They call it “butterflies” when you fall in love for a reason. When it all ends, it is what gets released into the world to move on. Like how that initial interest in someone is called a “crush”. Because smashed into pieces is what happens to your heart in the end.
So, he took what remnants of trust I had in men and threw it away with reckless abandon in favour of another woman. So, he handed me a list of excuses and no real explanation instead of the truth.
Let’s face it. I knew it was over long before the road split into two separate directions. Love is like that one last cigarette. You never want it to be over. It’s a terrifying leap off a cliff and you can’t see where you’re going to land until it’s too late. For better or worse. There’s a reason it’s in the wedding vows. That’s the risk.
Yet what an equal risk it is to walk away; to finally give a scattered, nomadic heart room to breathe. With wings, torn up and tattered, to begin patching them with all the things I have been re-discovering about myself. Like how much I revel in solitude, being surrounded by peace in the safe confines of my own walls, and how I dislike sharing my space with anyone other than my furry babies.
I let myself be liberated by being alone. This hesitant butterfly went to a rock show, solo for the first time. What started as meekly sauntering into the bar turned into buying a band shirt, pulling it on over my black dress, to head bang and dance the night away right up at the stage like the avid fan girl I have always been for this band. A little rock and roll gypsy who forgot how the deafening guitar grunge brings me back to life beneath flashing lights and a screaming vocalist.
Oh, there’s my soul, and a few pieces of my lost heart. Scattered in various corners of this city, waiting on me to find them in places that were my favourites as a single woman. A Saturday afternoon in the downtown retro clothes store so dear to me. That used book store, with its intoxicating old book scent that pairs so eloquently with a rainy day. The corner coffee shop that makes the best caramel lattes ever. In the front row, reminding me that rock and roll is life, love doesn’t love anyone in return, and it’s okay to be that solo gal losing herself in the music.
Free the butterfly. Spin me out of the dismal cocoon of depression and insecurities in which I spent the summer. Or, as a friend told me today, something that stuck in my mind:
“Live your gypsy life the way you meant to. He never deserved you.”
So, he let crumble what I clambered to keep together. I have let loose the butterflies he once gave me. Watched them flutter away on dishevelled wings as leaves faded from trees and fell. I’ll never need those feelings again. What he truly did was set me free. To choose the wildflower meadows I belong in. Upon which petals I will land. My life with him only held me back from all the things I want to do.
So, I will be a divorcee before I turn 30. It opens me up like a dew-drenched daisy to the sun. To travel; to do things on my time; to attend concerts with no objections to my music taste; to simply exist in those beloved little corners of the world I adore.
As I hold in my hands, once more, the flutters that once crashed against my rib cage, I know it is time to let it go. The heartbreak, toxicity of him, the unanswered questions, the last four years of my life, the devotion to him, the vows. Extend those wings, with colours frayed at the edges. Embrace the sunset of that chapter, for it means a sparkling sunrise awaits me come morning; watercolour smears of magenta and violet across the fractured sky.
Free the butterfly.
