What a miserable day

Today has been one of those looooooong, boooooooring, loooooonely, miserable summer days.
I woke up in the middle of the night sick to my stomach and ended up tossing and turning the rest of the night. This morning my stomach still hurt and I've had a borderline migraine all day with a sore throat and wooziness. I must be trying to come down with something. Great.

This by itself would have made for a terrible day, but all my friends were gone today. My neighbor Scott is out of town on vacation, and my other neighbor Ray was in South Carolina visiting some friends all day. I even tried to call a coworker about maybe getting together tonight to watch the Panther's game, but never did get a hold of him.

Soooo ...... here I sit. Been sitting here in the house all day. Bored to tears, lonely .... head and stomach hurting ..... no one to talk to.

And you know what happens when your bored and lonely and there's no one to talk to.

The brain starts churning. About the wife. All freakin' day. All I've thought about is Tori. When I'm not thinking about how bad my stomach hurts, I'm thinking about how much I miss my wife. I talked to her on the phone Friday and her voice was so animated for a change. So upbeat. It had that twinkle in it that I fell in love with back in '99. Talking to her always makes my stomach knot up .... then later the depression sets in.

I guess I'm gonna go stretch out on the couch with a blanket and a glass of tea and watch the game. Alone. Again. Last year I would have been at the local bar with my 3 football buddies, raising hell and eating chicken wings. Or I would have been cozied up on the couch with my wife. Because she loved the Panthers. This time last year things were still good. The problems were there ..... but they hadn't taken hold of our lives and marriage yet. We would have been cozied up together watching the game and having a good ol' time.

I sure miss those days. And her. I guess I always will.

Go Panthers

Music

Anyone who knows me very well knows that music is an extremely important part of my life.
Besides the fact that I spent almost 11 years playing in rock bands .... out on the road on weekends ..... I fill my free time with a cd or the radio going full blast .... lol ..... and I try to keep up best I can with the modern music scene.

In the last 7 months, I've found myself drawn to certain artists and certain songs. Some of these songs are like instant therapy set to music. They soothe me, or validate my feelings, or just reassure me that I'm not the only poor schmuck who's experienced heartbreak.

So here's a few songs as of late which seem to keep getting played over, and over, and over, and over on my cd players in the house, car and at work.

Ty Tabor - "Better To Be On Hold", "Funeral" and "I Don't Mind" from his unbelievably cathartic cd "Safety"
King's X - "Flies and Blue Skies" and "Cigarettes" from the "Dogman" cd.
Shinedown - "45" and "Simple Man" from the cd "Leave a Whisper"
Coldplay - "Clocks" from "A Rush of Blood to The Head"
Stevie Ray Vaughn - "Riviera Paradise" from "In Step" .... no lyrics, but it just soothes my soul!
Pearl Jam - "Black" from the disc "Ten"
Black Crowes - "Thorn in My Pride" from "The Southern Harmony and Musical Companion" .. possibly the best rock and roll album of the 90's.

And there are many, many more. Those are just a few songs that seem to keep going round and round in my ol' head.

What would we do without the gift of music?

Making changes

I've been struggling alot lately with wanting to make changes. In my life, work, home ... you name it. I know these feelings were born out of the frustration and feelings of loss and uncertainty stemming from my wife leaving me.

I may have no choice in the work situation. My company is on the brink of bankruptcy. It's second in just about a year. It doesn't look good this time. Even if we are able to reorganize and emerge strong from a second bankruptcy, it will probably mean the loss of hundreds if not thousands of jobs. As well as massive pay and benefit cuts which may force many of the surviving employees to seek jobs elsewhere. I know I have great seniority: twenty years in my current classification. So I may be one of the lucky ones that holds on to a job. But I also know I can barely afford to live in my house right now. If my pay is slashed 3 - 5 dollars an hour, like we're hearing the company is wanting, then I will be faced with either working a second job, finding a new higher paying job (unlikely given my education background) or selling my house, paying off all my debts from the proceeds, and finding a cheap apartment to live in for the time being.

Selling my house isn't the worst of possibilities. I have been toying with that idea anyway. It's very difficult living here alone. When my wife and I bought this house in April of 2001, we were full of hopes and dreams and optimism for the future. When we moved in, we brought all those things with us into this house. And in the 3 and half years since, a thousand memories have taken up residence as well. Everywhere I look I see reminders. This house is full of ghosts. No, not the Hollywood kind, with chains and scary moans in the night ... These are the ghosts of forgotten dreams, hopes, love, laughter ..... The ghosts of the future which have been denied their own fulfillment. The ghosts of home cooked meals, scrabble games at the kitchen table until the wee hours. Ghosts of teenage feet running in and out the front door unceasingly. Ghosts of everything I ever wanted my marriage to be.
These ghosts haunt me night and day. They are not easily dispelled.

Sometimes I think the only way to exorcise these ghosts would be to leave them here. To start again somewhere else. Not a new town, no ... I like it here. But a new house ... In a new neighborhood. Where the sights and sounds of day to day life don't continuously remind me of what I lost.

And I've been thinking about focusing my attention on others for a change. Take the focus off myself and my own miseries. I have a friend who volunteers at a nursing home in Belmont. He does minor repairs and maintenance. His girlfriend is heavily involved with the home and got him into it.
I think I will check into whether there is anything I can do to help out there. I looooove older people. Just adore them. I love to sit and listen to their stories and see the twinkle in their eyes when they talk about the "good ole days".
Maybe that would be a good way to pull the focus off myself. Helping others.
Of all the changes looming on the horizon, that might be the best.

My wife's lovely grandmother emailed me this week. She still sends me stuff on a regular basis. Still considers me her "honorary grandson." Still adores me and I her. She is struggling with her feelings toward her granddaughter. She has talked to her a few times about us, and is of the opinion that something is wrong with Tori. Something psychological. Something in her basic makeup which has caused her to never be happy, never satisfied with what she has, never content .... Grandma says those feelings are rife within her family. The Donovan family is littered with the ashes of divorce and ruin because of those feelings. She said that if that is true, then maybe I can comfort myself with the knowledge that no matter what I did, the marriage was doomed from the beginning. Nothing was really my fault and it was out of my hands all along.
On the other hand, she is still devastated by our breakup. By the loss of a "grandson" and the realization that the "curse" has struck again.

I feel so sorry for her and I love and adore her. And I wish my wife had a tenth of the wisdom her grandmother has. I hope one day she can acquire that sort of wisdom.

That's all for now. My mind is churning with topics to write about, but my cramping fingers need a break.

I pray that the hurt will go away.
I hold on to that hope.
And if the hurt goes away, maybe the ghosts will go with it.

I wish I had never seen them together

The title says it all.
I've been obsessing for the last 2 days and it is making me miserable. I just really wish I had never seen the two of them together. I can't get his big, stupid face out of my mind. He looked like a redneck thug. He is a redneck thug. Any man who would enter into a relationship with a woman who is married at the time.... is no real man. He is a boy. A pretender. A player. A redneck thug.

Why is it that everytime I think I'm making progress .... that something like this comes along and sets me back two steps.

First sighting

I posted this same message at Yahoo's Hearts On The Mend group.
I couldn't think of a better way to word it, so I just reprinted it. Here it is:

Ok ...Ever since my wife left, I've been preparing myself for what happened today. I've known for some time that she has a boyfriend. The guy that she left me for. They're still together. Just that knowledge is gut-wrenching enough. But I've always known that one of these days, I would run into the two of them together. It was inevitable. We live just 3 miles from each other and travel in the same circles.
So I was coming back to work from lunch today ... and I met her car at an intersection. There she was, in the passenger seat. She saw me and I waved. No big deal. I see her out driving around a lot and many times I see her riding with her daughter driving the car.
But as the car went past me, there in the driver seat is not her daughter, like I was expecting, but this freakin' goon .... big cigarette dangling from his lips .... he's shooting me a look from hell as we pass. She gives me a brief, passing glance. I can see her mouth moving. I imagine her saying, "Shit .. there's my husband."
Even though I have been preparing myself .... it just pummelled me.I immediately felt sick to my stomach and my head started swimming. I literally thought I was going to have to pull over. Luckily, I was only about 500 yards from my work place. I pulled in and just sat in my car for a while. I didn't cry ... didn't freak out .... but it was devastating. Just seeing the guy in the flesh. Driving her car. Like I used to do whenever we went somewhere. The look that he gave me .. it was definitely a "go to hell" look.
I guess in a way I should be glad that I finally got it over with. No more wondering what the guy looks like, whether they're still together ...... sigh ........
I've still got a long way to go folks .......

Wow, it's been a while

I can't believe it's been this long since I posted here. When I first started "My Voice", I imagined myself posting updates every day. Maybe more than once a day.

But life gets in the way of everything. Even suffering. LOL .... I have been so busy lately, that this blog just keeps getting pushed to the back burner.

That is good in a way .... it means that the good days are starting to outnumber the bad .... but it also means I am neglecting a very valuable part of my therapy. I'll try not to let it slip for so long next time.

I have been doing pretty darn good for the last couple of weeks. Until today. I got a great nights sleep last night, woke up early and generally had a good day at work. Until I got home. And for some reason my wife just slammed into my brain with no warning and parked her ass there all night. I have been replaying things and events over and over all night. What I would have done differently, things I would have changed, not said ..... etc .... Even though I know it's too, too late .... and dwelling on these things won't change a thing or bring Tori back into my life.

2 steps forward, 1 step back. Always pushing forward, but always sliding back a little too.

It's so hard. I still wash tears down the drain in the shower some mornings. She's still the very first thing I think about every morning when my alarm goes off. And usually the last thing I think of as I slide beneath the sheets at night. I don't know when I'll ever get past that.

But I have faith. It sustains me. A little at a time. Through the good times and bad.

But oh God, I still miss her every day and I still love her every day. And I still forgive her for all she did to me .... and I wish I could make her realize it ........