A few weeks ago I received a text from a phone number that was like a ghost whispering in my ear, “Remember me? Thought you’d quite forgotten?”

The strangest thing about this particular text is that I managed to recognize the long-deleted number from the guy who stopped calling me and blew me off when I was sick with whooping cough one January THREE YEARS AGO.

Happiness that you deserve, he says. How nice. How quaint. How flimsy and pointlessly offered. Why this? Why now?

Please don’t misinterpret my annoyance and disgust for conceit. The thing is, it’d be one thing if it was a fluke, but it’s not. His unnecessary text is not unique.

At 31 years old, I find that one of the most insulting things about dating has been the “after-the-fact” one-two punch of many an ex-boyfriend/ dalliance. Months later. Years later. After no contact whatsoever. No friendship. No nothing.

Why is it that my worth, my “value,” to these men is only evident once I’m in their rearview mirror? Why can’t they see what they have when I’m sitting in the car beside them? Ex after ex after ex after ex…they find their way back and want….what? What do they want?

The truth is, I have nothing more to give them. They’ve gotten the best of me already, had their chance, and I warned them. Be sure you’re done before you say it. This is the last of me you will have.

There is no more going back. And yet. There are texts, emails, Linked In invites, Facebook requests, and tweets cluttering personal and work inboxes left and right. Clawing at my eyes, my consciousness. More requests. More demands. They cling to my legs as I wade through the present. How do I go forward when I’m dragging around so many yesterdays? Where can I go, where can I look, that they have not yet papered with their inquires?

I have nothing for these men who used to know me. There is no piece of me that remains that they would be content to have. My heart is tired. My will to converse with them silenced. My unkissed lips have gone cold. My insatiate desire waned. I am no longer the woman they knew. “DIDN’T YOU TAKE ENOUGH OF ME LAST TIME!” I want to scream.

It occurs to me that I have not burned enough bridges. I have not been a bad enough girl to release these former somethings from their attempts at rekindled knowing. Rather than lash out or maim with words or deed, I retreat within myself and do not respond.

Happiness that you deserve, he says. Happiness. You. Deserve. I deserve.

What happiness might that be? Surely none that any ex-whatever can give me.

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If 2011 shaped up to be the year that I expanded my offline blog presence and met so many of the bloggers I’ve long admired from afar- joining the raucousness of Bloggers in Sin City, winning a spot at the 20SB Summit, and hosting a tweet up/ blog meet up in Chicago, as well as going so far as making actual business cards for Nic Narrates- where will 2012 take me? Back to BiSC? Back to planning more offline get togethers? Or off in new directions altogether?

And what of my love life? Last year will always be framed in my mind as the year I tried to live with a boy and failed miserably- both at living with him and hanging onto him. I take the blame. I am not without fault. And I accept that I could not fix it. I understand certain things that I never did before; how sometimes there isn’t that one thing that ruins everything, how you stop being able to talk to one another, how it becomes irreconcilable. As for what I do with that knowledge in 2012….well. You wouldn’t actually expect me to have that all worked out three days into the New Year, would you?

What I do know is this: from that failure I was given a unique opportunity. I was able to live with two of my closest friends and spend more time with them than I’d ever otherwise be able to. It was the kindest gift to not only have the offer of a place to stay for weeks at a time for both me and my dog, but to actually have been provided with it. Their friendships will forever stand apart for such graciousness.

Now that I find myself living on my own again in a new year, I’m forced to admit that 2011 shaped up to be wholly unexpected…it brought new friends, new experiences, an end to my relationship of over two years, and a new home. But in retrospect, I spent the greater part of last year feeling sad and uncertain in private.

I hope that 2012 will be a different kind of year for me. Personally, I’m not one for resolutions, but I will say that I hope to be more present in my life, to make more plans with friends both new and old, and to travel widely again. No matter what else this year may bring.

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But…

As I wile away the hours at work or on the couch with one Miss Wendy Lou Who, I know that this solitude is temporary. I’m getting out there and making more plans with friends again. I’m settling into my new place and figuring out what kind of kitchen table I want and where to hang things on the walls. I’m trying. I haven’t given up.

And as for boys? Well, I may be more cynical than is right or good for someone with my deep-rooted romantic longings, but I still believe in love. I may criticize, poke fun, question, doubt, and heckle; but underpinning all of that is the desire to be with my own special someone. To flirt. To catch his interest and hold it. To be kissed. To be touched. To tumble into bed. To feel love. To be loved.

And I will. This Christmas, I may be single again, but who knows where next Christmas will find me?

I’ll allow that such a sentiment may seem “hopeful,” but in fact it’s more simple than that. This single girl’s heart recognizes the inevitability that someone who wants to love and be loved someday will find it. Again.

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But the months passed and there it sat, nearly forgotten. And, life went on and nothing much, nothing good anyway, happened. The bottle became a fixture of the crisper drawer in the refrigerator, tucked amidst various cheeses and a half-empty limoncello. Spring became summer and summer passed to fall.

But last weekend, last Sunday night to be exact, I went from room to room of the apartment that was never mine and in which I never belonged, until I finally came upon that perfectly chilled bottle. I remembered buying it on a whim, spending more than I’d intended or could afford really, while tasting at Domaine Carneros in Napa the previous year. They called it Le Rêve because it was like, as good as, a dream. And, it was. But, the dream I was holding out for, the hope that I might drink it to mark an engagement, never came to fruition. Not even close.

Standing there in the solitude of his kitchen, in the chill of the open refrigerator door, I reached in and pulled the bottle free. The truth is, I didn’t know what I was saving it for anymore, didn’t know with whom I was saving it to share.

So, I opened it. Unceremoniously. Alone. And I drank it. All of it.

Sitting on the floor with my glass, I packed what belongings of mine remained. I let myself wallow just a little as I toasted what was and not what could have been.

And in the morning, I moved out. With a headache of course because “the dream,” well, I killed it.

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While it is not happening to me, I care about the people involved and feel a gut-wrenching anguish and odd weakness in my limbs each time I think about it. I am reeling. Shell-shocked even.

Jaded as I am about proclamations of “forever” and “true love,” this sort of occurrence does little to dissuade me from my cynicism. In fact, it has me questioning why people get married at all. Where does it really get you? What does it give you that an otherwise committed relationship does not? And, do people actually still believe it will last when they’re exchanging vows? How?

The thing is, sometimes what you think you want isn’t really accurate at all- whether that’s marriage in their case or living together in mine. You think you want something so much and you strive with all your might to get there, but then when you do, it turns out it’s horrible. Suddenly, you hate it and the person you’re living with or married to. You’ve lost your way, you don’t want those things anymore, and maybe you’ve somehow lost a bit of yourself too.

I find mistakes, or perhaps I should say evolutions, of this nature anxiety-inducing. I literally feel sick inside knowing what I know right now, having watched as things unraveled in my relationship and theirs, seemingly helpless on both accounts to do anything to alter the outcome.

And it’s not just my relationship or their marriage. It feels like everything falls apart eventually, that no feeling of being in love lasts. For those who believe love does last, aren’t you simply neglecting to see that it will change/ already has changed into something else entirely? If not dislike or hate; perhaps companionship, complacency, or even apathy instead? I mentioned I was jaded, didn’t I?

Reflecting on these recent events of the heart, I can’t resolve if- given the odds- it’s better to simply ”opt out” or to just “try your best.” In the meantime, I seem to be unconsciously giving less and less of myself in each relationship I enter into…a cause or effect of  ”Post-Romantic Stress Syndrome?”

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There are perhaps no “right” words to write about what the last three months have brought to both of our lives. With or without meaning to, my boyfriend and I both placed expectations upon what living together would be- me, naïvely but in good faith, and he, apparently feeling coerced and knowing all too well what for-the-worse-changes lay in store. Now both of us have reached the conclusion, have actually vocalized, that the decision to live together has irrevocably destroyed what happiness we had left together and has been a certain mistake.

In the beginning, in the early days of my unpacking, of our finding a routine within the newly shared living space, I had tears of disappointment and sadness. I grieved for the loss of what I hoped this next step in my relationship, in my life, would be like. The disillusionment that it didn’t turn out to be what it was “supposed to be” would come later, and not without a stopover to rage and anger. The sullen recognition that I have no home would develop by week six and carry forward. The slap in the face that would be his landlord’s sudden awareness of my presence would land after every fiber of my being already felt unwelcome, unwanted. Just when I didn’t think it could get any worse.

I began as the live-in girlfriend whose addition of belongings caused claustrophobia. I became a pariah within the apartment and the building itself without much understanding of how I had imposed upon or disrespected. I grew into the role of roommate, of boarder, and failed at holding up what end of the bargain I was given. I hit rock bottom as a proverbial squatter; an illegal alien in what is supposed to be “home.”

The embarrassing truth is that I am financially challenged to actively participate in the upkeep of the household- initially because of my own irresponsibility and now owing to my boyfriend’s determination that I build myself some “cushion” from which to provide a Plan B for myself or in case of emergency for us both. It would be completely and unfailingly generous on his part to allow me to live rent free, except for the sense of obligation it has assigned me and the inequality within which I now find myself caged. I would rather be poor and contributing than financially stable and an unwelcome drain upon this household.

I am, however, at liberty to free myself- that realization does not escape me. But the challenges that any couple faces in living together are difficult to separate from the challenges of our relationship itself. Is this the nail on the coffin? Did we somehow miss the dropping of the other shoe? Have “we” jumped the shark?

There is of course the loss of romance. The loss of shared interests. The complete and exasperatingly long term lack of affection. The mutual acceptance of our limited communication.  The inability to share in much laughter or fun with one another. The waning respect. The seeking of happiness in other places. And yet, there is still- still- a belief that things could be better, could be improved if not completely mended,  if only we knew how. If only.

These may not be the “right” words to articulate what these three months have been, but they are undeniably my words. Even as I claim them as my own and acknowledge that he invariably would also have his own, I desire to wash them away and hit “delete.” I find that rehashing the details and dwelling upon them is no longer productive. The decision, the mistake, was made. It’s what we do with each day forward that matters.

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Last week, though (like the bad little blogger I’ve been lately) I only just realized, marked five years for me as a blogger. Reflecting on that time, both upon blogging and the content on which I write, I’ve experienced quite a bit of Life over those years…

I fell in love. And out of love.

I went to London, Jamaica, the Dominican Republic- twice, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Napa, Seattle, Alaska, Las Vegas, and South Carolina. And New York- how could I forget New York?- again and again and again.

I met a boy. And another one. And then another one. Until there came the one who’s stuck by me- so far at least.

I got a dog and am convinced within myself I’ve met my soul mate.

I wrote letters to Jessica Simpson and openly adored Tina Fey.

I got fucking WHOOPING COUGH like it’s the Eighteenth century or some junk, birthed a kidney stone as though I’m some infirm old fucker, and managed to garner food poisoning while stranded in Vegas for 48 hours after a flight cancellation.

I observed and questioned motherhood first hand. I feared babies and their ability to, like bees, smell that fear.

I gave voice to my angst for pregnant smokers, Drunk Bus, Facebook, Icky Couples and other such Toolbags.

I threw a pity parade for myself as friends got engaged, married, had babies, and moved on.

I swore a lot and not always as a result of Who the Fuck is Sharon.

I fell into a depression. And I admitted the one thing I’ve always kept secret and for which I still feel ashamed.

I authored posts about which I am proud and not so proud, and still others I have, at times, felt disappointed went nearly without comment.

I celebrated birthdays and turned 30. Then realized, holy fuck, I’m now IN my thirties!

I bitched about work and covered my ass by requiring a password as my blog took on a more “real life” following.

I said good bye.

I wrote and I didn’t write. And other times I wanted to, but avoided what needed (still needs) writing.

I discovered Twitter and became completely addicted.

I left my home of six years and moved in with a man for the first time in my life.

I baked, took calligraphy, made Thanksgiving turkeys, and ugly Christmas sweaters.

I met other bloggers and became close with several others, and others still whom I have yet to meet in person but hope to one day soon. I greatly admired/ still admire several others from afar.

I Dressed for Dinner.

I found inner peace. Other times, not so much.

I drank. A. Lot. Of. Wine.

I allowed two people and 60 minutes to throw me into what wound up being a mid-life crisis that I still wrestle with some days.

I moved from Blogspot to WordPress and became “Nic Narrates,” then rebranded with my own site.

I contended with the Bathroom Troll. And other related topics.

I mourned for those bloggers who blogged off into the sunset…Charming But Single, Petite Anglais, Anonymous Coworker, Little Red Cape, Ashton Likes, and Surving Myself.

I wrote the things I cannot say to my dad, my mother, my brothers, and my grandfather.

Five years.

In five years, I grew to embrace blogging, found my voice, and began to identify myself as a writer foremost. I’ve been heartbroken, infatuated, furious, defeated, whimsical, sarcastic, jaded, humorous, naive, envious, and sentimental.

In five years, I’ve let you in, let you “know” me. Let you have a bit of myself and tried always to be honest with you despite the discomfort of knowing who else may be reading.

Thank you for indulging me (and my obnoxiously nostalgic links). More than anything, thank you for joining me along the way.

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