Kanslofull

I am not a particularly sentimental person. It is probably one of the many reasons that I hate holidays. Almost all holidays, there are multiple others reasons, but a lack of sentimentality is perhaps one of the main reasons for my dislike of holidays.  Therefore, as I was pottering about the shit hole in which I currently reside and found a book that I had actually written something to someone else (when presenting it as a gift), I was a bit surprised that my little 'dedication' was something akin to sentimental.

It is a very, very good book, and I encourage everyone I know to read it, but that is not really the point of this post. I gave the book as a gift, and like the true bastard that I am, I asked for (and received) it back when things went pear shaped (as they often do).  I didn't think much about my little blurb at the beginning of the book until today when I found the book on a shelf that I was attempting to clean (on occasion I do try to clean, a clean shit hole is just a bit nicer of a shit hole).  A quick trip to the kitchen, book in hand, and a quick, judicious use of the scissors, and the 'dedication' was excised, and promptly placed into the rubbish bin. Just like that, no muss, no fuss, no messy stuff. The passage that I wrote with such care, and actual feelings was consigned to the trash bin of history. If only everything was that easy.  Sadly, after I replaced the book on the, now clean shelf, I begin to ponder/wish that it had been that easy to excise the cause of the dedication from my life as well.

It was not that I want(ed) to take a sharp instrument to the person in question, though I suspect they would not have minded carving me up like a xmas turkey on more than on occasion, it is that I wish that I had the moral fortitude to just simply put them behind me as easily as I cut out that dedication of so long ago. I am quite certain that the other person has take her own pair of metaphorical scissors to the chapter that concerns me in the book of her life, and has gleefully sliced out those offending pages. And that is the way I look at it, I was a chapter in the life of another person, for only a certain length of time, or if you prefer, a certain number of pages. A chapter that had a fairly promising beginning, a certain time of pure bliss, and then a middle period of something approaching normalcy, then a few paragraphs that heralded a downturn, and finally a few fair pages of absolute despair, then finis.

The end of the chapter written mostly by, in this case, by the other person. That chapter that is now considered to be radioactive. Something that must be contained in a lead lined container, marked as hazardous material, and stored deep inside some sort of emotion free cellar inside of us. That place that is going to be radioactive for a while, and should be avoided for a while until that memory stops to burn so brightly or so painfully.  It will you know (or at least you sincerely hope), stop being quite so radioactive. It will take time, and it will suck for a while, but eventually you will have to take those lead lined containers, and drop them off a cliff into the sea of forgetfulness that washes away our conscious memories and thoughts. That sea that will, hopefully, eventually erode away the entire island of bad memory upon which you have found yourself stranded.

That chapter that when written will probably read better than it lived, will have to end. And things generally end badly, or else they wouldn't end.  All those chapters with all those bad endings that comprise the book of your life. But not the entire book, there are sections of that book that deal with lots of other things besides badly ending relationships. Other sections that need attending to, that you have neglected for far too long. Sections that you, and you alone, can write. And it must needs be done, this writing of the other, in some ways more important, sections in the book of you. It is something that though you don't quite yet realize it, might help you start a new age of something approaching normal, everyday life. The sun will still rise tomorrow, and when you wake up you might find that new age to be something much more important than just the start of a new year.