Holy. Shit.

I was sad, but he didn't seem to really care, which bothered me endlessly. Now, whether or not he did care, who knows. But he didn't show much emotion about things, and he's the kind of guy who looks for the silver lining in a mushroom cloud, and that optimism sometimes can be confused by others as him not missing you or not caring that you're gone.

I left for Illinois feeling hurt, neglected and unwanted. While I was gone, I heard from him less and less. His texts got shorter and shorter, and I would sometimes go all day without texting him to see if he'd notice. He didn't seem to. I tried calling him, he rarely answered and never called me back. We talked on the phone all of one time while I was away. One. Time.

We'd been arguing before I left, and while I thought it was just growing pains as we adjusted to being a real couple, he felt like it was something much more. To him it meant things just weren't working. Which they probably weren't, I was just too determined/stubborn/in love to face that. 

I remember the one conversation we had while I was in Illinois, I told him I wanted to be with someone that was crazy about me, that adored me, and I felt I deserved that. He said he didn't know what more I wanted, he was trying his hardest, he really cared about me, etc. 

He never once said he was crazy about me.

It was all I wanted to hear.

I hung up the phone feeling so hurt and defeated. I wanted to break up. I wanted to scream in his face. I wanted to run and hide. I wanted to just stop answering his calls and texts to see if he'd even look for me.

Instead I decided that when I got back and I saw him, I'd know what to do.

I got back in town just as he was leaving town. I still didn't know what to do. I missed him. I loved him. I was floundering.

I couldn't talk to him about it. Getting him on the phone was nearly impossible, and I always felt like he just got mad when I tried to talk about how I felt. I said nothing. It helped no one.

I don't remember ever feeling so completely alone.

Finally, after a month apart, he came back into town, and Saturday rolled around. It was time to finally see each other.

On the drive over to his house, I wanted so badly to feel excited. To be happy. But I just wasn't. I was filled with anger and loss and a weird sense of dread. I didn't know what to do or what to say or how to act around him. It was like I hadn't seen him in years. 

We had planned that night to go to the Drive In movie, which is one of my absolute favorite things about Arizona. You can go to the drive in all year round, but if you go at just the right time of year, it's heavenly.

The whole ride to the drive in, I felt uncomfortable, sensitive and I could feel some kind of darkness coming off of him like heat. I wanted to cry.

When we pulled in, I made some joke about something, and in return he made an off color joke about me talking about my feelings too much, and I. Just. Lost it. 

How dare he criticize me for having feelings?! How DARE he complain?! If only he knew how much I DIDN'T say to him! I had a huge internal scream fest in my head, and then started to cry, because that's what I do when I'm too angry to find words. 

When we parked I tried to explain why I was upset, but I just ended up blurting out a bunch of emotional, nonsensical bullshit that didn't make my point and didn't make sense, and got us nowhere, until he interrupted me and told me I was "Totally fucking overreacting"

Ouch.

Bill never spoke to me that way before. Ever.

We should've left then but instead we stayed, and watched an entire movie about friends with benefits, in stony silence.

I didn't spend the night that night.

I tried, but I just couldn't feel at home there anymore.

I got up and drove myself home. I cried the entire way.

The next day we didn't talk at all. Not. At. All.

On Monday morning I texted him to say good morning, and that I was sorry.

He wrote back and asked me to meet him at my house. We needed to talk.

I knew what he was going to do.

I drove to my house with shaking hands. 

I sat on the trunk of the car and waited, just like I did when he said he wanted to be with me.

He pulled up, sat beside me, and said he needed to end it.

He explained it wasn't working out, and he said over and over {so many times I wanted to punch him} that he just wasn't in love.

He didn't love me.

He wasn't in love.

I got it.

I told him ok, if he wanted to leave he could leave, but he could never come back. We could be friends, but if he walked away now he was walking away from our relationship as anything more than friends, forever. 

I said "Even if you wake up tomorrow and realize you want to spend the rest of your life with me, you can't ever tell me." 

He agreed.

I died inside.

He drove away.

I started drinking in the middle of the day.

So I know I said this was a four parter, but it's not. Stay tuned for Part Five, tomorrow!

Our Love Story: Part Three

If you haven't yet, you need to read Part One and Part Two of our love story, before you read this.

When we last left off, Bill and I had broken up. It was sad, and to be perfectly honest I was pretty crushed. I liked Bill a lot, and in the 3 months we'd dated, I had started to fall in love with him.

In fact, I remember the first time I heard myself say in my head that I loved him. It was April, and we'd been dating for a little over a month. I had tickets to see Airborne Toxic Event, one of my absolute favorite bands. Dave was supposed to go with me, but we had gotten in a fight over something so stupid I don't even remember it, a week before the show. I had bought both tickets, so I had an extra and I had a boyfriend, so naturally I had a date. 

The night of the concert, Bill got a headache. I know that sounds like nothing to any of you, but Bill and I don't just get headaches. We get Migraines. Yes, that word should be capitalized, because Migraines are a fucking force to be reckoned with. They suck ass, and I know first hand just how bad they can be. When Bill said he had a headache, I was totally willing to let him off the hook about going to the show, and just go by myself, because there was no way I would subject him to being in a crowded bar with a borderline migraine.

But he went anyway.

That probably sounds like no big deal to some of you, but to me, that was huge. He said he knew how much I'd been looking forward to the show, and he missed me, and he wouldn't miss it for the world. And he didn't. It quite literally melted my heart.

We got to the venue, and it was just what I expected: Super crowded, small, and extremely hot. I felt so bad for Bill, and I told him if he wanted to leave, we could at any time. He smiled, ordered us both drinks and said we'd have a good time.

Awwwww.

The band started up, and I was instantly into it. I was standing in front of Bill because there was just no room to stand beside him, and he was behind me with his hands on my waist while I danced and cheered and screamed like a crazy person. I was pouring sweat, my hair was flying all over the place {whatever hair wasn't stuck to my forehead with sweat, that is} and I'm sure I looked insane. I turned back at one point to look at Bill, and he was standing there, holding onto me, smiling.

I know his head hurt, I know he didn't know any of the songs {he'd never heard of the band before that night} and I'm sure he was uncomfortable, but he was smiling. So big, and so warm, and right at me while I danced and screamed myself hoarse.

It was like a movie. Shit literally slowed way down, and Bill was all I could see. I heard myself {my heart?} say in my head "God I love him". And even hearing myself think those words didn't scare me. It made me feel happy, and even more in love. 

So given all that, when we broke up on June 6th, I was crushed. I wanted to remain friends with him more than anything, and he agreed saying he cared about me, and wanted to be friends too.

Well, we stayed friends alright.

Starting that summer, we embarked on a two year long journey of being "complicated". Before you think that I call it complicated because of that stupid Facebook relationship status, let me clarify for you: It was complicated because I loved Bill, with all of my heart, and he did not {or did but just denied} love me back. It was complicated because he was hurting, still very very wounded from surviving a 13 year relationship with someone who didn't care about him, someone who wanted to change him rather than accept, love and understand him. It was complicated because I knew that our weird status of being somewhere between a couple and friends wasn't enough for me, I knew it hurt me, but I loved him so much {and so tragically} that I couldn't walk away from it no matter how much I knew that it wasn't enough. I stayed. I slept with him. For a long time I didn't even go on dates with anyone else. I waited. And things got more and more complicated.

Bill wasn't the bad guy, in case that's how it's coming across. He made it clear that he cared about me, but that a relationship wasn't what he was able to give me at that point. He said he didn't return my feelings. I stuck around anyway. I didn't just tolerate, I persued it. Being "just friends" just wasn't good enough. Even though it wasn't everything I needed from him, what we had seemed closer than nothing.

But, we spent too much time together. We had a routine, we spent every single Saturday night together, like a couple does, we spent most of our free time together, like a couple does, we had lunch together during the week, like a couple does, and neither of us had pursued relationships with other people, like a couple does.

And I could be hallucinating this, but it seemed like he started, over time, becoming more affectionate, more endearing, and more attached. 

I have a vagina. That pretty much means I read into everything. All the time.

When Bill and I were together, I was inexplicably happy. I felt so completely at peace in his presence, it was intoxicating. When nothing in my life made sense, Bill made sense. Always. When we were together, we laughed and laughed, sometimes until tears flowed. We liked the same music, so I made mixed CD's for him. We liked to same movies, we laughed at the same shit, we made fun of the same people in public, and being together felt so comfortable, so Goddamn right, it sometimes made me angry that we weren't together.

And for two years, we drifted and bobbed around in each other's lives like lost boats, occasionally coming close enough to touch oars, or to hear the scrape as our sides bumped into each other, but we always drifted away again. 

Bill went on dates with a few other people.

I went on a couple dates with one other person.

I waited.

He told me not to.

I did anyway.

It helped no one.

Every few months I would become terribly sad. I would cry on my roommate's shoulder about how much I loved him, and how he seemed to care about me so much, and really really like me, but he didn't want to be with me. I just didn't understand. Really, sometimes to this day I still don't.

I would tell Bill I wanted more, he would tell me he had no more to give, I would say I was leaving, he would tell me he wanted me to be happy, I would cry, and the next Saturday, I'd come to his house again.

But nothing ever changed.

Finally, at the end of April, 2011, I laid it all on the line. 

I told Bill I couldn't do it anymore, and I wanted some space from him to figure out what I was going to do in terms of us. It was time. I needed to be with him, or be away from him long enough to get over him.

We didn't talk for a day.

Then two.

Then three.

By the fourth day, I was out of my mind.

I asked him to meet me so we could talk, I was done waiting. If he still didn't know what he wanted, or if he still didn't want me, then it needed to be over.

We sat in a parking lot in the car, and went in circles again. Finally, I said it as simply as I could: "Do you want to be with me like I want to be with you, or not?"

He said no.

I held back tears.

He said it was time to end it.

I agreed.

He got out of the car, and I refused to cry.

That night I got drunker than I have been since I was 19. I cried, I listened to Joni Mitchele, I texted Bill. He was so nice , he was so supportive and understanding. It made me cry harder and sing louder and drink more.

It helped no one.

For almost a week, we didn't talk.

When I finally started talking to him again, I was so mad at him. I was angry, I was hurt, I was sad and confused and I missed him. Again, he understood. He was there for me. I tried to ignore him again, but I just couldn't. 

Then, on May 3rd, something magical happened. 

I was having dinner with my kids and my roommate when I got a text from Bill asking if he could come over and talk for a bit. This was huge. Bill never came over on weeknights. He never wanted to have face to face conversations, and he rarely, if ever had anything important he wanted to say to me.

With my heart jack-hammering in my chest,  as nonchalantly as I could, I said "sure" and instantly had the biggest panic attack of my life.

For 25 minutes, TWENTY FIVE MINUTES, I waited for him to show up, pacing around in front of the door. 

What could he have to say?

Did he hate me?

Did he not want to be friends?

Did he never want to see me again?

It never crossed my mind that he might have something good to say. I mean, he never had before. Why would he now?

When he finally got to my house, I grabbed a pack of cigarettes and walked outside like I could totally care less about why he was there. We sat on the trunk of the car, and he said he wanted to be with me.

And now you have to wait until tomorrow to find out what I said back :)

Suckerrrrrrs.

Our Love Story: Part Two

Before you read this, you should read Part One, if you haven't already.

As I stood there, at 1 in the morning, leaning up against Bill's car, completely lost in his kiss, my head began to spin. 

I liked this guy. 

I really liked this guy.

He was funny, he was sweet, he was charming and a gentleman, and he was considerate, and oh dear God he was handsome. 

And his kiss......*sigh*

I was a little tipsy, and I had an idea what Bill might be thinking, given how we were now kissing, what time it was, and how many drinks we'd both had. I quickly tried to decide if I would go home with him or not if he asked me. Let's get one thing straight, I am not a slut, I am not easy, but I am also my own person. In the past, if it felt right, I went with the moment. I didn't want to do that this time, even though it felt so so right. I wanted Bill to like me, and even more, I wanted him to respect me. 

I decided if he asked, I would not go home with him.

He asked.

I went home by myself.

The next day when I woke up, Bill was the first thing I thought about. His kiss, his smile, his eyes, his everything. 

I was beaming. 

As awesome as our first date was, and as well as we got along, and as crazy as I was about him, I want to tell you that we fell easily into a happy relationship, and fell madly in love with each other. But I warned you in the beginning, a lot of this story isn't very romantic. It's real.

Bill was separated, not divorced yet, and he was in the midst of an ugly, ugly divorce and custody battle with his ex-wife. Add to that the fact that he owned one {if not two} business at the time, that he was struggling to keep afloat in a shitty economy,  AND the fact that I had two babies of my own, it's needless to say that we had very little time for each other. And by very little, I mean, like almost none. At one point we didn't see each other for 3 straight weeks, and we had already decided we were a couple. We were officially together. 

It was hard. 

I wanted a lot more time with him. I mean, shit I at least wanted to see him once a week, but he just didn't have the time to give, nor {which I found out much later} the energy, emotionally or physically. It was sad. I missed him all the time, he felt frustrated and inadequate all the time. It helped no one, and eventually, after only 3 months together, we broke up. 

I remember crying myself to sleep, and thinking "If we had more time together he would realize how awesome we could be together, and he would make more time for us." It was nonsensical, it was sad, and it was severely misguided. I thought I knew the whole story about what Bill's life was like, and I thought my expectations were completely reasonable.

I found out much later that in fact, I didn't know shit.

Our Love Story: Part One

The story of us is a long one, and it started long ago.

It isn't always the most romantic story, and there probably aren't a lot of people that would say

"Oh I wish I could have a love story like that!" 

But it is ours.

It's our journey, and it's how we got where we are now, and where I hope we go in the future.

This is the story of us.

Our love story.

Bill and I met on March 14th 2009, if you count the day we met in person as the day we met. As unromantic as it probably sounds, we met online, on a website called Plenty of Fish. Classy, I know, but hey, I met one of my exboyfriends on MySpace, so I guess you just never know where love might find you. 

I wasn't really interested in dating. The Jedi was just a baby, not even a year old yet and I was still sort of reeling from my breakup with his dad, even though it had been almost a year before I met Bill. My cousins Lindsay and Danielle both had profiles on Plenty of Fish (and yes, I sometimes wonder if either of them had ever talked to him online before I met him) and they convinced me to make one, sighting reasons like "You can't be single forever." and "It's fun, if you like someone, have coffee, if you don't just see what's out there, make friends, have a life, blah blah blah"

After a little pressuring, I made a profile that I did not take seriously in any way shape of form.

I listed going to a roller disco as my top date idea, and I had a list of 10 reasons why someone should date me, which included things like "I won't steal Vicodan out of your medicine cabinet" and "I don't hear voices in my head."

A couple weeks went by, and I got messages from mostly creepers. I would sit up at night and read the awesomely spaztastic shit that guys would send me that they considered serious attempts to meet a lady. Things like calling me baby in their introductory email, asking if I was an angel cuz my smile was Heavenly (I swear to God) and even telling me that they heard voices in their head, but they all said I was beautiful.

Sigh.

I went on a date with a guy who was so thoroughly creepy, he actually asked me ON OUR FIRST DATE if I could see myself falling in love with him.

Ack!

It wasn't looking promising.

And then one night, I logged on and there was a message waiting for me from a guy with a very normal profile picture. Not shirtless, not posing with drunk blondes in a bar, and there was no photos of his car anywhere on his profile. Holy shit, could he be....normal?! Not socially retarded! ZOMG!

I don't remember what his message said, which to this day irritates me, but I remember it was funny, it was charming, and it actually made me laugh out loud. I was intrigued. I looked at his profile, and that was awesome too! He actually listed how sarcastic he was and that he loved ice cream on his DATING profile! 

Winning.

And y'all, he was H-O-T. I mean, seriously, old movie style handsome. Handsome in a way that you just don't see these days outside of movies like Casa Blanca and The Way We Were. I was pretty smitten, basically right off. 

There was an age difference of 17 years, which bothered me none, but when I told my cousin Lindsay, her exact words were "Sarah, holy shit, he was having sex when you were BORN." I didn't see why that mattered. Annnnnnd he was separated, not divorced, which at first was a little off putting to me, but he assured me his divorce was just around the corner and they'd been split up for quite some time. 

None of it mattered. I had to meet him. 

We agreed to meet on a Saturday night in Tempe for drinks around 9 and see where things went. Of course, this being a story involving me, something had to go terribly wrong. I locked my keys in the car at a gas station, and ended up being TWO HOURS late. But Bill, being the awesome guy he is, agreed to wait, and still met up with me at 11 o'clock.

We met in downtown Tempe, around Mill avenue, and I had parked in a parking garage and starting wondering around, lost, like I do. Bill and I were on the phone, trying to find each other, when I turned around and he was pulling up right behind me. He rolled his window down, leaned over and smiled at me.

Now, I've never been a believer in love at first sight, but that one moment, that first smile, changed something for me. As soon as I saw it, even though I can't say I was in love, I can easily say I have never seen a mouth that I more wanted to kiss in my entire life.

It was magical.

{Queue dove release now}

For a first date, we really couldn't have gotten more unclassy. I was in shorts and a tank top, he was dressed super casual {not his fault, he was sweet enough to coordinate outfits with me prior to meeting. I know, what a guy, right??} We ended up going to Macayos, having enough beer to get me buzzed, then walking to Hooters.

I know. For shame.

But it was fun!

I don't think I had ever laughed so much on a first date in my entire life. He was hilarious! He was charming, and disarming and so down to Earth it was obscene. Our conversation flowed easily, our eye contact was intense and our silence was inexplicably comfortable. And I was just dying to kiss him.

After Hooters, where I got a little more unclassy {read: drunk}we walked back to his car in the Macayo's parking lot, and this is where shit gets real.

He went to my side of the car like he was going to open the door for me, but when I went to get in, he grabbed me and spun me around to face him. Before I could say Hey, his lips were on mine, and I was knee deep in our very. first. kiss.

And as kisses go, it was, in a word, delicious.

Stay tuned for Part Two of our tale of two love birds, tomorrow!