Last night I kinda wanted to stay up and watch the Oscars. I didn’t watch them for years, but have tried to the last couple of years. Partly just to see the dresses, lol. Partly to figure out what movies are worth seeing.

But, after vacuuming the house, doing laundry, swiffering the floors, cleaning off my kitchen counters, cleaning bathrooms,making a snack for my new book club that has it’s first meeting here tomorrow, making a full dinner for my son and I, which is rare these days, I couldn’t keep my eyes open past 9:30.

So, I headed for bed, and was sound asleep by 10. I woke up at midnight, with a start. I realized I was angry. Angry at S for Saturday’s conversation, which didn’t need to take place. It changed nothing except to strengthen my resolve. I was angry that he couldn’t just let it be, that he had to question me as if I was the one who had sex with a stranger. Anger that he seemed to think I owed it to him to tell him that I was going out on a date AFTER his betrayal of me. As I explained to him, he threw the boulder in the pond. Everything that happen­ed after that was just what rippled out and washed up on the shore. In the words of Elizabeth Gilbert in a post she had on FB, I told him to “Own your shit S. It’s all yours, every bit of this.” Angry at myself for making poor choices, when the truth was staring me in the face.

That conversation took place on Saturday, by text, and culminated in me blocking him and I’m pretty sure I will never unblock him. I was fine Saturday night. And really, for awhile now I have thought I was past the anger. But there it was, in the middle of the night, Sunday night.

I tried all the tricks that usually work.  I tried meditation, I tried reading. I tried going on FB on my phone, I got up and took a Unisom. I lay there, and realized my stomach was upset. Solar Plexus chakra. I’m a reiki master. So I know that’s where we store our emotions. I immediately switched my meditation music and did self-reiki, focusing on the solar plexus. After about 10 or 15 minutes I felt the emotion move down to my lower chakras, and my stomach no longer hurt. But I still wasn’t sleeping. I finally dozed off to the meditation music for a little while. But I’m not sure I dozed.

When I regained consciousness, I remembered this vision. Was it a dream? I don’t know. I was standing looking upward. I held out one hand, reaching up,

and in that hand was a green ball, about the size of an old glass fishing float, if you’ve ever seen one. Maybe 6” in diameter. It was green but clear, hollow, which I guess is why I thought of the old fishing floats. In it was all my anger, and pain, and any other negative emotion I had at the time. And I was offering it up, to the universe, to take from me.

It wasn’t like I was asking. It was like the universe was offering. “Give it to me, let it go,” it was saying. Gently, sweetly, lovingly. “Surrender. Let it go.” I began to say out loud, “God is great” And then began chanting the silent mantra “So Hum.” I am. I am loveable. I am beautiful. I am happy. I am healthy. I am strong.

And so at about 4:15 I fell sound asleep, for 3 hours.

And today, I’m not angry at him. I’m indifferent. I don’t care. I’m not as angry at myself. I think it is the hardest to forgive ourselves. I knew better, but ignored it. But that’s where I was at the time. I wanted to be in love and love this man, so I did, even though he told me not to, even though my friends told me not to, my son told me not to. I wanted to.

And now I don’t. I don’t really even want to know him. Now I see who he really is, unclouded by eyes that have not seen a man care for them in a decade. Back facing reality. And quite content to be doing so, really.

I guess the anger, the pain, is still in layers there. I am peeling them away. I guess last night’s insomnia got a few of them peeled away.

In the dark of the night, in my lovely bed, I faced some truth and came through some dark ugly stuff. Stuff, truth I had to face about myself. In the end, I was more disgusted with S than angry. I was more angry with myself. And disgusted.

Healing. Not an easy road. But as they say, I’m grateful for my struggles. Because without them I wouldn’t have stumbled upon my strength.