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Monday, June 7, 2010

...the last attraction.

He met her online.

Meeting a woman in the "wild" had grown to be too much work. In cyberspace he could see what she looked like, read her hopes and dreams, likes and dislikes and not have to tap-dance through an awkward meeting. It was safer.

But she contacted him first. He had seen her profile before and he thought, "yeah...if only," but there it was, a message from her.

So he wrote back. And the correspondence started.

Said she was a counselor, helping people with addictions. Said she was also Spiritual and really felt the need to give something back. She even called him cute.

He thought it was a God shot, being in recovery himself. Who better? She might actually "get" him, and he could understand her. So they set up a date.

The ubiquitous Starbucks,have coffee, run it up the flagpole and see if there's a spark.

She was tiny and blond. Her pictures were from a few years back. Her jeans had a couple of very well placed worn spots. Wild curly hair, worn up, exposing a very graceful neck, cute ears and a cool tattoo below one ear...oh yeah, he thought, that would do nicely.

If she wasn't quite starting to slide down the other side of pretty she would soon, yet she was still sexy. Sexy enough to illicit from him a couple of low pitched throat noises, and that hadn't happened lately.

She wasn't a counselor, she was in recovery too, coming back after a relapse. He should have run, but he chalked it up to "recovery embarrassment." A little white lie. He supposed it could be forgiven. After all, he was coming back too.

She was staying in a sober living house for women. Mom paying the rent and buying her cigarettes. He had lived the same way over the summer, in a house for men, while he was getting it together again. But he worked for his money.

She had no car, so he picked her up when he could and they got along great. They would go to meetings, and talk about all the past fucked up stuff their respective lifestyles shared. What they had walked away from, the blackouts, the broken relationships. And they started to share hope for a better future, a sober future.

Said she had been a Dallas Cowboys Cheerleader, for a month, but she showed up at practice on acid so they let her go.

Then she became a paralegal but got blacklisted for doing cocaine in the courthouse bathroom.

She was waiting on a verdict from the folks at Social Security disability. "Not for my alcoholism," she said, with an almost hurt sound in her voice, " for mental health...bi-polar, manic depressive and I just got diagnosed with borderline personality disorder." Oh, that made sense.


He had kids, she had kids, but she wasn't allowed to see them. Bad break, he thought. She was so tiny, with a honey like drawl and she told him everything he so wanted to hear. In fact several of her personalities did.

He tried not to feel sorry for her but he just wasn't wired that way.

She needed a favor, a ride to pick up some meds. Hell, he was on anti-depressants, so he figured it was just another common bond.

Her medicaid was still in force so he took her to the pharmacy. She picked up a bunch of medication. So what, she was cute and often funny. Who was he to judge?

They would spend afternoons in his rented room. The sex was phenomenal. She had a gorgeous flower tattoo above a heart shaped ass and it just got better, and wilder and got to the kind of intensity where if they were alone in the same room for more than a minute, BAM, it was on.

He shouldn't have been able to get a good look at her for the amount of red-flags popping up, but the scent was in the air, and he was steadily pawing ground.

Her Mom gave her $1,000 to buy a car. She was turning her life around. He thought it great.

She went missing for three days. She went through the grand on crack and tequila, in East Dallas and Harry Hines and called him quite incoherent after the second day. He hung up, crushed, after begging her to get help.

She called again after the fourth day, sick, weak and afraid. She said she wanted help, didn't understand what had happened. She had nowhere to go after a nasty drunken scene at her recovery house.

He let her stay the night, and fed her and kept her safe. He thought his armor far too dented and rusty for this kind of rescue.

He took her to a meeting and she said she wanted to get better.

In the morning it killed him to do it but he cut her loose. His sponsor had called him an idiot in no uncertain terms, as well as co-dependent and a few other unhealthy phrases, and he supposed he was right. His recovery came first.

She called him a few weeks later and said she was much better, she wanted to apologize and asked if she could see him. Said she missed him and the way he touched her.

He should have run again...

...and we continue.

Waited till after midnight to write this. Feels better.

Not that the writing is any better, but my thoughts seem to come out of the shadows more readily, like they just got invited to the dance.

So the band is setting up and my thoughts are hanging out by the punch, wearing clothes they ordinarily wouldn't, hoping they don't slip and fall on their ass, when the girl they keep staring at gives them the "wanna dance?" look. And they take a few tentative steps toward her.

Realized today this is the one thing I can do, that no one can put a stop to. Oh sure, people can stop reading, I may never be published, but tonight none of that really matters. I don't have to check in with anyone about the things I write, no approval needed, thanks very much.

I could blather on, and have, obviously if you've read this blog, but some people keep reading it.

Doesn't matter if it's pieces of memory; or my notes on how I spent my day, my dreams, my loveless failures. I could write a story about a middle aged man who snaps and chops his spouse into manageable bits while singing, "I've got pieces of April," and no one would really care.

There's freedom in that.

I may be a middle-aged man in a fistfight with poverty, who chases a teenagers ideal of finding perfect love and redemption around the next corner, (see-silly bastard) but once I begin to write...I'm me again.

And as long as I have that, as long as that avenue is open to me, I choose to believe...anything is possible.

My new disclaimer...yeah I know.

Okay, the old disclaimer was tired. The ideas were outdated and keeping me stuck in a place I don't want to be anymore...so now for something more refreshing.

I have recently changed my views regarding women. Seems I had some issues with the fairer sex due to past pain and self- centered fear. (Yes...duh applies.)

I'm done with that.

Being in recovery has helped me change my entire life, perceptions and attitudes. I cannot change my history but I can change my today and my future.

I recently realized that the women I know in recovery are some of the strongest, bravest, most gentle and kind teachers I have ever had. You exemplify integrity and spiritual growth, and I hope you know who you are.

Some may know of my past marital and relationship history and been a participant in them as well. It's past and that's where it stays...in the past.

I own my part in those failures but claim no more responsibility in any misery you may be experiencing. I am sorry, but it's time to get off the cross. We need the wood.


Thank you all...