Nights Like These

"It would have hit them sooner or later - life isn't happily ever after and golden sunsets[...] It's work. 

The person you love is rarely worthy of how big your love is. 

Because no one is worthy of that and maybe no one deserves the burden of it, either. 

You'll be let down. You'll be disappointed and have your trust broken and have a lot of real sucky days. You lose more than you win. You hate the person you love as much as you love him. 

But [...] you roll up your sleeves and work - at everything -because that's what growing older is." 

— Dennis Lehane 

My French manicure is chipping. It was one of my last physical reminders that the ball wasn't a daydream, besides my gown and a few sparkling hairpins . I'll have to get out some cotton balls and polish remover soon, and maybe paint them a cheerful pink. I guess I've kept it on, in all its imperfect glory, because I didn't want to forget.

Sky and I have done...all right since that night. I cannot say well. There were days of welcome-home-from-work kisses, but there were also days of the silent treatment. He's hours away from being gone for a three day drill, for example, but we're spending the night in separate rooms; he watches some loud movie, and I sit on the other side of the wall blogging and reflecting. I've read that the average woman cries five times a month (and a man, once a month). Should I feel lucky that I haven't cried that many times this month, or should I be sad that I've cried more than once this week? And then there are nights like these, where anger dries up any tears I might have, where I think up biting replies to made-up arguments in my head.

I'm really looking forward to the Army Strong Bonds marriage retreat in a few weeks. (Sky is probably looking forward to the perk of getting to skip his May drill because we're going.) I think it's one of those things that any couple could benefit from, but definitely something that would be good for us. Not just for the time away alone, and not just for a change of scenery and a new adventure together- I hope it will be something that teaches us some news things. Maybe these kinds of nights can be lessened. There's no way Millie could see this in a year or two and not be affected by it, and that weighs heavily on my heart.

I need to work on a lot of things myself. There isn't a time frame that anyone can give me to be healed or 'over it', and maybe that's just as well. I'm not over it. I wonder how long it will be before I can go without flinching anytime something reminds me of what happened, or if that will ever go away. I have been told that the story of our marriage could end up being so great. We could inspire people, and give them hope in their own situations. I would be so thrilled if we could. I just wonder if it will still hurt to tell our story. I long for good memories to overtake the bad ones.

We start over so often, almost continually. I guess the point is that we keep starting over. If we have 50 beginnings, it means 49 tries. Of course, it also means 49 failures. (Tonight could definitely be considered one of them.)

But maybe, on the 50th try, we'll make it.