Took a trip to Denver in March 2014-After months of come-and-go writers block, traveling forced me to tap back into wordplay as a therapy tool. Was in an unfamiliar place with news that felt catastrophic, had to fall back on an old crutch. Thankful for this trip, and this piece because it freed that trapped feeling my mind was stuck in. Been easier to write since. This is what I wrote that day:

3-19-2014

Staring at these mountains. These fucking mountains. Snow-capped scaling the skyline. This place isn’t nearly as cold as home. Frostbite doesn’t seem to be a serious death threat here. Sure, it’s breezy enough to remind true mid-westerners of Chicago, the nations true windy city. There’s a huge difference though. The air here smells pure. Even if it is littered with pot smoke. My sense of smell made its first appearance since joining the cigarette-smokers club back in ’07. The scents were too much to handle at first, they made my stomach turn and nose sniffle like some coke junkie. Only took a few days to grow accustom to tasting through smell. Really enjoying it at this point. Alas, I’m preparing to fly back to Minnesota today. Trying to find my bearings first. Learned of her pregnancy yesterday. Boy, was that difficult to hear. Brought up that old friend drenched in negative self-talk again. Hadn’t missed that friend a bit. My mind just couldn’t take it. Still, I don’t want to accept it as reality. That should be MY family. That’s what WE always discussed. I was supposed to raise children with HER. That was supposed to be MY future. Now some stranger is walking in my lightly worn shoes. He’ll teach my should-have-been son or daughter how to play catch. He’ll teach them proper manners. Most importantly, he’ll teach them how to respect women, starting with their mother.

Figures that she’d find Mr. Right, right after me. Seems to be the case with most previous lovers. They go through this period with me, one that is apparently eye-opening enough for them to finally move on to desire true happiness. They go on and find it with someone else. To be fair, these relationships (really, who are we kidding, affairs) tend to start while the counter-parts are in the midst of their worst dating cycle. They find me when they’re dating abusive men, slamming drinks for self-respect, or dangling on the edge of suicide. Maybe I’ve done the world some justice, providing women this bridge, even if it’s an unsteady one, to allow them to cross their war-torn commitment driven worlds onto the promised land. That’s how I look at it when I don’t want guilt to eat me alive. Everyone, including karma, knows that’s just a crock of shit. Women take this journey with me and grow so frustrated trying to understand what the hell is wrong that they find themselves. Still doing the world some justice? Maybe. Doing myself justice? No.

Maybe it’s time to build a new future. My previous one has been invested into someone else, every single time. This time may hurt the most. This may be the last time it needs to happen for me to learn. Think I’m ready to go home.