It is a funny thing growing old(er). This requisite activity called life has convinced me of one thing with every passing moment; and, it is this: with every passing moment I grow ever more certain I know less than the moment before.
As of today the count-down to my financial resolution to my last “adventure in love” has reached its final tick and tock. First emotional, next friendship then legal and now financial ties been severed: there is nothing left but memories to reflect upon. I look back on those years that have lapsed by from when I first met Erica to now when I no longer know who she is other than as a shadow cast under the noonday sun of my waking mind. In a similar manner of unknowing her, I realize that I barely recognize myself but in a backward sort of way. In this I mean I think I know more of who I am than I did those few years ago when I started this all; but, whereas then I was certain I knew myself and my life at the time I met her, now I know I know nothing. Even in discovering I have zero grasp of the world, others, or myself, I believe I know myself with a deeper sense of certainty by the sheer fact that I know I know little of great import other than that I know nothing — and that is maybe the only “something” worth knowing.
When Erica showed me through herself the consequence of not forgiving, she gave me the greatest gift ever: the courage to turn the key to the door that lead to me forgiving myself. And when I opened that door I could only but step through and fall from the heights of ego that led me astray. Plummet I did, but instead of crashing I instead found myself floating in a piece of sky that resembles something like a peace, a joy that comes from knowing that life is an illusion. I am an illusion. Illusions are two-way. I cannot impact the world around me, but equally there is nothing more that can touch me than what I allow to touch me . If I am mere illusion–a concoction of culture, shared histories, external perceptions and a universe beyond my control–then I also learned my ego serves no purposes than to try to–unsuccessfully, I might add–manipulate and control a universe beyond my influence. At least for myself, I came to realize I lived in my head, not through my heart. And what I mean by this is that I came to appreciate I can no longer think of the next moment, but only embrace this very moment. And because this moment in its entirety in its raw form is infinitely larger than my intellectual capacities then the only thing left me was to open myself up to this moment. Where intellect drowned me in details, I discovered that surrendering myself to that ephemeral thing we call love allowed me to become buoyant in the very flow and ebb of this moment.
I babble; it is late.
I regret nothing. I am honored to have loved and still love and cherish Erica albeit in a different capacity now than then. I was honored then as I am now to have been married to her, too. And without a bit of irony or sarcasm, I am equally happy to have been divorced by her. It is maybe with a simple matter of anthropic principle at play, this has been my path with her.
With a frankness that maybe hallmarks this entry as one of my own, I confess I still have my fears for the road ahead of me. I fear being alone for the rest of my life even if I am not afraid to move forward alone. It is a strange, subtle, sublime this road I have been on thus far. None of it I would have foreseen so few short years ago when I thought I would die old with Erica–a life lived well and lovingly with a lovely person. And I will–but with me.
As with so much I knew I was right but not in the way I imagined:
