I spent the afternoon...

I spent the afternoon... giving away most of my life.

She took her stuff. Our stuff. Her's now.

All day, I just said, Take that, no I don't want it, go ahead, take it.

What did I keep? What after eleven years do you say, Yes, that is what I want?

Well, I kept a jar of mayo, a squeeze bottle of mustard, some soy milk, six drinking glasses and ten coffe cups. I also retained 3 forks, 4 knives, and 6 spoons. Five cookbooks, three of which I asked for, are now mine. A few pots and pans, more than I thought I would have. Some spices that for some reason or another were assumed to be mine. Several hand towels I couldn't give a damn about. The liquor.

I lost the coffee maker, the grinder, the fridge, the microwave, the rest of the kitchen appliances. All of my papers are on my dining table.

I look around, and it looks like I am moving. Hopefully, I am moving forward, but all night tonight I feel caught in the past. I have been drinking and smoking on the patio, listening to the new iPod I have. One song, Pink Floyd's Comfortably Numb, came on and it reminded me of the time I broke up with my other long relationship. I used to listen to that song all the time then. It spoke to me. The line, This is not how I am, still seemed to resinate with my life now.

The friends who helped her move always turned to me in quiet alone moments and asked how I was doing. I told them, and I think I thought this, that even though we as modern men look for women who can be our equal, we still subconciously believe our women to be our possesion. We are responsible for them. We need to provide, and make them happy. Well, let me tell you, that sense of responsibility doesn't stop with divorce. I felt a shred of relief knowing that I had set her up with her new life, and that now she might be happy.

Relief.

Now, it is done.

Now, I turn towards me. Now, I look at all the blank around me in this cement box, and I think, Ok, what do you want. What do you want to be, how do you express that?

I saw Jarmusch's Broken Flowers tonight. The whole movie is about a sad life being transformed into a life of unidentifiable purpose. The person I saw it with didn't like it. They couldn't understand why I liked it. They wouldn't understand.

When I wake up in the morning, it is mine. It isn't much, but now, it is mine.

Relief?

We'll see.