Not Tonight

I’m sitting here doing the kind of work I actually hate, but it’s necessary.

When you’re a one person team, you wear every hat.

Right now, I’m updating my publications. Re-reading old interviews. Some of them include him.

And suddenly, I scream out loud:“Where did we go wrong? What happened to us?”

I question myself first.

I dissent, I direct, I analyze, I tear myself apart before anyone else has to.

I know myself more intimately than most people ever will know me, or themselves.

Which is maybe why it hits harder when I start to feel, visibly, that I’m not enough.

Whether I’m falling short because life is just too demanding, or because I’m actually trying, in every possible way…

It doesn’t matter.

That ache shows up the same.

It stirs my wound of people pleasing, something I’m actively unlearning.

And then there’s the other side of me: My cold, sharp, matter-of-fact responses.

I don’t always realize they cut deep, especially with sensitive people.

But I was raised differently.

Affirmation, constant validation… it wasn’t something I ever received growing up and definitely is rarely needed now.

It was never really modeled, either.

And now? It just doesn’t register the same way like it does for other people.

Still, I never want someone to feel unloved or taken for granted.

So I overcompensate. I overgive.

And in the darkest moments, even that was dismissed.

The words said about me in those moments still sit on my skin like a heavy blanket.

When it gets to be too much, I withdraw.

I go cold.

Sometimes, I am just like my mom.

But I don’t mind that.

Her virtues are just as loud as her vices, and I inherited both in shades.

And still, I police myself more harshly than anyone else ever could.

The mirroring in our relationship…

It happened in the hard moments just as much as in the blissful ones.

I’m not perfect.

As loving and affectionate as I can be, there’s a double-edged sword to me.

I know this. But still, I wonder: Why does it have to be this hard?

Eventually, I question him.

God, do I want to go there tonight?

No.

Will I ever?

Not tonight.

Maybe we were too close.

Too much time.

No logical human spends that kind of time with one person.

But I did.

And I let it happen.

I craved the comfort.

And comfort? It can be just as dangerous as distraction.

Being alone these days is a whole different ballgame.

He was my person.

And once, I shared everything.

EVERYTHING.

But then I started closing off.

For reasons I won’t get into right now.

Not tonight.

Tonight, I stay solo, something I’ve grown used to.

I keep my head down, my nose clean, and I get this goddamn work done.

Because even in moments like this, the work doesn’t stop.

And neither do I.

xxxo,

Ci