Are you there God? It’s me, Margaret.

Are you there God?  It’s me, Margaret.

My goodness, where to begin?  So much is going on and could be going on.  It is going to be one crazy summer I’ll tell you that much.

Let’s start with the good, wonderful, fantastic news. My leg is 95% better!  That’s right.  I’m almost back to 100%.  I was so very worried about this damn leg and my cruise but no more!  My awesome and pretty cute doctor gave me some water poof bandages that I only have to change every 3 days so NO ACE BANDAGES ON THE CRUISE!!!  I could not be more excited about this.  I’m going to have the BEST time and there is no one I’d rather be on a big ass ship that let’s face it, could quite possibly breakdown in the middle of the Caribbean, with.  That person is my best friend, my mother.  I’m dubbing the trip the Happy Mother’s Day/I’m not married to the cheating asshole cruise!  Mom is pretty damn excited too. We got a free upgrade to a balcony room.  That’ll be nice if the ship breaks down and we are stuck on Shit Ship 2.o.  Mom is bringing air freshener and a flash light just in case.  The next two weeks CANNOT go by fast enough.  I’m also pretty damn excited because Maggie May has lost a total of 25 pounds.  That’s right.  All of the steroid weight is GONE!  So me!

How the hell did I talk about the doctor’s visit and NOT mention what I saw on my way home from that? Bad Maggie.  BAD! OK.  (In my best Sophia Patrillo voice) Picture it.  Downtown Birmingham.  A cloudy Monday afternoon.  There I am, in my car talking to my dad on my cell.  I missed my turn.  Don’t ask me how.  I’ve been there so many times now that I could drive this in my sleep.  Well, obviously not since I missed my turn.  So I missed my turn and had to get back to University.  Anyone who has driven in downtown Birmingham knows that it’s a labyrinth of one way streets.  Maggie and one way streets do not mix well. I have a tendency to drive the wrong way, but that’s another story.  So I make it back to University and am stopped at a red light, still talking to my dad.  If you know me, you know I don’t cuss in front of my parents. (It’s the southerner in me).  The conversation went a little like this. “So the doctor was really happy about what my leg is looking like and he said holy shit a banana just drove by me.”  My dad, taken a bit back, asked if I smuggled any drugs out of the hospital.  Then I had to explain that a BANANA literally drove past me.  Too bad I was on the phone or I’d have taken a picture of it.  It was a large banana, about the size of a Ford Excursion, and had four people in it lined up in a single row.  HILARIOUS!  I doubt I’ll ever see it again.  It’s like Bigfoot, only it’s a banana and there are no molds of its footprints, because it doesn’t have feet. Cause it’s a banana…

What else.  Sad news here.  My very best friend, other than my mom, is leaving me and moving to Atlanta.  I’m insanely happy and excited for her but so damn sad I’m not going to see her every day. One of the things I am gonna miss the most is having here there to make fun of me.  Like when I told her about the banana car.  Or when I told her about the eagle that was in my back yard. An EAGLE yall. I swear it was an eagle.  It could have carried my Swarley away. And then there was today. When she told me my nail polish was opaque and I informed her it was not opaque as it was translucent.  Yes, I was wrong.  I found out I was wrong when I looked it up at lunch and saw definition #1, not translucent.  Yes, I’m a bit of a dumbass at times.  Who is gonna appreciate that on a day to day basis? Sad Maggie.

On a related note, I too have applied for a job in the ATL.  I had an interview two weeks ago that went very well in my opinion.  I’m really excited about the idea of moving to Atlanta.  Atlanta reminds me of home.  It’s like Memphis, but bigger, and more redneck.  I really need a change.  I’ve been in the ham for 9 years now.  I love my job and I love my friends here but there are too many bad bad bad bad memories here.  Too many bad and yes, good memories in my house.  Which brings me to the next thing.

Him.  Please don’t get me wrong on this.  There is no part of me what wants any part of him.  Believe that but dear sweet baby Jesus will I ever not think about him? It seems like every few months he pops into my head.  I’ve done so well.  Hell I don’t even have or know his phone number anymore. Which is a good thing!  Never thought that would happen.  But damn if he isn’t everywhere.  I think about him while I’m getting ready for work.  I think about him as I drive to work and desperately try to keep myself from looking for his car.  I’m fine at work until I hear a song that reminds me of him.   Hell that happened today.  I heard what was supposed to be our first dance song.  Then Sister Hazel came on, then Van Morrison.  UGH.  I hate that music was such a big part of our relationship since. Music has always been my escape and now I feel I have none.  Then there is the drive home.  You guessed it.  Looking for his car.  Most days I’m about to not think about him at all.  Those are the good days.  It’s the days like today that are the bad ones.  The days I have to put down my hair dryer, look in the mirror and remind myself I don’t love him anymore and that I could never trust him or be happy with him.  If it weren’t for the good memories I don’t think I’d have a problem.  The other day I was filling up the dog’s water bowl.  I spilled water all over myself because I forgot to put the filter cap back on it and when I turned it right side up, swoosh!  Water everywhere.  I was immediately reminded of the water fight I had with him and his son.  Little dude thought a water gun would bring me down.  LOL the spray hose of the kitchen sink proved him wrong.  That’s a good memory.   There’s the memory Sister Hazel always brings up.  Him almost falling over and then asking me to marry him.  I really wish I could forget that one.  There are the memories I have of him doing his stupid little dances all over the place. Him leaving cabinet doors open.  His hand on the small of my back in the grocery store.  Him being there for me when my grandmother died. Me missing him like crazy when he’d spend a week in DC and him coming home and the love I felt radiate off of him when he came home.  Then there is the memory of him begging me to take him back. Him telling me he was wrong and that I was the only one for him.  The only woman he would ever love and how if he didn’t marry me he would never get married.  Meeting him at the Mexican restaurant and seeing him with flowers.  Me not wanting to be there but going anyway.  Him telling me that I could take as long as I wanted or needed and that he was never going to give up until he had me back.  Him telling me that he was ready to ask my father again to marry me.  He echoed words I had said to him when we first met, “You’re never getting rid of me.”

It’s those words that haunt me and scare me.  I’m afraid that they are true, somewhat.  See, I don’t have him anymore.  Hell I don’t want him.  But I’m terrified that his memory will always haunt me.  That some part of me will always love him.  After all, when you love someone when your entire heart, with your entire being, and they break your heart and then beg you back and once again you give all of yourself to them and they smash you again, do you ever put your entire heart, your entire self back together?  That’s one HELL of a run on sentence.  I don’t think you do.  Dammit I really don’t think you do.  I’ve wondered very recently, and I think it’s because of all of the changes happened and that could happen, what would you do if he came back again? What would I say?  I’m sure kiss my ass and leave me alone would be some of the things.  But would I hesitate?  Would I consider?  What if he came back the same way, promising the world and all the jewels in the Nile?  What if I made him work for it a lot longer?  Would I take him back?  I’ll tell you one thing.  If that annulment hadn’t gone through the answer would be an immediate HELL NO.

Now don’t get me wrong.  I’m not all weepy and saw over him anymore.  But I sure do wonder why I still have these thoughts.  I’ve head heartbreak before.  I’ve had ex-boyfriends I’ve thought of over the years.  But I’ve managed to get over them pretty quickly.  I guess having a broken engagement takes more time. That a fiancé is more difficult to get over.  I just really hope that I get this job in Atlanta.  It’d help me out a lot to not have constant reminders of him and what should have been.

I’ll tell ya.  The one thing that keeps running through my mind more often than I would like is why the hell did he come back?  Why break our engagement only to come back and say you were wrong and that you wanted us? That’s really the toughest part.  I wish I could forget February of 2012 to August of 2012.  If I could have those months erased from my mind I’d be much more at peace with it all.  After all, I’m the one who left him in December 2011.  He just had to take that from me.  Couldn’t let me be the one to end it.  I’ve also wondered if the only reason I took him back was to be “the winner.”  To be the woman he chose.  HA!  I’ve since learned that I AM the winner.  I don’t have to spend the rest of my life wondering if the man I love is cheating on me.  There is peace in that.

The one thing I’m not proud of is all of the hateful things I’ve said and thought.  I’m not a hateful person.  I don’t like that the situation brought me to say things I’ve regretted, however true they may be.  The thing I’m proud of is that I’m me again.  I’m happy.  I’m go-lucky.  Tee hee.  I go out.  I do things again.  Ya know. Every once in a while he would ask me where the old Maggie was and that he missed the old Maggie.  The Maggie he fell in love with.  You know, the Maggie he cheated on.  That Maggie got mentally beaten down and was made to not love herself.  Jokes on him.  The old Maggie came back as soon as he left.  I had missed the old Maggie too, but I like this new Maggie better.  She’s older, wiser, a hell of a lot of fun, and hotter than the old Maggie.  Seriously, the jokes on him.

Well that was a nice trip down memory lane.  I think I’ll pour myself a bottle of wine.  Play some sappy music and cry my last tears for the man that would have made me Maggie Goodman.  I like Maggie Mulrooney a hell of a lot better. It’s gonna take one hell of a man to get me to change my last name.  I’m looking at you at Ryan Gosling.

 

P.S.  Keep on reading.  Its about to get a whole lot better. You know who you are.