Sand Talk

When I want silence - to ponder things - he can't stop talking.

When I need conversation to discuss things that really matter - like if the theatre really is dead - he doesn't get the joke.    

Life alone is often more tolerable than a life with someone who can’t be quiet. I do value his ability to banter,  and yet it’s his very need to make conversation which drives me over the dune.

I don’t need conversation as much as I need to be understood.  With understanding I can be free to share what I’ve found in my silence. Without understanding, conversation is meaningless.

Idle chatter, void of all matter.

It takes me a while to get to that comfortable space;  I don't get there with many.

In silence I gain insight. 

In silence I find out who I am. 

"I might not say anything for a while.  Try not to read too much into that.  I know, that's hard, but try." 

I stand on the sand and wiggle my toes, but I do not sink in, like I was sinking with you, being pulled in like quicksand. Can you drown in sand?

Sand in my hair,

sand in my ears,

sand under my nails,

and in the sheets,

and on my feet. 

Sand, like memories, scratches me to the point of pain. 

Throw me a rope and pull me out, but each time you tried, I only fell deeper ...

I did not desert you. I just went to a place where the sand is level, where the waves crash into the shore, but don’t take me under each time.  I’ll learn something new here.

In thirty days I’ll learn to surf. 

In sixty days, I'll learn to sail.
In ninety days, I’ll learn to be me, again.

(I added 10 days just to be literary, just like Hemingway,

but I didn’t tell you - they didn’t make it.)

I’m addicted to the conversation, to the happiness.  Without you, it’s just noise that interrupts my solitude.

The thing is – I do not hate him. He’s kind and gentle and does so much for me – he loves me more than I love him – I just can’t take the noise.