Honesty and Policy

Hello dear readers, you may have felt it possible that I fell off the edge of the planet over the past month and that is why silence has reigned but the simple reason was I fell in love.

Now, at some point in early July I kept remembering Dorothy Parker's words: 'I shudder at the sight of men / I'm sure to fall in love again'. This is exactly what happened to me. I decided to remain a little crystalline single girl and then I went on a date and he kissed me. And at that moment I knew the game was up and I'd fall for him harder than one of those Sudoku quiz thingies on the back of the Guardian.

I am, quite simply, perfectly happy at the moment.

And so now I hit the quandary. I'm really proud of this blog and my writing. But there's darkness here and echoes of how hard the road had been over the past 18 months. I don't want anything to sully just how wonderful it is to be a semi-new person with a wholly new person. Half of me wants to tell him the address of this blog so he can hear my inner voice and experience this part of me and the other, selfish, part wants to keep it private so that none of the darkness here seeps out and stains my beautiful glowing present. I think of my soul as predominantly my writing voice so keeping it hidden seems somehow mendacious. And I'm an honest and upfront and upright person.

Tread softly, for you tread on my dreams.

How I love now

There's a poem that I haven't taught for three years that I had to teach today. Last time I taught it I was with my husband and I didn't really understand it. Today, I do.

Love After Love

The time will come

when, with elation

you will greet yourself arriving

at your own door, in your own mirror

and each will smile at the other's welcome,

.

and say, sit here. Eat.

You will love again the stranger who was your self.

Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart

to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

.

all your life, whom you ignored

for another, who knows you by heart.

Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,

.

the photographs, the desperate notes,

peel your own image from the mirror.

Sit. Feast on your life.

.

Derek Walcott

My class didn't understand it and for one dangerous moment I felt the tears dancing behind my eyes as I read it. Because this poem speaks volumes about who I am these days and how I live now. This blog is over a year old but the original posts - the first steps towards catharsis - date from this time last year. At that time there were suggestions from my ex that he might want to come back and I was very confused. I would never have believed the prophesy that 'The time will come' that I would feel at one with myself. That this would feel like my house, and mine alone, with no ghosts hovering.

I wouldn't have known that I can 'love again the stranger who was your self'. I've changed so dramatically in that one year: I'm confident, I'm a lot more attractive and, heck, I'm sexier too. Metaphorically and physically I've taken 'down the love letters from the bookshelf, / the photographs, the desperate notes'. I've thrown it all out. It doesn't clutter my home, my life or my psyche.

If you are someone who is on the first steps towards experiencing love after love, or if you are faltering on your path, I can tell you that this poem is full of truth and power. You will 'give your heart back to itself'.

Sit. Feast on YOUR life x

A new lease of life

It might not be a surprise to you that I am a diarist. Since 1989 I've written a diary every day of my life. It's not really Samuel Pepys or Anne Frank, but thankfully it's not Bridget Jones either. I favour five year diaries so in six lines I have to summarise my entire day: it doesn't leave much space for navel-gazing. Indeed, the omissions in it are blatant: there are very few references to arguments with my ex, despite the fact that they were practically daily. He definitely read it on one occasion and I'm not certain whether he read it frequently. I'd like to share a few entries with you, which have been edited for privacy and traceability reasons:

January 16th 2008, looked terrible today - puffy faced and tearful after last night. Went into (work) but came home during (afternoon)... Then had a mercifully quiet night.

January 17th 2008, (my ex's name) went out with (his friend) last night so wasted most of today on the sofa asleep

January 21st 2008, (my ex's name) got a lease in the post.

January 22nd 2008, Exhausted today - found the whole experience at (work) difficult and am unable to function properly. Tonight I was so frightened that the lease would have been signed but had a quiet + kind evening.

January 23rd 2008, Up at 3am talking and then in (work) on time - but bloody knackered with it. In afternoon went mental.

January 24th 2008, A quieter day at (work) but then this evening was awful. (Ex) has signed the lease and I walked out for a wander but, brilliantly, he didn't even notice.

January 26th 2008, Just another sad day. Changed my facebook status to 'it's complicated' but in reality it's very simple... Really having a hard time.

January 27th 2008, Another sad day. (Ex) told his parents today and I tried to pluck up courage to tell (our son) but I just couldn't. I did manage to get his kite flying so maybe I'm not completely useless. Less than a week now.

January 31st 2008, an odd day - calm and confidence has descended, despite the fact that my marriage ends tomorrow.

February 1st, 2008, So, it's the separation day. (My ex's) parting shot hurt: "you're yesterday"... In evening went to seek sanctuary at (my best friend's house).

Ouch. It makes difficult reading, doesn't it? However, it doesn't stir any emotion in me as I'm pretty certain it is now completely out of my system. Last year I was terrified that the lease to my ex's flat would be signed, this year I have a new lease of life.

Maybe I need to find something else to write about on this blog. Readers, I'm no longer getting a life. I've got one.

New Year's Solutions

Welcome to Divorce Day. No, I'm not getting divorced but this is the day that, traditionally, family lawyers do their best business as failing relationships sputter to a halt over Christmas and then refugees from domestic heartache seek divorce advice on the first working Monday of the new year. Certainly, this time last year felt like Divorce Day for me as I returned to work after the Christmas break and everyone cheerily said to me: 'Good Christmas?'. Well, no. I got dumped on New Year's Eve and cried constantly for four days. However I was in such a state that I couldn't admit to many people what had happened and just dumbly nodded, afraid that words would bring the waterworks on.

A year later I'm happy. I'm not feeling any negative emotions about this time of year and I can look back with a level gaze and see that I'm better off for being alone. However, it is time to look full-square at my life and find some New Year Solutions. Everyone knows that New Year's Resolutions tend not to last (although I did once give up chocolate for a year), so I'm looking to find Solutions to things that need attention.

The first is my size. I recognise I'm overweight and I resolutely refuse to follow traditional diets for a number of reasons. Firstly, I had extremely disordered eating throughout my early twenties and was severely underweight. The photos of me from that period make scary viewing. Secondly, I know that dieting makes you fatter in the long run. Therefore, I'm going to try Paul McKenna's system. His Golden Rules are:

1. When you are hungry, eat.
2. Eat what you want.
3. Eat consciously.
4. When you are full, stop eating.

I'm not dieting but before I even watched the programme tonight it struck me how I bolt food quickly in front of the TV. I'm going to eat at the table, with the TV and laptop off, and enjoy what I eat. I'm going to savour it. And I'm not going to empty my plate: I'm going to try to learn when I feel full.

Second solution: my life. I'm going to continue what I started last year: getting out and about and being with friends. This makes me a lot happier. I'm going to get out with my son more too: we went for a countryside walk the other day just the two of us and had a great time.

What about relationships? Well, the ones I have with my son, my friends and my family are much better now than they've been for many years. I'm going to concentrate on that instead of thinking about what I don't have. Hey, and maybe this time next year I'll be ready for my own Divorce Day.

A new start for this blog and for me

So, when I set up this blog in December 2007 I didn't really have anything to write about, but I did know that I wanted to write something. This, it turns out, was unwise. Because by the end of the year my husband had decided to have an affair with another woman and move out into a sad-Smiths-inspired-navel-gazing-bedsit leaving me a single mother. So then I had loads to write about.

Unfortunately, all the really juicy stuff, the mad-Wuthering-Heights-loony-tunes stuff went by throughout January and February and I was far too potty to write anything lucid. This is a shame because it might well have made compelling reading as I was madder than any bag of frogs you'd wish to point at. I have tried to remember some of my more mad moments for general consumption but it appears that my psyche cleverly wiped it all away before I became a proper nutter. I know I was mad in January, I just can't remember anything about it.

But now I'm making a new start and that's what this blog is going to be about. I've begged my ex to come back, promised all sorts of changes and his general response was to ask me to sell the house and give him some money so he could 'start again'. Nice. Well, there's a credit crunch and a recession brewing so I'm clinging on to the house and he can't divorce me for 5 years because I did nothing wrong. So there.

So, back to new starts:

1. I threw away all the clutter in the house over Easter. Partly feng-shui, partly embarrassment at the state, mostly revenge.
2. I got a cleaner. Well two actually. Carol'n'Lisa. My ex: "I don't really approve of cleaning services", me: "well, I don't really approve of adultery". Thursdays are wonderful, I come home from work and it's like really clean burglars have come in and nicked all the debris.
3. I've started to do things with my beautiful son that I never did before because my ex wouldn't have approved. Today we went bowling and then we did crazy golf in UV light. Yes, you read that right, crazy golf + UV light. Marvellous.
4. I bought dresses and HEELS (after ten years of being with a man shorter than I it felt indecent to put on heels. But good).
5. I stalk his new girlfriend via Facebook*
6. Tomorrow, I'm booked into Bravissimo.

Aren't I doing well? There's more to do: I've joined Guardian Soulmates but can't bring myself to 'add' anyone, I still wear my wedding and engagement ring and I've looked at Gingerbread's website (the charity for lone parents) but I haven't joined yet.

My new road is just opening in front of me and I'd be immensely touched if anyone followed it with me via the pages of this blog.

*OK, this isn't good as such, but it is immensely enjoyable and rewarding....