Sho 'Nuff

I saw an old friend the other day, Denise, who was actually from the days w/my ex. I've always liked hanging out w/her and her husband, but everyone knows how it goes when a couple splits up; somehow the person that knew them first gets to "keep" them. In all honesty, she would be the only person out of all of my ex's friends that I would want to keep in contact with. Anyway, we're now friends on myspace and I didn't want to just be "dead weight" on her page, so I commented her w/a goofy picture. The next day I went back to her page to see if she'd checked her myspace yet (please tell me this is normal myspace behavior), when I discovered that the then 19-yr-old who was putting the make on my then-boyfriend, had placed a comment directly after me.

I'm not stupid. I checked out Denise's page quite thoroughly before posting a comment b/c I don't want to make waves. Initially I knew Shawn was a friend of hers on myspace, which is why I didn't initiate myspace friendship w/her to begin with. When I approved the request to be friends, I noticed that she had taken him off her friends list. I wasn't totally shocked; when we ran into each other she had stated that she rarely, if ever, spoke w/him anymore, and she didn't sound very approving of his lifestyle. Of course, I never asked her about him b/c that's just not part of my life anymore. Or so I had told myself….

Yup, checked out that girl's myspace page to find that she and my ex are together. Got to see his comments to her on New Year's Eve. It was a dorky picture and some comment like "I know what you'll be doing later. I love you." So today I learned that nothing else instantly makes you want to puke more than seeing your ex tell the chick he swore up and down he never cheated on you with that he loves her. Wait… seeing the countdown clock until they leave for Vegas…that one really made me feel like shit too.

Your ex doesn't turn into a eunuch after you break up w/him (though that would be nice) and who he's loving now is so none of my business. But I can't help but feel like Gwenyth Paltrow's character in "Sliding Doors", what we me working my ass off, trying to get a second job and going back to school to get back to where I was financially before I met Shawn, (that was the last time I had zero credit card debt, which is no coincidence) and the whole time he's been happy w/someone else. He hasn't gone through the loneliness or the pain of being single; he was taken care of all along. And I was just the dumbass that would wake up at 11:30 pm to make sure he had a hot meal waiting for him when he got off work at midnight those last couple of months when I suspected something was up, but had not yet found the phone bills to bolster my suspicions. And how he had me believing his ridiculous explanations for things, and made me think I had turned into some suspicious half-crazed harpy. Someone making you question your sanity just so that they can have a gf take care of them AND bone some chick on the side shouldn't be allowed to have it that easy.

Y'know, after the first big cry, I realized that I don't really care about all that, and I just HAVE to find a way to let go of all of this. All I can hope is that what happened in the movie will hold true; out of all of these hard lessons will come the life I've always dreamed of having. Finding an honorable man who will be my best friend, having enough money to own a house and travel a bit, and having a fulfilling career that pays well. People create their own problems, and I'm getting through the ones I've created for myself. I don't really know how to end this, but I can't help but feel that I've somehow backslid into a place of betrayal, when there is nothing there left to get upset over. I never wanted the life he could give me, so what do I care if he's giving that life to someone else?

Here is a direct cut/paste from my blog during that tumultuous time when Shawn and I first broke up:
1/31/06
So he's gone and the winds of change are a'blowin'. I dunno, it doesn't burn as much as I thought it would. Maybe it's because he did me wrong, and I don't cotton to that sort of treatment. You can pull my hair, curse me out, encourage me to gain weight, (yes, he was quite a dream guy, don't you agree?) but don't you cheat on me dammit because then all bets are fucking OFF! I say that as if I were pursuing him in some negative campaign to make him pay for hurting me. While I cannot say the thought had never crossed my mind, I will say that I'm too busy focusing on my bright "gotta-wear-shades" future, so I don't have the time or energy. Also, a part of me believes that the best punishment is the absence of me. He left b/c of the bad (can you believe I wanted him to shower and brush his teeth and wear clean socks & underwear EVERY DAY?!) and that means he also gets none of the good. So I hope he's enjoying the view in his sparsely decorated apartment, soaking up the stench of stale cigarette smoke and dried out pieces of Little Ceasars pizza, as they lay decaying in their boxes. Yup, life is looking up for that guy. And lots of luck to that 19-year-old child who thinks he's the best thing since Summer's Eve odor masking douches; she'll get all that she's bargained for and more. You're right sweetie, I guess I wasn't treating him right, and now here's your chance to be exposed to his abusive, selfish, and evasive behavior. Just remember that women who steal other people's men are doomed to walk the next life as cockroaches (that's why there are so many of them).

I wanna go back, and I don't even know how I got off the track... Much love and thanks to Michele and Jana for listening to me blubber this weekend. This too shall pass.