Not the quiet reunion I was hoping for.

If you happened to be at a certain incredibly busy central Canadian airport yesterday afternoon you might have seen possibly the funniest and sweetest thing ever. Jacob, walking very quickly (a million miles an hour on his endless legs) and yelling my name across the concourse, which was packed with people. He was very loud, and only just a little drunk. Unable to drive in the state that he was in, and so he called me to meet him there. He only had enough wits to yell my name five times, so excited when he saw me, and trying to get my attention in the crowd, because he forgets that I mostly hear him now. He's never sure if I'm wearing my hearing aids or not. It wouldn't have mattered. He's tall and gorgeous and so loud, you can't miss him.

After tripping over a tour group of elderly Vancouverites and their collective baggage and a large gaggle of college boys who were blocking the stairs, he reached both arms out for me and suffocated me up into his coat to the point where I had to hit him on the back to remind him that I was better off breathing than a slightly-blue and completely dead plaything. He laughed and put me down and put his hands up to my face, planting a very sloppy, slippery, rum-soaked kiss mostly on my lips and slightly on my nose, too.

Then back to his arms I went. His hands into my coat, then tangled in my hair, and he surreptitiously checked to see if I had my hearing aids in. I clung to him like I used to when he'd return from being away for months. I dug in with both hands, clutching the back of his coat and balling up the fabric in my fists as if it might keep him grounded in my arms forever. He smelled vaguely of airplane fuel and even more rum. His beard felt soft on my cheek and I missed that. I missed everything about him so badly.

People stopped and watched. They do that when things like this happen. I would if I saw it. Because life is short and love is beautiful, and because Jacob made a complete spectacle of us.

    When spreads thy cloak of shimm'ring white,
    At winter's stern command,
    Thro' shortened day and star-lit night,
    We love thee, frozen land,
    We love thee, we love thee,
    We love thee, frozen land.

Hearts like paper.

Ruthie came home yesterday with a love letter crumpled haphazardly into the front pocket of her backpack, put there in secret when she briefly left the room to put on her snowboots. She pulled it out and unfolded it, a huge grin on her face. It was a piece of paper crudely shaped with safety scissors into a makeshift heart, a glorious display of the innocence of the grade-two set.

What does it say, Mommy?

It says 'to ruth i think you're pretty love james.'
She giggled and told me in hushed joyful whispers that today during morning recess they were going to get married on the ball field. I smiled and told her not to kiss anyone until she was old enough to drive. She smiled back at me, her satisfaction evident at having caught the eye of one of the more eligible elementary boys. He was tall (for a seven year old), dark and handsome and he routinely looks for Ruth's full attention on the monkey bars.

I realized how completely unequipped I am to handle this.

This heartbreaking thing they call 'growing up'. The inevitable highs and lows of watching your children repeat history in their own unique ways, with their own personal hopes and dreams ready to take flight, and quite possibly vastly different from what dreams you held at the same ages, and equidistant from the dreams you hold for them now.

How do I tell my daughter that love is so beautiful and difficult all at the same time? How am I going to celebrate her love when and where she finds it without wanting to save her from the certain heartbreaks? How do I teach her that it isn't okay for a man to hurt you ever, even if you could never prove it? How do I teach her that I didn't do things the right way and I'm incredibly lucky that I ended up with her stepfather? How do I make sure she is happy with the one she loves, secure and safe, treasured and respected? How do I not cringe when she brings home the rough ones, a dangerous glint in their eyes, rapture in hers? How will I ever stand back and let her make her own mistakes without ever letting her know that I could have prevented things she will go through?

How do I keep her small just a little while longer while I linger on the innocence with which she played yesterday, forgotten in her preparations for her recess nuptials today?

Ruth is only seven years old now. If these are my thoughts and feelings brought forth by an harmless note to my daughter from a classmate, how are we ever going to make it through the next ten to fifteen years?

All these thoughts rushed through my head like wildfire, and Ruth folded the note up and placed it back in the pocket of her pack and banished my fears in an instant with her next remark.

Don't worry, mommy. James is going to have to share his Oreos with me too or tomorrow Steven will play the groom.

The courage of hobbitses.

This morning I'm listening to Encomium (Hootie and the Blowfish doing a smashing cover of Hey Hey What Can I Do), I'm coveting a pair of green cowboy boots and a Samsung SGH-i760 smartphone, and I'm sporting a pair of very tired, burning bottle-greens, thanks for asking.

The boys came and took me out for a second breakfast, I call it a hobbit breakfast because they are the only people who eat breakfast twice, and I am stuffed so full I can barely walk. It was a very rare and much appreciated treat for me on my last day alone before Jake comes back tomorrow.

I also did something else very smart, too.

So fucking smart some of you will alternately slap me on the back so hard I fall on my knees or you'll just fall to your own knees to give thanks that I finally went and did something that needed to be done without just standing behind Jacob's shoulders while he did it for me.

Oh yes I did.

Well, almost anyways.

I called Caleb last evening (still with the ceiling-crawl issues when I hear his voice, and I called him. Talk about baggage) and told him he had to back down because I can't take it. That he can't visit, he can't call and that right now I'm not in any place from which I find it easy to interact with him.

He was reluctantly flattered, not surprisingly.

I wanted to murder him.

I can see where it gets difficult. He looks like Cole, he acts, sounds and even moves like Cole. He has the same sense of humor, same passionate attitude, same laid-back yet stressed out demeanor. And since I said I still loved Cole (I know, I waffle. Sometimes I still do), Caleb transferred those feelings unto himself. Uninvited. I said I couldn't distinguish between them as two separate people and yet there remains a strange and wonderful barrier of complete unreality that keeps me grounded and mercifully out of trouble.

I told him I had no plans to spend any more time with him and that he wasn't going to get a free pass to step into his little brother's shoes and complete the heartwrenching love triangle that has played out over the past ten years once again, oh no.

Caleb is fully aware that Jacob won the contest, for whatever it's worth. And in a way that speaks volumes to me about the possibility that the brothers might be less alike than we can see on the surface, he understands the frailty of my emotions and my refusal to take any kind of chance, no matter what need he might harbor to set things proper.

It's not going to happen. Ever.

We'll welcome his letters, if he wants to write to the kids, and he can call them, if he can pre-warn me by email or text I will answer without freaking out and then give the phone to them. But I can't see him. I can't be in a car with him. I can't be having awkward moments in hotel rooms with him (because, my God) or non-awkward moments in the middle of crowded airports with him, I can't look at him and wonder if he hurts the women he sleeps with when no one is there to witness his depravities. I can't honestly wonder if he likes to grab their wrists and hold them down because he isn't Cole and that is none of my business.

I can't go there. I'll self-destruct completely just thinking about it.

And you know something? Caleb already knew about my feelings. He understood the trouble we were in and he had already agreed to stop contacting me altogether.

Because Jacob called him first and told Caleb he wasn't about to sit by like Cole did and do nothing while I struggle through my feelings. Jacob was going to fix the parts that were wrong and so he asked Caleb to stop calling, and to not plan to come and spend time, for now. That it's too hard for Bridget, and too soon, and Jacob isn't going to allow for anyone making life difficult for his wife, himself included, so not to take it personally. Caleb told me what Jacob said, word for word and ending with the most wonderfullest (more new words) sentence.

Bridget will not be hurt again, ever. I won't allow it.
Oh, music to my everloving ears. The hearing aided ones. Yes.

They agreed to meet for lunch tomorrow on Jacob's way home through Toronto and bury whatever hatchet they shared, and Caleb was very much in awe of Jacob's firm and devoted approach to my emotional well-being. To protecting my precious heart.

Aren't we all?

Again Jacob put his shoulders between the world and I, so I can be safe and that's fine by me.

He and I talked on the phone late last night for three hours, which also speaks volumes about how serious and non-flighty this whole situation had become. Jake was quietly very concerned and incredibly patient with waiting to see if I would come to him about it, and not wanting to call attention to it if I was simply being my customary over-reaching emotional self. He was prepared to call Caleb over a month ago and ask him to refrain from contacting me but he was thrilled and audibly relieved that I did it myself, unheeded. He's looking for the safe passage for us through the latest stormy sea and was moved that I found it too, without looking to him first to fix it.

He also said he much prefers to be the bad guy and is happy to have me standing behind him while he fights whatever battles rage near enough to us to warrant our defensive.

Because we didn't get this far to stop now. One more night and I'll be back in his arms where I belong.

    Wanna tell you about the girl I love
    My she looks so fine
    She's the only one that I been dreaming of
    Maybe someday she will be all mine
    I wanna tell her that I love her so
    I thrill with her every touch
    I need to tell her she's the only one I really love

Keep breathing, dear Bridget, keep breathing. He's coming home soon.

Of mice and monkeys.

Well, shit.

Caleb called to schedule his next visit, he asked hesitantly how I was really doing with Jacob away on business and possibly doesn't believe me when I insist that I'm fine. I realize everyone is waiting for me to fall apart again. Maybe I sounded a little weird because whenever he calls he says my name when I say hello and for a few seconds I have to peel myself off the ceiling and remind myself it isn't Cole on the other end of the phone. They sound exactly alike. No wonder I don't sound so good when he calls. I can't hear myself talk because of the damn screaming inside my head.

And that isn't hard or anything. Nope.

You probably guessed who the monkey is. Caleb doesn't seem to believe in thinking of my happiness or comfort level first and that's a brick wall I keep throwing myself up against because I have to come first. He thinks he has to come first and so he's going to keep visiting and keep calling even if he knows it's hard for me because he feels better. Wow, we're stubborn collectively. Which also doesn't escape anyone's notice.

I used to think he and Cole were polar opposites but I am being enlightened every single time I interact with Caleb that they are almost exactly the same. Caleb is simply Cole from the future, had he lived.

Yes. Hello. I know. Please don't. Don't let Bridget go there.

No more, please.

I need time before I confront him again because it's like a window into my past and my future all at once and I'd like to board that window up for just a little longer. Seeing him took so much out of me. He, on the other hand, wants to feel better yesterday and so if he's here a lot or checks in all the time then he is satisfied that he's somehow going to erase my past for his own peace of mind or possibly exist to drive me insane. He says he's trying to atone and it's bullshit.

I've been throwing out a lot of mental well fuck you toos his way today. Oh, I lie. All month long.

Jacob stays far out of his way. He's spooked by Caleb, not having really spent any time with him and yet having spent so much with Cole. He's apprehensive and aware of their similarities and what it does to me and yet he can separate it. I can't and it makes both of us nervous and weird. No pretty words for these feelings, I'm sorry.

I keep telling myself that they are two different men. I can tell myself that they are not the same and that I'm with Jacob and life is going to be better.

But Bridget doesn't see it at all.

Textaoke. Is that even a word?

So much for the mighty mouse.

I was doing really good right through this morning, after a wonderful wake up call from Jake at 6 am. It was 8:30 his time and he was waiting for his meeting to start and he missed me so much he said he ached. I know exactly how he feels.

But what a way to put a smile on a girl's face. Which was terrific because the first thing I look for on Mondays now after waking up in his arms is a full coffeepot and fresh bagels from the bakery sometime around 10 am. I got my own coffee and opted to skip the bagels, having toast with the kids at 7 instead.

Right. So as I said, I was doing really well.

Just as we were starting to bundle up for the walk to school he started sending text messages, one every half hour or so. Here's what I've gotten so far.

8:30
i love you

9:00
i have loved you all along

9:30
i miss you

10:00
been far away for far too long

Looks like it's going to be an all-day 5000 kilometer karaoke fest, one line at a time, starting with our song, which I didn't figure out until the last message just now. This kills me. Which is really sweet and kind of funny. So yeah, I'm sort of doing good considering how much I loathe being alone, being without Jake right now, but at least I'm one night closer to him returning safely and he's sticking close where I can reach him when the ache gets really hard to withstand.

Yeah yeah, drama queen. I know.

Corduroy sheets.

I'm possibly the only fool who would use them exclusively. For some reason I can't fathom, I love corduroy. Love it.

And believe it or not I loved it before the coat, which is coming out of retirement with a fresh retrofit-new elbow patches and re-sewn pockets, since it will work well for class where it had stopped working so well for Sunday services.

And yes, I stuck my nose in it too. Just to smell it. Even though it had been put away washed, of course. I stick my nose in all kinds of things, so you know.

Even cake.

Tonight Jacob has to catch a flight home to the rock. He's speaking at a conference and will be gone for three nights-enough time to attend two days of meetings, speak at the dinner and check in with his fading great uncle. While I would love to loudly vocalize my fragility and keep him home because I don't want to be without him that long or because I'm afraid, this is a reality. He can't be beside me every moment and I have to grow the fuck up and live life in spite of the overwhelming want to run and dive into our bed and pull the quilt up over my head, refusing to move until he is safely home.

I'm staring down a very long week, I guess.

Hit the lights.

Last night involved take-out pizza, pink floyd and a winter hat with earflaps. It also involved a couple of lights-out shots, which, for the uninitiated, are shots made up of half vodka and half Jagermeister.

It was a very relaxing night, exactly what we needed. And no, the earflap hat wasn't anything sordid. It was a hat I finished knitting for Henry, and I put it on to model it for Jacob. He thought it was adorable on me and suggested I keep it so I wore it all night, but I gave it to Henry this morning. He always has cold ears so the flaps are a necessity.

So so happy to be done with the antibiotics, done with the antidepressants and pretty much not anti-anything right at this moment.

    Its a sin that somehow
    Light is changing to shadow
    And casting its shroud
    Over all we have known
    Unaware how the ranks have grown
    Driven on by a heart of stone
    We could find that were all alone
    In the dream of the proud

The view from the flannel wall.

If I close my eyes and press my nose into his shirt I smell patchouli and coffee and soap. And love, newly tactile somehow, if that's even possible. He bends his head down and his hair tickles my ear while I shiver as his warm breath touches my back. He sighs and closes his arms tight around me and I feel safe. Safe, loved and almost human again in a way I haven't felt in months. I'm not straying so far from his arms these days, truth be told.

And I feel like this without the checks and balances. without the drugs anymore, without having to rehash every last painful moment with doctors, with family, with friends. With myself.

    Theres a passion in being alone
    A grace in a loveless time
    There's no new cross, there's no new sign
    Only the sun and the changing tide
    And out of respect, well I really must confess
    I never lost your number
    I never lost your address
    And if we remain friends at best
    Sometime later no, no not yet
    We'll smile and remember it like this

Secret guilty pleasure. When I wrote that the other day something snapped awfully hard.

Today I don't feel like sharing anything and that's not cool to me, this is my place to sort through everything and lay it all out bare and unprotected under the bleakest lights, judgments be damned, and yet right now I feel protective and remorseful for sharing so damned much. My very first pang of modesty with my words. You would have thought the pornographic writing would have been the first regret but it's not. I hope I feel differently tomorrow.

I can't put this shit back in, you know. It's out there, cached in the living internet machine and anyone, everyone can see it and I don't like that right at this moment. My, our history, a good quarter of it spilled into cyberspace. In my haste to deal with everything in the best way I knew how I forgot you were all out there watching me collapse. A quarter of it because I'll never tell everything.

Guilty indeed. I know who reads. I stopped posting pictures. I turned off the comments, with help. There are few links save for reminding myself where I said or did something relevant to a new entry. It has become so simple to make it easy for people to keep my words. Because words are all I have to give, and within them I have given you everything. No pressure, come and read, then come back tomorrow, because you know there will be more. Bridget, one molecule at a time.

I rarely comment on other's journals anymore either, I feel awkward and stunted when I try to weigh in on their lives. I have no business commenting on your lives when my own is so fucked up sometimes and that didn't even hit me until this morning.

Was it a bad idea? No. I work through alot. I have a place to hang out. I have an identity I can grasp by reading back. I can see who I am without blinders and editing. I could read about that girl and recognize her instantly. It's me. For fucks sakes, it's me.

I'm simply struggling with how public this has become and so, via my usual beloved words I am exploring how I feel about it.

Because I do that.

So no worries.

Tomorrow I'll share, but with a brand-new monkey on my back. I just have to figure out how to type without waking him up. Because you would have thought for all Jacob's (half-assed) pleading to take down the journal it wasn't him who gave me this pause. It was someone else.

And none of us are happy about it.

Non-conformist noodles.

I crinkled up my eyes and smiled at him from across the table this afternoon. Jake was making chicken noodle soup while I was finishing a short story for a deadline that passed on Monday. Not a fortune to be lost but I waited too long to get my shit together this month and I am so behind already.

Organic chicken soup with whole wheat noodles, organic flax crackers and green tea.

Jacob, this is why I'm dying of colds this year. I have no preservatives in me.

You'll live until you're a hundred if you keep eating right, princess.

What if I don't want to live to be one hundred? I'll be deaf and dumb and probably blind and even more wrinkled than I am now.

You aren't wrinkled now.

Crow's feet. Look at them. I'm an apple doll.

Please, you've had those since I met you.

Right, which means I'm aging dreadfully.

Oh, be quiet and eat your soup.

Well...it is pretty good. Pass me one of those hippie crackers, please?

One hundred, princess. Mark my words.

***

(Save the Bridget, save the world).

I might have t-shirts made. Does anyone want one? Hell, I might wear one myself.

Random drive-by panic attacks are exhausting for husbands. He's not helpless, he talks me down. He talks to me soothingly until my breathing slows and my eyes lose their wild glow and my hands stop with the fucking fluttering. He's amazing. This is why he's going to make such a terrific chaplain, because in an emergency he's the one you want right beside you.

Even at four in the morning, like last night.

I really hope that was just a scraped-up effort culled together by my brain to check for progress. Because I would like to point out how really really good I'm doing. And I'm going to continue on that path, I just need a little more sleep first.

So, meet the sugarbaby.

The friendly giant is awake and drinking coffee, feeling none the worse for wear this morning. And yes, I busted myself by talking about sex. Technically I'm not supposed to be having any. So, shhhhh please don't tell Dr. P.  But really. I feel good and we're not indulging in x-rated Cirque du Soleil here so cut a girl a little slack. And cut me a lot of slack for the location choices of said sex I'm not having, because judging by my inbox you people are even less impressed than I am.

Did I mention slackers? Guess who phoned this morning?

Caleb.

Speaking of which, I remain, faithfully yours, the secret interweb guilty pleasure of repressed Canadian businessmen. You wouldn't believe it if I told you the numbers. If I had a webcam I bet I could make a fortune.

Let me just figure out how to hook up my new speakers and then I'll deal with the webcam in about fifteen years when the technological part of my brain recovers from this latest onslaught. Because! speakers! There's more than one plug and so I'm flummoxed. You should have seen me the other day-the stove element came apart and I considered ordering take out for a good hour before I realized it's supposed to do that.

I digress. I'm tired. Jacob kept me up half the night singing the blues. John Lee Hooker no less. Slightly tipsy ministers have no business singing the blues, you know.

Okay so...Caleb.

Caleb called to thank me for his visit, for the meals, and the company and for the belongings of Cole's that I set aside for him to have. He's having his real mid-life crisis or something. He's broken up with his latest girlfriend (loosely used, that term) and wants to plan to come out once a month or so and spend some time with the kids. To be present to somehow make up for Cole's memories. I assured him the kids have mostly good memories of their dad. He wants to know immediately if we need anything. Again, I assured him that we have everything we need.

And then I dropped the protests, because maybe spending time with his niece and nephew helps Caleb feel better about the time he didn't spend with his brother. I can't deny him that comfort if he needs it and so I relented. As we chatted for a few more minutes I distinctly noticed his sentences changing in form from talking about seeing the children to talking about seeing me. I corrected him twice and he hadn't noticed but I'm left slightly bothered by that. I'm bothered that after five years he's back in my life, just. like. that.

When I told Jacob about the call he winced when he laughed (hello, hangover) and then asked how many sugar daddies does that make now?

I frowned.

I've lost count.