The story of fireweed

I have a fireweed stalk tattooed on my arm-in a pretty conspicuous location.

I was a musician and performed quite a bit, and the fireweed would be visible while I played guitar. When I went back to Alaska a few years ago, I had an award winning female artist expand the design, stretching it around to the back of my arm. I have never regretted it, as this flower means a lot to me.

I have lost sight of this part of myself lately, consumed with pain and anger.

Fireweed blooms in places where most other plants will not grow. It can be found in culverts, on rocky hillsides, in areas ravaged by fire. When traveling Alaska in the summer, the meadows and tundra often look like a blanket of lavender. In the autumn, the leaves turn bright orange, with the tops of the plants a wispy white...and in a field when the wind blows the effect looks like a fire on the tundra. It is beautiful.

Alaska Native legend has it that when the flowers have bloomed to the top of the stalk, winter has arrived. So, this flower serves as a kind of timepiece. On my arm, I try to remember it as my own prompting to carpe diem...seize the day...

I haven't done that in a long time. It is no one's fault, including Nicole's. My rage at being treated badly (and there is no doubt about that), and the unfairness of what occurred, has blinded me to the best parts of myself.

The bottom line is, I loved her and I still do. I doubt I will ever understand what darkness in her (or weakness) allowed her to take the steps that she did, to break her own promises with little apparent remorse, and to make choices that left me in agony with no choices at all. I really had no idea she had lost that much faith, and had completely forgotten who I am-because she didn't share that (or anything) with me.. She must have known it would destroy me, and it is SO hard to reconcile that she didn't care enough about me to be more careful with my heart. Given our history together, and how many times I have put her goals, comfort, happiness before my own-how hard I tried to be there for her-I deserved more (any) respect, and for her to at least allow a break-up to occur within the context of an effort.

 I sit in our "this can be a new start" beach house, with a rent I cannot afford, due to her requests to move here."Please get me that beach house! I'll be in the yard all the time. I'll come home. You'll see." I wanted her to be happy. But, I was not happy. Not because of her (I loved her completely)-but because I was not being who I am. I let our chances slip away in the easy distractions, the illusions that belay the pain of unresolved memories, relationships, regrets, failures, a lack of joy in the living of life...and I let her get away with anything. Including giving up on us.

The more I find out about things, the more I realize there are more lies than have been confessed to. Some of the stuff is just heartwrenching. I know she has a conscience, and it must have eaten her alive to come home to me and play the game she did. She still hasn't even told me the whole truth, and I'm not sure if it even matters now.

I am using the court to make some of it right-or at least try. But, I think I may have already settled the score in a pretty decisive way. I haven't drawn anything more than what has been taken from me, I guarantee...and yet, as I knew already, "balancing" things has not given me the peace I had hoped it would. I am not remorseful at this point, but I am also not feeling good about hurting her.

I have a few more decisions to make about things that I know matter to her. I am not sure where my path is leading yet-but I am going to try to remember who I am. I still cry every single day over her, but I also can push her from my thoughts. She is still the first thing I think of in the morning, and the last thing I think about at night-but I am not always sobbing when sleep comes. If I really think about what she did to me, I can become both angered and crushed in an instant-and then I am impulsive.

I am trying to find the wisdom in enduring without retribution, and letting her reap superficial benefits while my whole life and heart came apart.
 It is a struggle, and she continues to make mistakes with me, and my heart. She hurts my spirit. I can't believe she forgot my eyebrow, and the dream .

But I am who I am regardless of which Nicole wins the struggle inside of her. If there is not more than I see now, then she will eventually be caught by the same sad characteristics that have hurt me. Even that thought doesn't make me happy...because.I love her. I know her. I know her bark and her bite, and I know what pains they really cover. I know her shames, her weaknesses, her hopes, her vulnerabilities..I know what she is most afraid of....and I love her for exactly those things and more.

..and so fireweed inspires me again...blooming in areas ravaged by fire, on rocky hillsides, in forgotten places...