Being single for the first time since I was in high school has been weird for me.
When I had been married for 5 years, I started seeing stories in the news about all the inappropriate things kids were doing on the school bus and learned what a “rainbow party” was. And it freaked me out. When I was in high school, there were still grungy riot grrrls who wore black eyeliner, knew who Mia Zapata was, didn’t take any shit or do anything they were told and guys still thought they were hot.
So when I found myself back in the world of dating, I think there was a huge learning curve. The first guy I spent more than one date with, let’s call him “Section V” because sadly, the last section of my thesis revolves around the fumblings of feeling something for him, this someone besides my ex-husband. Turns out, a year later, he is a manipulative, lying douche bag.
Oddly, I can talk about my dating life with my ex-husband (Yeah, yeah. It’s weird. We’re FREAKS. Whatever. Judge all you want…it’s just how it is) and he made the observation that perhaps my abilities to find a decent non-douche bag were not very good as I first stumbled out of nine-and-a-half years of marriage. And I think (I can hear the ex-husband patting himself on the back now…sigh) he is right. I just needed a guy who would say the right things and let me cook him dinner so I could feel domestic again. I was douche blind.
But on the upside, these events of crashing and burning with “Section V” and other men have made for great metaphorical weirdness in my poems. Men say some pretty crazy shit. Men also do some pretty crazy shit and women (I am talking particularly about me here) don’t do much better. But I am lucky because I find interactions between humans, especially those trying to care about each other (or giving the illusion they care) horrifyingly fascinating. Weaving together human contact is imbedded in the core of humanity and man, that isn’t easy. To give you a metaphor: you have to wander through the corn maze and sniff a lot of pumpkins before you learn to tell which one TRULY isn’t rotten. Apparently, I like finding a foul smelling gourd and then writing about it.
It is in these times, post-relationship and trying not to hurl eggs at his house, I can sit down and write a poem to focus. And the restraint in trying to use language to pinpoint my missteps, figuring out how exactly to juxtapose my perceptions against his actions in the relationship, and organizing it all brings about a reflective place inside me where poems can grow. Even if they are just about apple pies, hotel room doors closing or what his note said when it was over.
So, to those men who have mingled with me this past year: take heart…at least I wrote some poems about you.
