Bad Break-Up

-Winter 1993

         I'm living in Manhattan...but just barely. 

         I limp around the city with a hole in my heart the size of the Chrysler Building.

         It doesn't help that everyone else is in a happy relationship.  Everywhere I look I see smiling couples; arm in arm, kissing, gazing at each other, picking out towels and china at Macy's and Gracious Home.

         I hear my own solitary footsteps echoing back as I drag myself around town.

         I do the least I can get away with.  I still show up at work...mostly.  I'm not signing up for any catering gigs, and do the minimum shifts at Starbuck's.  I'm trying to ditch all of my flying.  I really can't afford to take any time off, but do it anyway.

         I hate to leave my apartment.

         A friend calls and suggests I get a cat.  (She's probably trying to create a distraction so she won't have to hear me rehash the break-up...again.)

         "No cats!",  I tell her.  "That's the first step." 

         "The first step to what?"  She asks.

         "I'll be one of those crazy senior flight attendants who never got married, never had kids, talks about the cats like they're her children, and wears pink furry boots with her uniform at the bus stop."

         "All that?" 

         "Yes.  Then there'll be the citations from the health department for having too many cats.  And, one day, the neighbors will complain about the smell.  When they break into my apartment, my thirty cats will be dining on my decomposing carcass." 

         "You're not being a little over-dramatic?"

         "I don't have the energy to be dramatic, much less over-dramatic.  Seriously:  Getting a cat is a slippery slope in my line of work.  I've seen it happen dozens of times."

         I hang up, thinking I won't talk to this friend for a while.  I suspect she thinks I'm a loser. 

         I look around the apartment.  It would help if I would clean up.  If I could just pick up the wads of Kleenex and the delivery boxes... 

         (Heavy, self-pitying sigh.) 

         The thought of cleaning makes me feel even more exhausted. 

         I pull the blankets over my head and take a another nap instead.  

         I'm on about an 18-nap-a-day program. 

         In between I think about karma a lot.

         I have the urge to call everyone I ever broke up with and apologize.  (Okay, both of them.)  I should try to make amends...like in some 12 Step Program.  Did I inflict this kind of pain on someone?

          It feels like I'm living every hurt I ever experienced, every cut, bruise, heartache...all the dental work, all at once.  It's excruciating.  It surprises me to look in the mirror and see my same old self.  (The same except for the unwashed hair and the dirty sweatshirt.)  I feel like I'm one big open wound posing as a human being.

         No matter what it seems like I'm doing these days, all I'm really doing is not calling him.  

         It takes steely control at every moment to keep from running to the nearest phone and asking, for the thousandth time:  'Why???"

         It's been ten days since I called last.  In two more days it will be a record.  I hope I can make it.  Every time I call I have to start the process over from scratch.  When will I feel some distance from this?

         He called me by his new girlfriend's name when I called last.    

         I vowed, (again), to never, ever, ever, call him again.  And, really, who would want to call the guy after that? 

         The answer, of course, is:  me. 

         I'm not sure why anymore, but I do still want to call.   

         I might shrilly tell him what a jackass he is, or try to talk about the break up (...again, I want to understand), or I might remind him of the great times...or a thousand other approaches I rehearse in my head (when in public) or out loud (when at home).  
     
        Well, I did catch myself answering back out loud in the park yesterday. 

        I don't even need a cat.  I'm crazy already. 

        I realize how few relationships I've formed here.  I hardly know anyone.  I've always been either working or flying off to see him.

         Now I have no desire to form relationships with anyone.  I project into the future and see my hermit life. 

         It doesn't take much imagination at this point. 

        

         My best friends are Ben and Jerry.

         ...it's a love-hate relationship.

         A pint of New York Super Fudge Chunk costs $3.01 at the corner store.  I find myself digging for change in the middle of the night to get it. 

          I eat the white chocolate chunks, letting them melt to butter in my mouth, then the dark chocolate chunks, then I chew the chocolate covered nuts.  Finally, even though I'm already too full to eat any more, I stir the ice cream until it's the consistency of soft-serve and eat every chocolaty rich bite of it. 

         Then I stay up all night hepped up on sugar, and self-loathing.  It doesn't matter.  The demons gnawing at my insides would've kept me up anyhow.    

         I feel fat and ugly. 

         Can't imagine why.  A diet of carbs and sugar, and a fitness regimen consisting of sleeping and crying should get me to my ideal body, shouldn't it?

         I listen to sad 'love-gone-wrong' songs.  I listen to 'our songs', which have become sad. 

         I look at pictures of us together.

         I try to figure it all out.   

         Mainly I think about everything that's wrong with me. If I were more accomplished, had more money, were more successful, didn't have that scar on my nose, and the overly-sensitive side...  If I'd gone back for my master's degree, if I had skinny thighs, exercised more.  If I'd been more interested in his explanation of the electroplating process...we'd still be together. 

         He would still love me.

         Now, no one ever will again.

         I might be a little depressed.

   It's been 20 years and I remember like it was yesterday.  I would have sworn that I'd never care about anyone again.
   Anyone been there/done that?