Feeling Joy....

Ever since the last day of 2010, I have felt a newness in my spirit.  I was so ready to let the past year go and embrace some happiness.  I'm still discovering new things about myself every single day.  I have a ways to go, but I am feeling the joy return.

I've been told many times over the course of my life, that I am funny, that I make people laugh.  I felt the last year and a half robbed me of my joy.  I wondered if I was ever going to feel happiness and joy again.  Would people ever find me funny again?  I hid myself away from people and avoided any subjects of depth because it seemed to constantly go to my "situation."  Being the type of person who buries myself away when I'm sad, I felt almost alone.  Self-imposed exile.  Who wanted to be dragged down with my shit?  I avoided group situations that involved any socializing with my ex and my old friends.  I wouldn't, I couldn't, meet their eyes and pretend I was okay.  I was sooo not okay and being phoney has never been easy for me.  Being joyful, is easy...if I feel it.  

I saved up a lot of tears over the years and learned to paste a smile on my face when the situation called for it.  That's what years of working in the public will do to you.  I started having a large capacity for bullshit.  Then behind closed doors I would regale my co-workers with the latest "mayor of crazy town" client that had sat in my chair.  I was able to compartmentalize the bullshit until I had an opportunity to release the toxicity of someone else's bad energy and turn it into comic relief.

Then I left my husband.  I became incapacitated with grief and sadness.  I pretended I was okay in public and within my small circle of friends, I wasn't.  It felt like a lifetime of grief.  A hole in which  I couldn't see how I would ever climb up from.  Every time it felt like I'd found some footing, the hole would collapse on me and I would taste the dirt and mud as it fell over my face.  

I was consumed with what was going on in my life and I wasn't able to concentrate or think of much else.  I was very, very, self-absorbed.  I was Debbie downer for sure.  I got through each day by thinking about how many errands I could come up with to keep me busy and not think. How many hours until I could pour a glass of wine, how many hours until I could go to bed and not think anymore.  I thought a lot about being asleep.  One of my friends told me they had never seen me look so haunted, so hollow. A woman I met, a photographer, with an eye for detail told me my eyes held sadness.  It made me weep with sorrow for the woman I knew I used to be.  The woman who was once told "she had 'Tinkerbell' eyes"...filled with mischief and joy.

I truly believed, that once I made the actual decision to leave my marriage and move here, that I would instantly be able to get off the anti-depressants and move through all the bullshit very fast.  I was wrong.  I had lots to examine.  Lots of sifting and sorting.  Lots of tears that were still threatening to fall.

One of the things I think about is that any man I decide to get involved with now, will never know me as a young woman. He will never  see the smooth, tight, skin, or youthful face that my ex did.  The new relationship I may have in the future will only know me as middle aged...jaded... a little set in my ways with wobbly bits that come with being this age. I have collected packaged baggage throughout my marriage that I didn't have as a young woman. Baggage that will surely have to be unpacked before a new romance could be healthy and achievable.  I have shared experiences and memories of the past with my ex that can never be replicated or be issued a 'do-over' with someone new.  This robs me of a little joy just thinking about it. 

I'm so over myself and the bullshit of going through a divorce.  I want to heal now.  Today.  I want to move forward and quit thinking about the "what-ifs" and the "shouldas".  But, ah, alas....these things can't be rushed.  The universe won't let you heal that fast.  There are things to learn.  Things to accept about myself.  Ground to cover...but, I'm getting there.  I'm feeling moments of joy again.  I've started to be funny again around my friends.  I feel like the chronic cough of sadness is gradually getting better. I find myself looser.  More open again.   Not so protective.  But mostly, I am finding that I don't think about sleeping so much.  I forget about wanting wine every night.  I quit smoking. Not every conversation I have now is about "my situation".  When the time is right, and romantic love comes into my life again, the sadness will have shaped me, but not defined me.  I am feeling the joy return.  Slowly but surely, I am laughing again.  A lot.

Joy cannot be contained...it permeates the room you walk in, it fills you and your body relaxes.  My friend, Tamra told me last night, "your face is glowing, you are laughing more...." That was the best thing I've heard in two years.   I am feeling the joy return,  my eyes are beginning to sparkle again with Tinkerbell mischief, I am feeling joy begin to return.... Hurry up and wait....