The Great Divide

Have you ever had the experience with blogging where you know what you want to write about but when you sit down to type it out you begin talking about something else instead? I have done this 3 times today with 3 different topics. Each time I sat down at the keyboard with my topic firmly planned out in my head the words that appeared on the page had nothing to do with the subject.

My first attempt was to talk about my first lesbian sexual experience.

My second attempt was to share some of my thoughts out of the diary I kept a few years ago when I realized I was gay.

My last try was a rambling short thought post including my unhappiness with Melissa Etheridge's latest release and this incredible ring I found online that is the perfect replica of a vagina, well except the pearl that represents the clitoris. I could do without the pearl. I mean I KNOW where the clitoris is. Without the pearl it would be perfect toe ring. Am I nuts?

But instead of all these semi-interesting topics which I am sure you all are dying to hear about I keep coming back to my current situation with my beloved Mainer. I live it everyday. I breathe it like oxygen. I try to escape it by sleeping too much and when I finally do sleep I have dreams of longing and loss disguised as falling and getting lost in dark forests. Worse still, it is waiting for me like thick smoke floating just above my head and falls on me the moment I open my eyes.

3000 miles. I feel every single one like a blow to the stomach. In the beginning, it was a buffer in case one of us turned out to be an internet wacko. That was Dec, by February we had both passed the wacko test (I suppose that conclusion could be relative), by July we began to realize how geographically handicapped our relationship was. I suppose the internet has made the world a smaller place intellectually but physically it is still full of vast expanses of "not with her".

The space between us has caused its share of trouble. It is hard to come out in the world while the woman you love is not with you. I needed to drown in lesbian romance and she could only be with me in short visits. At one point I made the decision to date others. So we broke it off and I did. We have broken up several times over different reasons. All reasons which would have been minuscule had we been living close by. But always we find ourselves back together in spite of ourselves, in spite of the miles because life doesn't feel right without the other. We joke with people and tell them that we have done our best to break up and get on to better relationships where there are less obstacles but it just didn't "take". And its true you know, no one has tried harder than we have to undermine, alienate, to terminate our relationship. We are both finished with it. It doesn't work and we quit. We are together.

We have spent much of our time dreaming and planning on how we will integrate our families. Several times this year we have come close then even closer to making it happen. Twice Mainer has made up her mind that she was coming to Boise to live with me. In doing so she would bring her adopted daughter with her but would leave her son in Maine with his other mother. Both times after I had become excited and started rearranging my things in order to make room for her and planning a tween's bedroom decor, she backed out. The first time I was devastated. The second time it shook me to my core. Having my dream of being her wife, mothering at least one of her children and having her in my bed every night, yanked from me, felt almost fatal. I was grief stricken. But I couldn't be angry with her. How could I be? I am a mother. I know from experience how painful it is to leave (or in my case, sending away)a child you have raised from birth. How could I ever expect that from her? And so my heart caved in on itself and I began to try to imagine my life as always away from her.

It started slower the third time. The last time. She was scared to repeat the hurt again. But we can only go so long without talking of the future and admitting our need to have one together. She even enlisted the help of a therapist to help her stay focused on the benefits of living with one's partner. And like all the other times we threw out all thoughts of it not working and began to plan again. This time with us living school months in Boise and summer months in Maine. This would break up her separation a little bit. I began to take things off my walls and shop for a bunk bed. I went to visit her over Halloween. We were both in heaven. One gorgeous fall Maine afternoon I went with her to pick up her kids after school. I opted to stay in the car where I could see the kids playing on the playground. I watched her as she walked away. I watched her face as she scanned the kids to find her son and the sudden joy that only a mother shows when she recognizes one of her own. I looked over at the crowd of kids to see her son grinning from ear to ear as they both made a b-line for each other. They wrestled each other and hung on each other. I was smiling at the sight but then it hit me like a tidal wave. Tears just appeared in my eyes, I didn't even feel them coming. Once again that familiar pain tore through me. When she got back to the car she noticed that I was looking distressed. I turned to her and said just above a whisper, "You can't leave him here to live without you." It was as if gravity had been pulling extra hard on her body and then suddenly corrected itself. She was visibly relieved. Maybe because this time she didn't have to be the one to say it. Maybe because she realized that I truly did empathized with her position. But with her relief I recognized that sadness which seems to come with the territory for us. 3000 miles. I know she too feels every single one of them.