Guilt Trippin'

So I go out to lunch today with my good friend Rick Sutton. We work together and have a few things in common. We both love music and used to play in bands. Rick was a singer and keyboard player in a variety of R&B/Dance/Soul bands while I was more into Rock and Blues. But we love to talk about music. And like me, he is well into his second year of separation from his wife with no more idea what he wants to do or how he wants to proceed than I do.

Rick and his wife split up barely a month before Tori and I did. Unlike us, they were married a long time. Several kids. One still in college. And like me, Rick is struggling with his feelings every day. Like me, one day he wants his wife back so bad he can hardly make it through a day .... the next day he hates her so bad he wishes he had never met her. We talk a lot together about our feelings toward our ex-wives and where we are going with our lives.

We're both confused, frustrated, stressed-out and all-together baffled by the whole turn of events. Like me, Rick still doesn't know exactly what happened to his marriage. Unlike me, he and his wife have actually tried to get back together a couple of times. But everything goes to shit again after a while and they end up apart again.

Tori and I have never discussed that sort of thing. She knows how I feel. But I don't think she will ever make the attempt. As I have said before, she knows that if we were ever to try to make a go at it again .... she would need to come clean with me once and for all about everything that happened in the waning months of our marriage. And I mean everything. I don't think she will ever have the balls to do that.

So Rick and I are sitting at Taco Bell this afternoon and he says to me, "My ex and I's anniversary is tomorrow."

"Wow," I said. "How do you feel about it?"

"I don't know man .... I mean, it's gonna suck. It hurt me bad last year and I think it's gonna hurt again tomorrow."

"Are you gonna call her, or did you send her a card or anything?" I ask.

"No card," he says. "But I will call her tomorrow and talk to her. It's the least I can do."

So then my mind starts spinning ... as usual. This past March 30 came and went and I didn't even realize my anniversary had passed til about 3 days later. At the time I thought that was a good sign. "Movin' on" I thought. But then this past Monday, the 4th of July, her birthday, hit me a lot harder than I thought it would.

And I didn't call her. I wanted to so bad. But I stopped myself. And I didn't send her a real card in the mail. I sent her a stupid little "e-card" that basically just said "Happy Birthday" and that's all.

And 4 days have passed and I'm guilt-trippin' bad. And I don't know why.

I really don't think she gives a damn whether I remember her birthday or not. Why should she? Hell ... she didn't call or anything on my big 4 - 0 last year. Why should I worry about her? Why am I beating myself up mentally over something as stupid as a birthday card? Or lack thereof?

I know why.

Because July 4th will never be the same for me the rest of my life. It will never just be "Independence Day" for me. There will always be something else lurking in the background. A feeling that I should be celebrating a different holiday with somebody special.

I'm guilt-trippin' and I wish I wasn't. I wish I had the strength and the "balls" to never, ever give a damn about her the rest of my existence.

But I do give a damn. And that's the problem.

That's why I'm guilt-trippin'