Outa Whack

I’m getting a divorce. Wasn’t my choice. There were warnings, but I mostly chose to turn a blind eye.  Then there was the knock on the door I couldn’t ignore. The papers were served.  Not by my spouse (that divorce happened long ago)…

But by Life itself. 

I learned from my first divorce a long time ago that there were stages most of us pass through when facing such a passage.  That understanding gave me a vague road map that helped steady me a bit while I traversed what felt like an epoch journey through an unknown land. The YOU ARE HERE red dot on the map moved from places named Denial onto Anger and so on until it settled on the final destination which was the place of Acceptance where a new balance could be restored.  One of the middle stages was a place known as ChangeBack.  Once you got there, you all of a sudden thought the previous stops were just some sort of wayward vacation that had taken a wrong turn. “Good thing I got here and realized I was going in the wrong direction ! I can turn around now and get back to what I know, taking with me some nice photos of those places I passed through, to remember them by. That’ll make everything ok again. That will bring it all back into balance.” 

But guess what… it doesn’t make everything ok again. Turns out incorporating a few little experiences of unknown places into your old reality just won’t cut it. So back on the road you go, knowing now that turning back isn’t an option.  ChangeBack, here, has been wiped from the map.  The destination now is Acceptance or bust. 

I’ve been through a lot of different emotions these past few weeks since Life as I knew it has left me.  I’ve had to learn how to walk (actually mostly NOT walk) in the world that no longer offers up the game board I was used to playing on.  The usual handholds that helped and the potholes to be avoided have all shifted or disappeared or become unwieldy.  All of this brings waves of grief, anger, confusion, and sometimes surrender.  It requires patience waiting for tides to change. 

I have to accept that Life on this planet has been outa whack for a while.  If we’re not being asked for an outright divorce, we’re at least all being sent to our rooms (literally) to think about what we’ve done. Either way it’s time to get on that road again, pull out that map and make our way to a new balance, learning as we go towards Acceptance.  

Make sure ChangeBack is not on the itinerary. 

Make sure you go all the way. 

Make sure that all the sacrifices were not in vain.

Otherwise it will just all be the same - outa whack - only with some dramatic memories to color the walls.