Chapter 74: Back In The Saddle

piff piff piff my feet hit the pavement in little puffs of dust.

God, I love running.

When I was first going through the process of divorce, I was running six to ten miles a couple times a week. I was lean and mean then, now I feel like I’m dragging this dead yak of an ass behind me, damn near 50 extra pounds, giant anchors pressing down each foot, forbidding me to move another step. Lead foot has a whole new meaning. I lug each foot ahead anyway, forging ahead, regaining myself with every single step.

I’m gonna have to do a better job at defending this fort of a body. I’ve been allowing all manner of garbage in, sentry asleep at the guard post with his unused and worthless cork gun. I gotta fire this guy and hire some ninjas and sharpshooters to protect this temple.

So I run, and abstain, and start treating myself well, and I have lost almost twenty pounds, and now the dead yak I’m dragging down the street with me is really more of a dead goat (sorry for the mental image, the extra weight just seems a lot like hauling around a large dead animal. Or like heaving your one-wheel-resistant-every-time luggage through the airport. See? Dragging a dead yak. Do I have to apologize to yak owners yet?)

As I run, I listen. One of my favorite life hacks when I have a problem is researching the ever loving hell out of it until I get an answer. I can go through so many books and suddenly, there the answer is, page 158, third paragraph, second sentence in, and BOOM! Lightning strikes and everything is reframed. I have a greater understanding, birds chirp, planets align, unicorns fly high above farting extra oxygen into the atmosphere. You get the idea. Things click, and finally I am able to avoid the gaping and obvious pothole I was previously running over every single time I’d hit the road.

One of the titles I have been listening to is a get-over-it breakup book. After the disaster of Jackdude, an ironic name with its Titanic mess of a situation (and Jack totally could have fit on that floating door if Rose would have just moved over her selfish society ass), I read a truckload of books about relationships, how to identify a good man from a complete player/asshat/douchebag, how to get the ones in your life to stop treating you like shit, and why he Just Isn’t That Into You, and much of the advice is bullshit, but some of it is gold, glittering sparkling advice I tuck away for future reference. And this book happens to be my current favorite, an awesomely accurate book titled It’s Called A Breakup Because It’s Broken.

This is the book I recommend to anyone who just can’t let go of lost love. It’s designed to get you back on your feet again, the main premise being that if you were meant to be together, by golly that person would be sitting at your breakfast table with you right now. They would be eating dinner with you. The two of you would be cuddled on the couch watching Office Space for the twenty-third time. There’s no way they would leave you alone, at least not for long. If that chair remains empty no matter how long you wait, if they aren’t blowing up your phone when they haven’t heard from you, if they stopped texting, it means something is fatally wrong with the relationship. It’s dead, and you pretending it’s not doesn’t make it any more alive than disco in 1985. There’s a common tendency to attempt resuscitation of dead relationships, but it’s like Norman Bates having tea with his decedent mother, playacting like she’s still alive when even the flies know she’s long gone and should have been respectfully buried months ago. Dead things rot, and a cadaver of a relationship is something that needs to be six feet under, or it’s going to stink. Just ask your friends, trust me, they are tired of the smell, too.

Along with a lot of practical advice for getting over lost love, this book also has a plethora of ridiculous stories of how much abuse we will take from a significant other who may be horrible, but from whom we just can’t seem to loosen our death grip. From overly extravagant gifts of gold jewelry, vacations and massive flat-screen TV’s with little in return, to letting them overstay their welcome on the premises until even the dog doesn’t want to talk to us any longer, we are willing to put up with a stupid amount of bullshit from those who have stolen our hearts. We excuse bad behavior, tolerate being taken for granted, and gush over obviously cheap and lazy gifts while we painstakingly choose just the right thing and generously break the bank to give lavishly to this insignificant other, sometimes even allowing free room and board, naively permitting them to use up our everything, all in the hopes that they will love us once again, desperately dreaming of the day they treat us with equal priority.

THEY WON’T.

And it’s time for us to realize this and move along folks, nothing to see here. Nothing to experience. Nothing to make our lives better, no addition, no benefit. Vacuums up a lot of time, energy and resources, though. And that’s just one reason why staying in an unfulfilling relationship can destroy you.

So, I run. I run away from the church. I run away from Dudes. I run from everything that isn’t me. I run for my life, toward all the Monica I can be.

The irony is, now that I’m no longer interested, now that I’m building my own life, now that I’m rediscovering who the hell I am, guys are coming out of the woodwork. Suddenly it seems everyone wants to date me. I swear to God, there is some kind of radar guys have when you are unobtainable that suddenly makes them give chase. Men seem to want what they can’t have, the forbidden buffet always preferred, even though it may only have Tofu Tetrazzini and goat milk. Why do I keep writing about goats?

Youngdude calls. I walk him through his latest situation, and encourage him yes, you should stay with this girlfriend who’s actually your age.

Fundude wants to connect again. Sorry, Fundude, I can be friends, but I am considering you an independent contractor and as such, there will be no benefits.

Guys chat me up when I’m out, but I no longer buy their stories. Just like what happened in the church, I’ve seen too much and now it’s difficult for me to believe them, to trust the glimmering facade being placed before me. I’m calling bullshit.

In the midst of carefully placing life puzzle pieces back together, I don’t want to interrupt the process of construction. If I add guy pieces, the final creation will only last as long as they do. Nope, not doing it.

And so, I run, and build, and…

Oh wait, you’d probably like to know what happened at the Irish event.

Where did we leave off?

“Who ARE you?!”

And I stand there with a grin bigger than a stoned Cheshire cat, rattling off my pedigree to the musician who heard me belt out the request to pay attention. He is raving about my voice. We wind up singing songs for quite a while after the event ends, harmonizing together on old classics as I stack chairs and tear down wall hangings. We sing Beatles. We sing Elvis. We sing other cliches of music everyone generally knows, and I am having a blast. He takes my information and sends it over to a friend of his who has a band. You gotta hear this singer, ASAP. And, the very next day, a text pops in would you like to audition for our band? I reply: Absolutely! When?

… tonight?

Holy shit, they want me to audition tonight! I don’t even have time to think about it!

And just like that, after all of the time being here and doing absolutely nothing musical, a forgotten relic gathering dust in the attic, I have an audition. I dust off my trusty cordless Shure Beta 87, and head excitedly across Big Suburb, butterflies on cocaine flittering away in my gut.

I pull into the driveway, and am face to face with two of the biggest dogs I have ever seen, a pair of 200 lb Great Danes. I can’t get out of the car, these Cujos are gonna get me. As I’m ready to peel out, junkie butterflies in tow, The owner calls off the horses, and I tentatively set foot out of the car. I introduce myself to one of the guitar players and head into the basement.

And the minute I walk in, it feels like home. I instantly like these people, I can tell right away they are my brothers, friends to the end. Well, at least if I can pass this audition.

I plug in my microphone, and I’m tossed into a litany of rock songs I barely know. I improvise my way through many of them, and I’m doing Tarzan swings through this music, barely catching the end of another vine before I’m swoooooping through the air again to the next one, hanging on for dear life.

And suddenly, they are all looking at each other.

Bass player: “Does anyone have any reason Monica shouldn’t be our singer?”

And no one dissents, and they are murmuring unanimous sounds of approval. They like me! They really like me. And I am totally ecstatic at making music again, at fronting a band and being my crazy self onstage, doing what I was created for.

I pick up a massive chunk of Me that evening and walk out the door, feeling like the King of the World. (What’s with the Titanic references today?)

Until I get a message from Prepdude’s friend.