This Must be a Re-Run

I couldn't sleep past 7:30am. The first thing I do is to suddenly open my eyes and take a deep breath, as if I needed more air to exist in reality and not dreamland. My first thought was a whisper, "Tom ..." My first sensation was the grip of anxiety.

A year ago, I was going through the same thing. Oh, and when I say "the same thing," I mean it. Every time, it seems, I am to be frustrated about something in the relationship. I express it, but it doesn't get answered. When I finally get pissed about him evading the question, he tells me I have a "temper problem." I don't understand why he evaded the question, why he feels I have a problem, he tells me I just don't understand him, and we are not meant to be together. Of course, to come to find out, his heart is still with someone in his past. My anxiety is heightened because I feel like I can't live up to a memory. Besides, what's happening doesn't makes sense. So I try to explain, I try to ask why, but he gets impatient and eventually gets pissed off. Then, I hang up. I think about it and analyze. No, it's not. It's not true. None of it. So I write him a long e-mail trying to explain that it wasn't just me (thinking, no, please don't punish me!). Even though it made me feel better temporarily, of course, that was still a waste of time -- he would never understand. This must be a re-run of something.

Here we are again.

I'm in Central Oregon, but we have gray skies these few days. It seems like an extra shade of gray at 7:30 in the morning. Or maybe it's just me -- my heart makes my eyes gray. My roommate's brother told me I looked shorter than usual yesterday. Well, I guess my troubles make me small, too. Maybe it's because it cuts my appetite.

Here we are again.

So I am hurting. It follows the same prescription, the same recipe. Let me backtrack, and I will remember what will come next. ... Well, wait. It helped the last time to have friends around, to have a job, to have no creditors after me for student loans. Maybe there are deviations after all.

Experience tells me, though, that I will not be missed.

I read something first thing for breakfast this morning, a quote: "It started before it could be stopped, and it was over before it began." I can't even explain how I feel when I read that.