Down the Rabbit Hole

Two months shy

The holidays are nearly past us, with the exception of New Year's Eve. Today my eyes burn and my spirit feels oddly broken about the edges. I have a lingering meloncholy which seems to have as much to do with an argument last night, as it does the end of 2008. It has taken years to build a foundation of faith for myself; faith in friendships and faith in love. It always surprises me how precarious that foundation is though, when tested, it seems as fragile as house of cards.
It seems I am preconditioned to expect love to come in a rushing tide but leave in a slow ebb that dies out a little at a time. Before you know it, all that's let is the separation of property and the mental taking of your emotional inventory. And you ask yourself how deeply can your reserves be depleted before the next tidal surge hits you?
I'm a product of parents who loved each other suddenly and whole-heartedly. The end of their marriage, and our family unit, crept in quietly until it was sitting at the table with us, smiling a mirthless grin. The truth, as ugly as it was, had finally breached. It took little over fourteen words and ten minutes for our father to shatter my mother's world. He told her he didn't love her anymore. He told her he didn't like who she was or who he was when he was with her. He told her all of this while we sat there watching the scene and wondering what it would mean. Ten minutes was all the time it had taken to eradicate 25 years together. It hadn't mattered what they'd been to each other, only what they'd ceased to be for each other. It has been difficult to forget what it felt like hearing those words and living the after effects of that devastating admission.
It is hard to look at life, at my own marriage and think...that can't happen to me. It can happen, after a year, two, fifteen, twenty-five or forty-five. There is no mark you pass that suddenly makes your love immune. It is hard to have faith is something that has those kind of odds.
I'm thinking all these things today and wondering about how long life is. There are times, usually on the dying end of an argument, when I feel the lights going out. It's like I'm retreating someplace and if I'm not careful, I could take up permanent residence in some dark, distant corner. Time passes and love gets sicker and weaker, hope fades and faith...faith tumbles like a delicate house of cards.