All week, I've been thinking about telling the story about The Man I Didn't Marry (this next chapter was to be called "How I Didn't Marry The Man I Didn't Marry"), but I discovered something real writers have probably known for a long time: when you start with the title, you're in trouble.
And when I was lying in bed this morning, thinking about getting started this morning, the story I thought I really wanted to tell was about my mom's chemotherapy, something I haven't really written about yet.
But then I got sidetracked, and I sat down at the computer, and tried writing that story, and realized that I'm not ready to talk about it in detail yet. It was just last year and it's bound up in talking about my brother (who is fine, now, thank you), and all that stuff is just too emotionally there still. It's in my head a lot, still. So here it is, the original story I meant to tell, the shortened (yes, shortened) version of How I Didn't Marry The Man I Didn't Marry.
It's not that interesting a story, to be honest. I'm talking about all the stuff that happened before I didn't marry him: a lot of details that I do and don't remember, the ones I don't remember (how he proposed, when he proposed) being mostly more interesting than the ones I do. That time consisted of a long build up of me putting the brakes on mentally at every completed detail: restaurant booked - flowers ordered - photographer chosen - dress purchased and fitted... When it was time to buy my shoes and jewelry, I felt so trapped and scared that everyone started asking me if I was getting the "cold feet." My feet were fine: I was terrified. I mean, at each successfully completed chore, I thought: OK, that's one more thing that's going to make calling this thing off just that much harder. I watched the time trickle down to two weeks, and then I knew cutting it any closer would be the wrongest (most wrong? worst?) thing I'd ever done.
Calling it off was hard. Telling his parents: maybe even harder than telling him. Maybe because they believed me right away in a way that Drew didn't. They, I think, saw me for who I was: young, confused, unhappy. Drew, in his sweet and confused way, thought that my request to call off the wedding and not see each other anymore was temporary; he didn't yet know or want to believe that this was it. His parents knew it was for real.
I felt like total shit - please don't think that this was a jubilant or exciting time for me. I was scared, unhappy; lying to him (because until we had our talk, I think he thought everything was just fine and dandy; I'm not a very good actress on stage but I guess I had him fooled. We never, ever, discussed the scary parts about getting married), our friends, and our families: it was terrifying.
But it was the right thing to do. When I tell people this story, I always say, "I couldn't marry him because I could see myself making his life a living hell." It's true. And I will repeatedly say, about Drew: He was (is, just because we haven't spoken in years doesn't mean he's changed) a very nice person who deserved someone who loved him completely, and totally, at the very least, at that moment, on his wedding day. And I couldn't do it.
So there, in a lot of words I sort of didn't intend to write (or I did, and then I didn't, and then I did it anyway), is the story.
(There are a few more details: when I called off the wedding and we broke up, I was working in Malibu, at the Crown Books out there, a job I hated. My best friend and confidant was a red-haired 18-year old boy. I was listening to Jeff Buckley's album, Grace, pretty much nonstop. My car, a 1984 Subaru GL, broke down for good, and my sister sold me her 1987 Toyota Celica for $2,000. I was smoking the most I've ever smoked: 1/2 a pack a day, sometimes a whole pack. Around the time when we were supposed to be married, I came down with a really bad case of bronchitis. After I broke up with Drew, his friends Marshall and Charlie called me about 20 times a day at work, wanting to know what happened - after a few of those calls, my co-workers, who were mostly insane and total dicks, were really nice for a change and told him I was either not there or busy. I lost about 15 pounds.)
I think your broken engagement was just when I was starting in flute choir but you know my story is so similar. When I called my "time out" he had no idea that I wasn't anything but blissfully happy. 18 months of therapy later (and you know the other things going on), we finally called it quits and he moved out. But he still thought that it was temporary until I "worked some things out". I still think he hates me but that's his wasted energy now isn't it? You were a little further along in the plans than I was but I did have the dress and the hotel. It was the time to start dealing with all the other crap that I lost the plot.
ReplyDeleteIt all works out for a reason. If you married this guy, you wouldn't be able to marry Stewart Copeland now would you? Glad you and Patrick have your "sex-ceptions" out in the open.