Most of my life I’ve suffered for love…and written every tear – drenched moment down in the pages of my journals….pages and pages and pages and more pages of tear-stained dark and inky writing, so fraught with drama and agony that they almost make me laugh now , when I re- read them.
Almost.
Blessedly. Almost.
Laughter born of pain, awareness resulting from shredding experience, patina scratched into one’s skin from the rough seas of mere living….well…we were never actually promised a rose garden, were we? I mean, yes, we Disney girls, raised to expect our Prince to certainly arrive upon a horse that’s somehow always white, we are hoodwinked into believing there’s just one pesky evil witchy stepmother Queen and a slightly glamorous enchanted nap under glass to get through and POOF! The Prince comes smoothly riding up, touches his suspiciously red lips to Snows and everyone lives ….well…. You know….. happily, etc.
And somehow, with never a hair out of place or a pimple on her fair flesh, Snow is never shown sitting by her Princess phone waiting for the Prince to call! We never see her picking up the receiver to check if the phone is out of order or whatever….we never see her agitation or her agonizing about whether or not he will call!
So, as real flesh and blood girls, we’re quite shocked to realize most modern day Princes are just slobs who live in their parents basement after graduation with a useless degree in English lit! And so we invest our energies and yearnings in false Prince after disappointing Court Jester, seemingly to be eternally waiting for our phones to ring with the guy asking for that second date.
And of course there’s always the “ one that got away!”
Mine was Bob….a hunky, handsome , charming, ambitious producer of television commercials, who I saw across a crowded hootenanny and I was hooked by his beauty and his skillful 12-string guitar playing!
Hooked, line and sinker!
We were a passion for several on and off NYC years, his perfect princely physical endowments notwithstanding, until he chose diminutive Debbie over me, leaving me sobbing and shaking on the floor of the shower stall where we’d just made love…. Don’t ask! It was a mellow goodbye scene, my tears mixing with the hot shower water still dripping!
But as a result of that injury to my heart and fresh perm, I realized how unwell my ideas about love actually were and I finally sought professional help and a good 12-step program called CoDependents Anonymous!
I grew up, to some degree, and began a much needed journey towards a healthier Self…. Tip of the hat to Bob and his little Debbie!
Into every girls life a little Bob should fall……there’s self knowledge in that crucial pain, awash in good hot shower water mixed with stinging tears!