I am not your enemy.

Jim, I am not your enemy. 

I am not trying to make your life difficult. I have only ever wanted to make your life better. 

I do not want you to suffer. I have only ever wanted for you to be happy and whole. 

I do not wish for trouble to find you. I have only ever wanted good things for you. 

But right now it feels like we are on opposite sides of something. Please know that we are not. 

I don't know what we're supposed to do next. I'm stuck. I have no idea what you're really thinking or feeling and I spend way too much time trying to figure out the next chess move. 

You say you want to be done, but you don't take any steps to make that happen. So does that mean you really don't want to be done? You just can't bring yourself to do it? Or does it mean it's already a closed chapter to you and the formalities of the actual ending are just not of interest to you because you know I'll just eventually take care of it. Maybe you're trying to hurt me by dragging it out and not responding to me. Sometimes I think you want me to have a reason to "hate" you, so you act like an asshole, knowing I'll eventually get fed up, be a bitch, file for divorce and then you can tell the story about just how much of a bitch I was, justifying your leaving in the first place. 

I keep waiting for the feeling in my heart to change. I mean, why shouldn't it? You have been essentially living with her for more than 4 years. You have built an entirely new life. You sleep in her bed. You only exist in a world that includes only her and no one from the first 50 years of your life. 

And yet, there's this connection to you I cannot shake. 

I understand, or think I do, how scared, alone and afraid you were. It didn't start with the business, but that whole mess certainly didn't help. It started earlier than that ... and maybe your dad's death had a bigger impact on things than we both realized. I think you felt alone ... and when B's diagnosis came in, that only got worse. My attention was focused on that situation as the business started to fail. You didn't want to give me more to worry about and tried to keep all of the balls in the air, and the bad luck just continued to compound. By the time Didion blew up, you knew the business was not going to make it, but you didn't want to "fail" again, so you kept trying, throwing good money after bad. 

You knew I'd be pissed and react loudly. We'd already had that conversation before you started Symplified ... how we couldn't repeat what happened with the construction business. How I would not / could not go through that again. You needed me to be a safe place and you didn't think I was. 

I want you to know that I wanted to be. That I never doubted our ability to make it through anything. That every time you said, "We can get through anything together. I'll live in a tent with you as long as we're together." I believed you. There were times I didn't trust MYSELF to actually live in the tent, but I knew I could trust you to get me through it. 

Maybe we got too comfortable together. Maybe we took each other for granted. Maybe things just got to be routine and we stopped focusing on us. I think about the way we didn't buy each other Xmas gifts and wonder if those little things started to feel like we stopped taking care of each other. 

I know you were embarrassed and ashamed about the business failing. I know the mess that followed drove you deeper and deeper into those dark feelings. You never wanted to hurt me. Maybe you started to see yourself as this fuck-up that I wouldn't want to be with. Shouldn't want to be with. I think you started to make decisions about how I would feel without allowing me to actually weigh in. You didn't trust me or our relationship enough. 

And I reacted exactly as you thought I would. I yelled. I cried. I threatened to leave. Which drove you deeper and deeper into the turmoil. 

On some level, I think you left because you didn't see another way out. You didn't think we could be fixed ... when I found out what had actually happened, I'd never be OK or we'd never be able to be OK again. 

Plus, the more I yelled and cried, the worse you felt and the more we were just proving that things couldn't be fixed, driving you further into the belief that you had to go. 

And there she was. No complications. Great opportunity financially and otherwise. She needed someone to be her hero. You needed to be a hero. And then there are all those leftover feelings from oh so long ago. First loves are powerful. It makes me laugh a little ... because only you would find a way out of this mess with an almost-doctor who can provide you the financial and emotional cover to make leaving me work. You wanted to feel better and this new opportunity made you feel better.  

It bothers me so much that you told her from the get-go that we were done. Not going to lie. That hurts like a motherfucker. Makes me wonder how long you'd actually been falling out of love with me. For all I know, you were moving away from me for years. 

I just wish I'd known it. 

I may never understand how you kept up the two storylines for as long as you did. Or why. I want you to know that I honestly never thought we'd end up here. I believed with every fiber of my being that you would come home. I knew things weren't right. I knew the breadcrumbs you dropped ... missing saddles, missing taxidermy, ring/credit card/debit card/garage door opener left on the island, tools gone from the shed ... should have added up to something, but when I asked, you explained and I chose to believe you. 

I wanted to believe you. I needed to believe you. 

I just didn't think you could possibly lie THAT big. Would you lie about money? Yes. I knew that. But I never thought you'd lie about us. 

I didn't see another woman as a possibility at all. How many times had I asked you about it? When you started to feel so far away ... when you were lying in our bed ... you still swore you'd never cheat. 

And I believed you. 

You've said you didn't intend to. But you also didn't do anything to stop it. 

I try to imagine the turmoil inside of you. I can't decide if you looked forward to talking to me each day or if you found it to be sheer torture. We had so many heart-to-hearts during that time. So many times I thought we were baring our souls to each other. And, even though we weren't seeing each other all the time, I still felt close to you. 

But you were also growing that closeness with her at the same time. 

For all I know, you started falling out of love with me a long time ago. Maybe I was too much work. Maybe we just weren't meant to be. Maybe I missed all of the signs. And maybe you tried as best you could to stay, but it just wasn't enough for you. 

I'd actually love to know the real truth ... about what you were feeling and how it all happened from your perspective. But I realize I might never get that. You'll never be able to give me that. 

I'm not even sure you tell that truth to yourself. I think you have talked yourself into a version of the truth that justifies what happened ... but that's not the honest-to-God truth. 

What hurts now is that you've told me you don't love her. Yet you choose to be there. So either you're lying about that, or what you have with her ... love or not ... is still "better" than what you had here. 

That stings. A lot. And I just can't figure out how I didn't notice that you cared for me so little, for apparently so long.  

When you stopped persuing me physically, I honestly assumed you were having some issues. Like little blue pill issues. And I didn't want to push you or make you uncomfortable, so I didn't ask you about it. Plus, we were in the thick of the business stuff. I was guessing the combination made things tough. I used to hit the bathroom before going to bed and "prepare" a little bit extra ... hoping that night would be "the" night. And after a few nights of it not happening, I started to feel defeated. Undesired. Undesireable. But I was too embarrassed to say anything. And too proud, probably. I didn't want to look like some loser, begging you to love me. 

But here I am. I've been begging you to love me for the better part of a year ... really, most of the past five years. Knowing that you won't. That maybe you can't. 

Some days I think this whole thing is about me and you. You needed to get out of our marriage and that is all this is. Plain and simple. And then some days, I know it can't be just that. If it was just about me and you, it wouldn't involve Kati and everyone else in your life. 

Unless you are punishing yourself for making mistakes. Eliminating your entire past is a pretty hefty price to pay for some mistakes. 

In the end, I know I can't fix it. 

I still believe we could fix it, but you have told me you don't want that. And, at this point, why would you? You've got a pretty good situation going there and why create another problem that would also require effort to end. 

So here I am. Still stuck. You aren't allowing me to move forward. You aren't willing to let me go, but you have said you don't want me to stay. 

I can handle the truth, Jim. The truth would help us both get to the next step. The REAL truth. Not the story you think will make things easier for me or for you. 

I will never be your enemy.