you're a good woman...

if anyone but the dude says these words to me, i feel like i'm in a really bad country song. but, when he says it, or texts it, i feel all grown up and solid and... accomplished.

i've been away for a while because i've been hurting. shortly after my last blog post, the dude and i broke up. the dude, as i refer to him, is a lovely man that i met in january last year. we had a wonderful year full of road trips and tacos and football games and... and... i could go on and on about how absolutely wonderful he is and how well he treated me. let's just say, i was the happiest redhead you'd ever met. it didn't mean a hoot to me where he took me or what he gave me. he gave me himself and his love one-hundred percent and i was thankful for that every day.

but, all relationships have their bumps and we hit ours at, conveniently enough, just about the one year mark. we didn't survive.

i'm admittedly not handling it well, even after a pretty crappy track record. after a difficult divorce, i fell into a relationship with someone who was bipolar and that was incredibly hard to leave behind. eventually, i met the canadian and fell head over heels for him. after a good long effort of trying to regain his attention, i finally accepted the truth and we are now friends.

then came the dude.

after all of the previous relationships that i've had, i've been pretty resilient about dating at their end. even after the canadian, i got out there in the interwebs and started conversations almost immediately. no regrets, move on... it's been almost an unconscious drive. this is not the same.

i've been unusually reclusive and i spend a lot of time standing in the middle of my apartment forgetting what i was just doing. i did get a wonderful companion, jack white--the fluffiest kitty ever, and i have finally begun to accept my friends requests to go out. but, the thought of even talking to another man makes me queasy and not in school girl nervous kind of way.

our breakup happened rather quickly and i didn't honestly see it coming. i was insanely happy one day and the next trying desperately not to fall apart at my desk--in a new job.

though i like to believe i'm a real pick-myself-up-by-my-bootstraps girl, it has been close to two months and i still cry at some point nearly every day. it's pretty ridiculous and pathetic. i'm angry with myself about that.

i recently saw the dude for the first time since we broke up, and as always around him, my mind went blank and i just smiled. somehow, his presence just gives my crazy little world a little extra sparkle.

of course, i can go on without him. of course, i will. but, the truth is, i simply can't see the bootstraps through my tears right now. i know that they are there and for now, i'm hanging on to that.

in the meantime, i keep reminding myself that i am a good woman who is momentarily trapped in a bad country song.