falling apart
DECEMBER 2017
Soon, some space is breathed between the sharp corners of our heartbreak. We sit in the summer sun late one Thursday afternoon on the wonderful decking of a family that has been very dear to Matt over the years. It’s my first time meeting them properly & I already love them. Lee is a wonderful host & an even better woman & mum. She makes a board of smoked salmon & crackers & pours us a glass of champagne. Their home is something that I’ve only seen in movies before, a fairytale that they built from the ground up. We are surrounded by trees, & wide open space. I feel free out here. The cicadas sing the sound of summer, sunshine, friends in our ears & just for a moment I forget about the unraveling that has happened this last week. We speak of the engagement party that’s coming up in a couple of days. My heart skips a beat when I am asked to capture the special day. I say I will.
Capturing the ethereal & in between moments of our friends special day planted a seed inside of me. That day a fire started burning & hasn’t stopped. This, whispered something deeper, is what I was born to do. Tell the stories of the free-spirited, the real, the everyday. Too soon the night is over. We have rested in the space-between the sharp bits for long-enough.
x
By the next morning it’s as if the air around us is thicker, weighty with the song of unwelcome. It’s getting harder to breathe. I lay out my yoga mat in the midst of it all, my heart already undressing before I sit. I close my eyes gently as the tears come.
Soon Matt & I walk along the beach at dusk with our hearts in turmoil. All I want to do is run as far away as I can from this place & never come back. But still he speaks of our future here. Hurt & hurtful words are spoken & I feel the sand swelling into a big black hole in front of me. The sky dances in purples, pinks, yellows but I don’t remember it’s colourful steps. We’re at a crossroads & everything feels bigger than it is. We walk hand in hand together back to our Airbnb even though we don’t see eye to eye. We are sitting on the bed as the tears come & he wraps me up like the most delicate gift & reminds me why I chose him all over again. Love isn’t meant to be easy. But oh is it beautiful, expansive & worth it.
In the morning we decide it’s time to go home to Melbourne.
My heart hasn’t felt this burdened since my best friend & I had to go our seperate ways. I deeply wish it could have been different. We want so badly to start a life here, plant a garden here, have daily beach walks here, start our own family one day here.
We sit for a while with Matt’s dad over coffee under the ancient arching tree. There’s nothing left to say. We say goodbye. It’s sad. There are parts of me somewhere that do still have space for empathy, but it’s buried deep under the sharp, protective, angry parts. I try not to disown my angry, ugly parts as I used to, even though they are hard to deeply feel & accept. But there is a sense of release that comes with the deep acceptance of what has happened these last few days.
Ahead of us, all we see is road, & trees & road. I think of just a week earlier, how the road bared excitement, hope, promise. & now these same roads look very different. We are just an hour into driving when we decide to stop in at South West Rocks to see Matt’s other side of the family.
We find a spot at the top of the caravan park overlooking the coastline. I let my body rest completely there in the grass as Matt follows up with his Mum on her whereabouts. In the distance I see Coffs, where we just came from. It’s funny seeing it from so far away. The mountain ranges look like little molehills from here. Maybe that’s what this big emotional mountain will feel like soon, I hope. We sit & we look with still not a word to say. Matt holds my hand. Sadie cheers us up with the little sticks she finds & excitedly drops in our laps.
Everyone here is warm, inviting. They smoulder us with kisses & christmas love. They look & feel what Christmas is meant to feel like. The holiday park at South West Rocks sings of sweet togetherness, of forgiveness, of acceptance. They sit in circles with an abundance of food cooking on the barbecue. I can hear the sweet sound of waves crashing all afternoon. I try to engage, I feel myself laughing, I watch on as effortless banter is exchanged - banter that sings of summer holiday surrender. & after everyone packs up & goes on with seperate plans, all I want to do is cry.
Matts mum can sense we’re frozen, I just know it. She gently squeezes my hand over dinner one night. A couple of our family members camp out under stars the nights we are there so we can sleep on their bunks.
x
We spend our days there walking along the beautiful beaches, laying around sunshine’s sweet kisses & I get better at forgetting. Sometimes we talk about it. Sometimes we don’t. I think about India, how I am leaving soon for two months. Knives hit my stomach with nerves. I am meant to travel with another, but she cancels last minute. Underneath my fear, I know it’s meant to be - like most of life’s silver linings.
I think about my Mum & Dad. How I miss them so, especially during the holiday season. But I get to see them soon, I am visiting them for a few days before I fly to India.
I think often about the way of things, about falling in love with Matt. I wonder what life would have been without him, how different it would have been. I drift & wonder into thought-clouds about how he changed me, changed my entire path & turned my world upside down. I can’t help but feel it was written by the creator & conspired for with thunderstorms.
Our time in South West Rocks is over too soon. We leave with a little less weight on our hearts. It’s just us & our Sadie on the road again. We know, even with all our growing pains, that we will be back. & so the pieces fall.
