The Long Goodbye

I have spent the last couple of months saying goodbye to our friends from Houston. Maybe I was living in denial, but I had put my feelings for Michael's impending exit on hold. I thought about it and when I did I started to cry, but I was really tired of crying, so I stopped thinking about the day he will have packed his car and he drives away with no idea of when I will see him again. He has vacation in the summer, but I do not. He has vacation in the fall, but again, I do not, so while he is home I will be at work. I cannot picture living day to day without him because it is unfathomable. I can't imagine it, trust me, in order to brace myself, I have tried. I applied for jobs in the Chicago area. I guess we will see. Their unemployment numbers are much higher than ours, here in Texas, so I have no idea what impact my little dog and pony show will have. My feelings are that they can find someone already there to do any job I might qualify for. I am not being pessimistic, but realistic, as to what it will take to make a monstrous move like that one. We sat down and made a pro and con list of three places we could end up, including Houston, and Chicago. The third city I don't want to mention now, for personal reasons. Houston came up the winner by default, but still a clear winner, most of it doing with housing prices, inflation and income to outgo ratio. Now we wait...we have a year to figure it all out, but still we will have to wait in limbo for a while longer. Our friends one by one are leaving us behind. Then before I know it, our turn, or I should say Michael's turn will come. I am still not prepared to think about it, even when it wakes me from a dead sleep. I am good at resolution. Usually when I make my mind to something I am good at shoving things through the barely open portal until all the opportunities fall out. Right now, even I the over bearing, big mouthed, resolutionist ( I can make up words) has no idea of which way to shove. To give up my job, the one I just got, the one I love, well, I think right now it would take something rather extraordinary to happen. I am waiting for a sign. Not so much for the heavens to open up but something more clear than the foggy ideas we have come up with while sitting stewing in our own juice. In the mean time, and I am not going to lie, this feels meaner than ever, we have to go and send our friends off to the new city. It's wonderful to care that much and awful at the same time. The last one was for our friends who I love so much I cannot even hardly tell you. Being with them in the jungle, their jungle, well, for me it was a little piece of comfort, a slice of home, familiarity in action and words. The jungle was dismantled and the moving van has long since evacuated their beloved belongings and Friday, very appropriately, the thirteenth, I said goodbye to my friends. Long hugs, well wishes and no tears from me...Until Saturday when the weight of watching more friends pack up and go hit me like a car. I hate crying, it is closely associated to weakness with most of the men in my life not tolerating it, but I have little choice as tears push out of my visibly pissed off face. I cry and then I get on with it. I guess I shouldn't feel so bad about feeling so bad, but I am tired of me and all this crap we got handed. I had thought, naively thought, that by now we would know more, have more of an answer to all of our questions. It was not to be. Our questions seem to come in long strings, wrapping around each other causing an increasingly tangled mess. I have sent resumes up there, and Michael has sent resumes down here. Both trying desperately to reach the other in order to be together. So far what we know is more about how to write a resume than where we will end up. Neither of us can be the sole support of this family in either direction, so we must both have jobs. This is one hamster wheel I would have loved to have never gotten on. Our only certainty is uncertainty. Our constant is change. So here it is, the middle of April, counting down to the last week of May. I will turn 49 in May, this year. I will blow out a fire hazardous cake and then pack up my best friend, my boyfriend, lover, dishwasher, lawn expert and personal comedian, my beloved husband and send him off without me. OK, it sucks, it really does. At what point will we know what to do? At what point we will do something, anything to be in the same state, let alone the same city? I don't have those answers either. This weekend I let go of more of those I love. I wish them happy, I really do. I hope they find wondrous things, make new friends and shake all of the fun out of the trees. I will continue to love them wherever they are. I looked at Mike and said, "So this is hell..." "I actually think it is Limbo," Michael said with a smile. "Nope, I am pretty sure this is hell. Limbo, being a misnomer, they tried to convince us is better than hell. I think this is hell right here on earth. No security, no answers and not even the person you pledge to love until death gets to help you along the way. Nope this definitely hell." I said that and then thought better of it. This is indeed Limbo, the place where you can see heaven just beyond your grasp, but can't get there. I had thought it was hell because it has been tortuous. Since I do know at some point a trigger will be pulled in one direction or another, and that trigger will eventually bring us back together, so then this will not be permanent, it just feels that way, so Limbo it is. For now while the waiting game continues I am going to go stretch. If Limbo is my new home, then I had better get my back in shape.