that’s a line from an old joy electric song, and appropriate over these last couple of years…
tamara loved (loves?) shiny, glittery things. it was such a cute personality quirk. i could pretty much be assured that she would like anything i bought her that fell into that category. it was one of a number of unique traits i really loved about her. the fact is, she was a very unique individual, and i think we had a lot of things in common that it will be very rare to find in another person. there was so much possibility between us.
unfortunately, she appeared to self-destruct and allowed herself to get involved in an affair. as much as i would like to believe alistair took advantage of her frail mental state by feeding her lines to bed her (as he knew very well she was married, but obviously didn’t care enough…if he cared at all…as a person, much less a believer), i know she had plenty of times where she made her own choices.
i put up with a lot of things during this time because i believed we were partners. i was stumbling forward in a state of shock most of the time tamara was making her new lifestyle choices. i couldn’t believe she was the same person i’d met, fallen in love with, and married. but she was. and even though she seemed to momentarily reappear and ask to seek reconciliation with an acknowledgement of the wrong and harm she’d committed, it wasn’t long before she was gone again, replaced by a person who was looking for self-satisfaction and pleasure in whatever means presented itself most immediately. it was this new person who chose to take half of everything, even while she maintained with mutual friends that she was fully intending to honour the agreement we’d made. blatent lies, but it didn’t stop her. unfortunately, the “legal” system has been blindfolded to truth and fairness, and she was able to walk away with what everyone who has any knowledge of the situation knows is not fair.
am i bitter? yes. am i hurt? hell, yes. would anyone dare deny me my pain? if i forget about all of this and let it go, it’ll be because i’ve moved on to something else — not because i’ve found any justification for her actions, or alistair’s behaviour, or the legal system’s decisions. because there is nothing just or right in any of that. do i want to move on? yes. i would love to find a new, positive direction in my life as far as a relationship goes. the problem is, i’ve not permanently moved on yet. and what i had was pretty good, overall. until the complications in our lives piled up too high and we had problems dealing with the issues, and then she betrayed my trust and turned and walked away from me. (and don’t think the irony that isaac was the name given to the long-time-coming but promised child of abraham and sarah is lost on me, given what we were going through and who she had the affair with.)
after one of the last counseling sessions, she read me a letter she had written to me, detailing a possible plan for us staying together. a plan that involved us moving to one of the coasts and starting a new life, seemingly cutting all ties and forgetting everything up to that moment. she even had plans of what we could do. it was so horribly difficult for me to not agree to it, because i wanted so much for our marriage to be good again, for our life to be good again…but i knew it wouldn’t actually solve the crisis we were in. i knew it wouldn’t fix things for long. it also didn’t really seem about our marriage, but about tamara doing what she needed to do for her to be happy. it wasn’t a plan with consideration for me, for us, just everything she would like to do herself. looking back now, it’s probably…i don’t know. i just know i couldn’t agree, and it hurt like hell.
during this conversation outside the counselor’s building she cried, and she gave me that sad expression i’d seen so many time before, clasped her arms together in front of her and moved into me, and i wrapped my arms around her and held her tight…for the last time. and even though she’d betrayed me and was continually inflicting more pain, i just kept wishing i wouldn’t have to let go and everything could be better.
i have no false notions any more. but that doesn’t keep me from continuing to feel the pain from the hole inside of me where my partner, my lover, my best friend, tore herself loose and left me behind. i know i need to move on, but a good portion of my life disappeared when she chose to give up on our life together.
i pray G-d can see His way to provide me with peace and fulfillment in this area of my life, both in dealing with my broken past and with looking with hope into the future.
Skip to content
failure is not an option. it's a requirement.