I JUST GOT ENGAGED!!! I wouldn't feel right if that wasn't my first statement on this blog upon returning from vacation. But I have something else on my mind...
Tyler Didn't Give Up On Me
When I was a child I always assumed I'd get married because that's just what people do and I am people. Then as I grew older, I grew weirder and became set in my ways. The boys I liked didn't like me back, so that was that. The end. Miss Auvil forever. I adopted an anti-marriage philosophy. Marriage was for people who can't stand to be by themselves. Marriage was for the desperate, the insecure, the sheep who couldn't make their own choices. And sharing all your stuff? Impossible!
What about love? Surely love exists without marriage. Why couldn't I have that? Because love was an even harder find than marriage. Christ, strangers can marry in Vegas for 50 bucks! History is full of marriages meant to unite land and fortune and create humans to inherit said land and fortune. Any two idiots can sign a piece of paper binding them legally. But LOVE...LOVE maybe didn't even exist.
Of course, I never really believed that. I just wanted to, because believing marriage was a big old dumb, outdated institution made it easier to accept living without it. So, while wearing this "No One's Wife, Love My Life" tiara, bad choices abounded. And I was okay with that because what did it matter? True love, any love, was never coming my way. I lived in this rut so long I had a claw foot tub installed.
Then I met Tyler, the most amazing man I have ever known.
But I didn't deserve him. Of course not. Not in the long run, at least. I knew that. So what did I do? Self-sabotage. Well, the damaged, poisoned side of me did all the dirty work. My other side, my true self, was trying to break out of my self-inflicted chains. Tyler knew something I was too ignorant to know: that we were meant to be together. He saw the Real Me locked in the attic like a deformed product of incest and he decided he was going to set me free even if it got messy.
It got messy. The pile of rancid shit I put Tyler through is greater than that of a Woodstock '99 Port-A-John. I regret it. If I had one wish, it would be to go back a year and meet Tyler as the person I am now so I wouldn't have put him through such pain. I could come to him as a whole, healed human being and our path to happily ever after wouldn't have had any significant bumps.
Did I always like or approve of Tyler's methods? No. Could he have done something better suited to my delicate sensibilities? Yes. Would it have had the same outcome? I believe yes. Would we have gotten here this quickly? Hell no.
If it weren't for Tyler I know I'd still be in my rut, soaking in my claw foot tub while the Real Me scratched the door of the attic until her bloody fingernails were embedded in the wood (Sorry, I've been reading a lot of Stephen King). Tyler saved me from myself. But more importantly, he didn't give up in the process. He fought the good fight. He won. We won. I let go of my bitterness and bad energy. I am letting myself have the happiness I deserve. And now this man who acted as psychologist, drill sergeant, and life coach wants to spend the rest of his life with me. I am awe-struck and ever, ever grateful.
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