Thursday, December 4, 2008

EXHALATION

LOOKING AHEAD

I’ve learned some really important lessons this year. How NOT to use a chainsaw was one of the more painful. That one cost me surgery, an astronomical medical bill, a scheduled triathlon, and the proper movement of my left leg.

Another equally painful lesson I’ve learned in just the past month is about loss and letting it go.

On Sunday I awoke, filled a mug with Café Bustelo, and turned on my laptop to find my data missing. What data, you ask? ALL data: Every document and file gone. Music gone. Pictures gone. Everything gone. At first I panicked, paced frantically around my house—which is my usual way of dealing with catastrophe. Next I called professionals and spent hours on the phone trying fix after fix to no avail. The data wasn’t there.

Now, for you to understand my state of mind, I must also confess that just a few weeks before I experienced the end of what I thought was a life-changing relationship. Think driving a car. Not the most impressive car you’ve owned, but something about this car makes you want to drive. Makes you want to get out and take it places. Something about the car drives you. Something--everything--about the car makes you want to own it for life.

So, you start slowly at first, then opening it up to higher speeds, feeling it respond to the pressure on the accelerator, getting in-sync with your hands on the wheel. You look down to find you’re driving at over 100 mph. The world flying by, colors blurring, feeling one with the machine. Suddenly, in the blink of an eye, there is no gas in the car. None in the tank, none in the gas lines and none in the engine. The ride ends you never know what happened to the gas. How did it disappear? How could it happen when the ride was going so well? Nothing left but question. I’d been sleeping about 3-4 hours each night, not eating, working out furiously, and focusing my thoughts on work.

So here I was, on Sunday, with that not far behind me sitting and looking at a laptop on which I run my business and my personal life. Looking at nothing. I suppose I could have put on my running shoes and gone for one of those long runs during which I grit my teeth and my hands so tightly they ache for hours after. The ones where I push my leg to exhaustion then keep on until I’m running through sheer pain and sometimes wiping tears away so I can see the road.

But I didn’t. I sat down in my big chair and put up my feet. For the first time since the week before my relationship ended my heart beat slowly and my mind was at peace. There were no questions. No what if I’d said this or done that. No pain. Everything stopped and I could hear my heartbeat.

I did what I advised her (the woman I previously compared to a car--and to be very clear, she's really a wonderful person so, while I miss her, I don't regret her) to do when her job (a financial company in the midst of the financial crisis) hit the fan and her office was chaos and her job was to help keep things cool—I exhaled. I took a long, satisfying, deep, chest-empting release of breath and exhaled. Then I smiled. What I understood at that moment was that if the data was just hidden or non-indexed I knew someone in High Point who could extract it. If it wasn’t—if it was really gone, forever and ever amen—it just was. There was nothing I could do about it. Asking why it happened wouldn’t change the loss. The past, everything that happened prior to that moment, was past. Memories. Gone.

I had to live in the moment. I had to be here now. I couldn’t sit around, as Colin Hay says in his song by the same name, “Waiting for my real life to begin.” The relationship ended when I felt it end on a cold, Sunday when something in her voice shifted. It was really over when we were at a quaint country inn having a wonderful dinner and time and I caught her sneaking text messages to someone when I ducked out to give her new puppy water and let her out of my car for a little walk. Over. Everything I'd felt the moment before was gone.

The data wasn’t where I could get at it, so it wasn’t there. I had to accept that reality and do the next thing. I had to either have someone extract the data and buy a new laptop or just buy the new laptop and try to recreate what I could.

Start from scratch. She (the woman I previously compared to a car) told me once that she and her neices count down the days until they see each other until the night before when they announce, "No more days!" So, this moment for me was that point, "No more days!" My life has to continue in whatever direction I choose from this moment. No putting things off. No blaming events/people from the past for not getting or doing or having or being. No excuses at all. No more days. Today is it. I awoke this morning and made a huge list of things I AM DOING. Moving back to DC, apartment there, new clients, taking all the inherited money I have squirreled away because it embarrased me and putting it into viable investements, personal goals (triathlon in 09!!!!), selling the first novel AND the screenplay, etc. Sure, it's long, but I'm ticking it off as I go...and I'm going each of the 1,440 minutes I have today.

So, here I am. At the beginning. Nothing behind me, and an endless panorama ahead with a pretty good road map to get there.

One bright point: I called her (the woman I previously compared to a car) because she has the only known copy of the latest novel I’m writing. She emailed yesterday that she is putting it in the mail, so I’ll have it. And, even after the initial few seconds where I stopped breathing when her name popped up in my email in-box, I slept through the night. Finally. Things are looking up—and ahead.

7 comments:

Owen Wynne said...

As usual, Dale, some really good stuff to ponder now that the end of the year is approaching. Sorry about your laptop, but it could be God's way of telling you to let go of the past as care about now. We're never as free as when we are struggling for life and existance. I had a heart attack four years ago, and suddenly everything in my life came into sharp focus. My kids, wife, relationship with my own father. All very clear. Thanks for reminding me.

Sara said...

Go Dale! I love to see you living life at full speed. You're an inspiration. I'm going to sit down and figure out how to do the same with my life. I can't afford to be "Waiting for my real life to begin." Great song byt the way! I just downloaded it from itunes:)

Anonymous said...

She was texting some other guy WHILE on a date with you? Good riddance! She obviously doesn't deserve someone good/nice. Stop making excuses for her, that's just BAD. No one deserves that! For God's sake, she could have waited a few hours. BAD!

Anonymous said...

"There must be more - more than all this pain...more than all the falling down & the getting up again." I just heard Andrew Peterson - a humble & unassuming - not particularly charismatic - guy perform that song with only an acoustic guitar. If you don't have it, I encourage you to download it. It's beautiful. "...every hole was made to fill & every heart can feel it still.."

- captain

Anonymous said...

anonymous from 12/5 clearly does not know that she was playing his game right back at him.

Owen Wynne said...

Anonymous from Dec. 31 is way off the mark! While I haven't met Dale, I've read his wonderful book and all the postings on her since day one and I KNOW without any doubt that he would NEVER treat someone that way. I'm even sure he wouldn't play a "game" of any sort with someone's emotions. Look, there simply is no justification for the woman texting someone else while on a date. None. But, as Dale says, he's not angry with her. He doesn't regret her or his time with her. I'll bet he even still (sounds like it from the last two posts) has deep feelings for her.

AND I THINK YOU ARE MISSING THE POINT.

The lesson he is imparting here is that: things happen and sometimes (most of the time) we can't control them-especially someone else's feelings. Secondly, when something catastrophic happens we have a choice--freak out and fall apart--which only delays action, or we can exhale and move onto plan b or c or what ever the next course of action may be.

At least that's my humble opinion.

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