It's Not Your Fault.

If I've learned anything in the last four and a half years, it's this:

It's not my fault.

The likelihood is that:

It's not your fault, either.

When others try to blame you for their problems, remember:

It's not your fault.

It's their own shit they need to deal with. It's how they tackle adversity. How they learn to cope with emotional stress. How they learn to have a conversation with others. How they learn to say what they mean. How they handle difficult situations, whether it's family, friends, work, money. How they invite conversation. It's them. It's not you.

You're probably a really good person. You probably mean really well. They, on the other hand, are probably short with you. They probably have a quick temper. They probably blame you, blame work, blame being tired. They probably don't give you a reason, just cut you off. Put you down. Tell you it's your fault. You pushed too hard. You probed. You instigated it. You tried too much. It's your fault, your problem. You picked the wrong time to talk. You forced the tequila down their throat, forced them to drive drunk. It's not them, it's you.

Whether it's a hand, a belt, a fist, a shove, a slur, a condescending sneer, a 1 am call flush with hatred, a snarl, a venomous name calling, a mean text, the infinite blame: it's not your fault. Their alcoholism is not your fault. Their inability to hold a conversation is not your fault. Their lack of motivation, procrastination, excuses, failures, poor choices, family, upbringing are not your fault. Their inability to take responsibility for their actions, to control their spending, or to control their temper is not your fault.

Shit gets hard when you grow up. It's not always fun. Cleaning the toilet is not fun. It's not your fault he doesn't like that chore. It's not your fault he prefers just one more round over finishing the painting. It's not your fault the diaper needed changing, the dog needed walking. Not your fault the spark plug had to be changed, the plumber had to come and he had to rearrange his schedule. It's not your fault he went to a concert instead of paying the bills. It's not your fault housework isn't fun. But it's not your fault.

Sure, we all have regrets or wish we could have done x, y, or z differently. But how our significant others treat us is never our fault. We make choices about how to enact the change we want in our lives. We decide how to treat one another.

You're probably both really good people. Deep down.

But first? It's not your fault.

Bittersweetness

You move across, innocence lost
All static and desire
You're blue in the face from navel gaze
You set yourself on fire

You strip down and lay yourself out
I know you can't fake it
But are you tired and naked?
Are you tired and naked?

Yeah, I'd sooner chew my leg off
Than be trapped in this
How easy you think of all of this as bittersweet me

R.E.M., Bittersweet Me (1996)

So this happened today, among other things. It's bittersweet. Bittersweet me. This is what I wanted, right? To sell the house and move on? Now that it's actually happening, it's tough. Damn tough. In the scheme of life, it's not all that awful. Relationships end. Houses sell. Possessions are divided. We move on. I'm not a Syrian refugee, or an Iranian refugee, or a Sudanese refugee, or a climate change refugee, or any one of the other people fleeing violence, tyranny, famine, extreme poverty, lack of natural resources.

I should recognize my privilege in the world and stop complaining. But that's not productive. One of the first rules of caretakers is that you must take care of yourself. When the plane is crashing, you put your oxygen mask on before your child's. Emergency responders treat their burns before they rush back into the fire. 

When your life is a meteor about to crash and explode into a thousand shards, causing mass environmental change, you don't stop to say, "Gee, someone else is in a worse position in life than me right now" and let it crash on you. You run. Or you freeze in a panic of terror, knowing unthinkable change is happening faster than you can plan your next move.

That's a long way of saying "Relationships are hard"... sometimes. Is there an effortless relationship? I think it's impossible but then I think of my Potatoface friend who, after almost a decade, consoles me with hope that it's possible for things to be simple - providing we acquaint ourselves with a complementary personality. Of course I know other people who get along swimmingly. They don't have the knock down fights where voices escalate above the din of a world gone mad. They don't reach into the depths of unutterable slurs, slinging curses from room to room. They don't re-write the history of how you got from there to here, and everything in between.  

But I have a difficult passion. I'd like to blame it on being an Aries. As much as I try to wrangle it into submission, the passion often overtakes sensibility. One minute, there's calm among chaos but faster than the tattoo needle scars your skin forever, my passion awakens. Sometimes this is great. At work, I love projects that I love. I will stand up for my municipalities and their leaders even when I'm doubtful. When that fiery email refuting a narrow perspective is sent two minutes too soon, it's not great. This passion makes relationships tricky. 

The same passion that instigated this life change is needling between utter sadness, hope for future change, and the acceptance that nothing - absolutely nothing - is permanent. When the fog of this bittersweet passion separates, a theater curtain pulled back for the opening act, I am hopeful I'll see the myriad lessons learned. I already sense myself correcting past mistakes as I move forward. Simultaneously, I recognize when I take us down a narrow rabbit hole of circular logic. I knew one of these days that the for sale sign would go up. The reality is quite different. How I handle this is how I learn from this.

So, what's the lesson learned? There's a for sale sign up in front of my house. It wasn't there when I left this morning. But there it stands, taunting me with my passion's failure. I know this is the right step to take; the caretaking I need to do is for myself. The suffering around the world is no less important, no less noble, but if I'm not taking care of myself, I'm no use to anyone else.

Still, it's bittersweet. The end to a dream we failed to realize together, accepting a plan not communicated, diminished hopes set in a bar too high to cross. One step forward in the direction towards "moving on". The potential that letting go of the house is letting go of our interconnected lives.

I'm tired. My emotions are naked, laid bare and stretched out in front of me. My foot has been in my mouth too many times. Chewing off my leg to spite my solar plexus - my energy source. And us? Both blue in the face. No one's happy. No one's an innocent anymore. Mud slung ceiling to wall to floor. This isn't easy for anyone. But here we are. Bittersweetness surrounds us, taking shape in the form of a for sale sign.  

This Decay (a poem)

He said to me, "When did this decay start?" From recent conversations, it started at the beginning. A slowly crumbling decay. In September, I attended an open poetry workshop. I wrote this, based off the theme of "the elements".

My anger is red hot, burning from my Aries temper

Fueled by passion, jealousy, and immovable honesty.

Its flames light up my face

A radiating force field of one sided stubbornness

Finally admitting the slow decay of a relationship doomed.

Tears flow freely, the vital fluids that carry life forward,

Released.

Healing can start when the energy is spent.

Where is the oxygen I need

To sustain a beating heart?

The heavy air of our fights chokes me.

Ashes to ashes the fire from my depths meet the cool (eventual) end of life.

Returning each moment to the beginning,

A cycle of life and death, life and death.

Earth’s elements envelope me

Offering rejuvenating breath to free my soul,

Drowning my fear, suppressing the glowing embers of anger,

Baptizing me with newfound wisdom. 

We need decay to be reborn
Like the fire releasing the seed in an old growth forest.