“You’ve been sitting in front of that keyboard for the better part of two days,” the logical portion of my mind, which I refer to as Brain, said walking past me swirling a spoon in a piping hot cup of tea. “You’ve got less than a day to complete the next chapter. What the devil is holding you back?”
“I’ve been telling this story for the better part of six months,” I said while still gazing at the all but blank electronic page in front of me, barring only the words, “God Can Wait!” and my byline.
“You might find this hard to believe,” I continued, “but reliving all of this is taking something of a toll on me and our relative state of mind.
“I feel like I did during those months, hopeless, as if yet again my world had come to an end and I had nothing left to do in life but sit back in that desert oasis and wait for the inevitable end.”
“Really?” Griselda, also enjoying a cup of tea, asked in a bemused tone of voice.
“You, like nearly all of your audience know exactly how this story ends. How could you possibly be feeling like you did then?”
“Perhaps,” I responded, “it’s because, like then, I find myself once again sitting in front the Mac wondering what to say next.”
“I’ve been telling this story for the better part of six months,” I said while still gazing at the all but blank electronic page in front of me, barring only the words, “God Can Wait!” and my byline.
It was true. Following Jonny’s last Dear Chuck message, I’d reached the end of the denial, anger, and depression portions of my reaction to our breakup and was now trudging methodically past bargaining toward acceptance.
I had removed and stored in the back of a closet the large print of Jon hanging on my bedroom wall, placed there so strategically for maximum laughs just two months earlier. I couldn’t bring myself to unfriend him on Facebook, mostly, I told myself, because it would appear to be an act of high drama.
So, in order to avoid seeing news of his comings and goings, not to mention what it would feel like if and when I saw him in the company of another man, I unfollowed him on Facebook. Regrettably, I did the same with Brodie as so many of his and Jonny’s posts tagged one another and I didn’t want to take even a slight chance of running across an image of Jon and those warm, inviting eyes and that heart-melting smile.
My final task would be to respond to Jon’s last message. I wanted to correct a couple of assumptions he’d made, make clear as honestly and truthfully as I could my feelings and the regret I felt, while at the same time choosing my words carefully so as not to inflame the situation with recrimination and accusations in much the same way all of my previous relationships had ended.
Using the counter height breakfast bar that separated the kitchen from the living room in my tiny flat as a standing work station I stood before the blank screen on my MacBook for what seemed like an eternity. Finally after many unproductive hours I placed a FaceTime call to Ken.
“I thought you were writing all this down to help get it out of your head?” Ken said after I’d brought him up to date on my actions and decision to get on with my life sans one hunky Canadian.
“I am,” I said, “but I can’t help feeling I have to do this one last thing before moving on. Besides, who wants to read a story with an unhappy resolution that doesn’t even end with at least a glimmer of a hopeful future?”
His only response was, “start typing,” meaning I needed to put down everything that was going on in my mind at the time and then to edit and re-edit the piece until I had the essence of what needed to be said.
My first draft took six hours and clocked in at a whopping seven pages. The following day I took another crack at it and chopped it down to five and a half pages. Later that afternoon, another pass through the text, pruning here, cutting there and I managed to get it down to just a few lines over four pages.
The following morning I woke feeling more upbeat than I had in weeks. I fixed breakfast, cleaned up afterwards, took a cup of coffee over to the counter where my laptop was waiting and dove right in. After about an hour I stopped to refill my coffee mug. It was then I realized I’d stopped obsessing about what I was trying to say and was now focusing on my response as if it were a writing assignment.
I kept whacking away at the text removing anything and everything that was even remotely tangential to the idea that I was angry, depressed, or pointlessly clinging to any hope we might get back together.
Two more pass-throughs and I had my response to Jonny down to a page and a half.
After lunch I returned to what I now referred to as “The Project” by going back and reviewing each version of the message and to my surprise there was one thing that survived every draft.
Buried as what was meant to be a humorous ironic aside in the first version of my response were several lines I’d thrown in about being so swept away by those first three days in Toronto, I’d completely forgotten to share an idea I’d been mulling over since first boarding my flight to Toronto.
Using the counter height breakfast bar that separated the kitchen from the living room in my tiny flat as a standing work station I stood before the blank screen on my MacBook…
While preparing for the flight to Ontario, Brain kept raising the question of, “what next?”
“Say we have as wonderful a time in Toronto as we had when Jon was here, what happens when the weekend is over and we have to return to Palm Springs and he goes back to Owens-what’s-it-Sound? It’s not like we have an unlimited travel budget and he’ll have an abundance of free time, what with classes and exams.
“It’s not as if you were living in the same state, much less country, and you could spend time together dating and getting to know one another before deciding where you want to take this thing.”
I thought about this all throughout the flight. About two thirds of the way to Toronto, and with my loving heart Griselda guiding me along the way, I came up with an idea.
For the first time in my life, I was free to go anywhere and do anything I wanted. As a writer I could work anywhere there was enough power to keep my MacBook charged and internet access, with which to blog away my thoughts for days on end.
Jon’s winter semester in Owen Sound would only last four months, since it was a college town I reasoned there would be a stock of reasonably priced short term rentals available. I could rent one and over the course of those four months we could behave like any ordinary dating couple.
I stopped thinking about this idea right there for two reasons. First, I could see it was driving Brain apoplectic as it never occurred to him that either Griselda or I would ever think of tapping into our last remaining financial resource, my portion of the funds from the sale of the house in North Hollywood.
The main reason, however, that I stopped thinking about this idea was that it was clearly something that needed to be discussed with Jon before moving ahead with any research or planning.
Then I got off the plane in Toronto and the rest of that weekend, as the saying goes, was history. A history of such dizzying pleasure that I didn’t once think of interrupting it by talking about the future.
After assuring him there would be no need to respond to this message as it would be my last. I summarized my thoughts about the things Jon had mentioned in his message, tossed off my idea about my coming to Owen Sound for the winter, again attempting to be ironic about it, and concluded by telling him that despite all that he had said, I still firmly believed he had feelings for me and that it was clear, to me at least, that the fear of risking everything he was working toward was driving his decision to end things between us.
I concluded by saying;
So do I think I can change your mind about this?
No, only you can do that. I’m telling you all of this so that you can understand and believe this;
While you are the only one who can face and overcome your fears you do not, nor will you ever have to, face them alone. I am and always will be here for you.
love
chuck
And thus ended August 2015.
Edited by
Kenneth Larsen
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