It happened today at Hobby Lobby.
Everything was innocent. So regular Tuesday morning, so easy, so not "Oh my gosh I'm getting a divorce and everything about my life is going to be different and I don't even know where I am anymore."
I went with my friend Sarah because I needed her minivan to buy a tv stand for $139.99. At first I thought the price tag said $1399.99 and I thought "dang, I can't afford that but I love that tv stand." And then I realized it was $139. And I talked to Sarah and said "I need your van for Hobby Lobby right away before someone else buys this. " And she said ok.
It was Sarah and me and three of our combined five children. Heavens bless school.
We yanked the price tag on the tv stand. I picked out two standard drawer knobs. None of this bright turquoise or moon shaped door knobs that Hobby Lobby has going on these days. We strolled down the party section where Sarah was looking for tickets so that she could open up her very own "Mommy Store" for her children. Oh, parenting. The kids touched everything in sight. There was lots of "No, you can't have that, put that back before it breaks, DON'T OPEN THAT PACKAGE."
We rounded the corner from the party aisle and all of a sudden there we were, smack in the middle of the world's largest Christmas selection.
The memories came rushing back, like a flood- urgent, steady, swift. The day after Thanksgiving, him and me and our two babies at Hobby Lobby picking out all things Christmas. We need new decorations! Fresh decorations for a fresh start! What kind of ornaments on our tree this year? I'm kind of tired of the gold. Ok. Let's add some color. Do we want decorative Christmas pillows? Oh that would be so fun. I kind of want to put new lights on the front of our house. Oh my gosh we have to get one of these silver Christmas trees with the snow. Let's do all new stockings this year. Red for the girls and green for the boys so they all match. Should we buy extra just in case we have another baby? You devil you. Maybe three extra stockings? Oh stoppppppp.....
A marriage rocky, hard, and troubled-seemingly finding its smooth sailing. At last. We can do this, I thought. We're out of the rough patch. Gosh we're so tough, and we've been through so much, but our marriage is stronger than ever and we got this. It felt so good to be coming out of that storm and to feel safe, secure, invincible. Hope bursting out the doors of that Hobby Lobby Christmas section.
We loaded up the babies and the Christmas decorations and picked up a pizza and went home to eat the pizza and put the babies to bed and decorate the home to be Christmas.
But the storms came back, the rocky got rockier, the invincible, suddenly, so heartbreakingly vincible. A clear realization that we would never need those extra stockings.
And I'm left in this Hobby Lobby, looking down a row of tacky Christmas ornaments wondering when these memories will stop assaulting me. When the hope that we are strong enough to make this marriage work will finally give up and die already. In my head the hope is dead. Put to rest and sleeping peacefully six feet under. But in my heart that hope is more tenacious. Still yearns for life. Frantically tries to jump out of my chest and begs for another chance.
Leaving my marriage is essentially the painful job of forcefully saying goodbye to that hope. Of knowing that giving the hope life again and again and again will not ulimately give me the life I want or deserve. I tried. For seven years. Oh how I tried.
Letting hope die.
Who would know that's the hardest part?
Everything was innocent. So regular Tuesday morning, so easy, so not "Oh my gosh I'm getting a divorce and everything about my life is going to be different and I don't even know where I am anymore."
I went with my friend Sarah because I needed her minivan to buy a tv stand for $139.99. At first I thought the price tag said $1399.99 and I thought "dang, I can't afford that but I love that tv stand." And then I realized it was $139. And I talked to Sarah and said "I need your van for Hobby Lobby right away before someone else buys this. " And she said ok.
It was Sarah and me and three of our combined five children. Heavens bless school.
We yanked the price tag on the tv stand. I picked out two standard drawer knobs. None of this bright turquoise or moon shaped door knobs that Hobby Lobby has going on these days. We strolled down the party section where Sarah was looking for tickets so that she could open up her very own "Mommy Store" for her children. Oh, parenting. The kids touched everything in sight. There was lots of "No, you can't have that, put that back before it breaks, DON'T OPEN THAT PACKAGE."
We rounded the corner from the party aisle and all of a sudden there we were, smack in the middle of the world's largest Christmas selection.
The memories came rushing back, like a flood- urgent, steady, swift. The day after Thanksgiving, him and me and our two babies at Hobby Lobby picking out all things Christmas. We need new decorations! Fresh decorations for a fresh start! What kind of ornaments on our tree this year? I'm kind of tired of the gold. Ok. Let's add some color. Do we want decorative Christmas pillows? Oh that would be so fun. I kind of want to put new lights on the front of our house. Oh my gosh we have to get one of these silver Christmas trees with the snow. Let's do all new stockings this year. Red for the girls and green for the boys so they all match. Should we buy extra just in case we have another baby? You devil you. Maybe three extra stockings? Oh stoppppppp.....
A marriage rocky, hard, and troubled-seemingly finding its smooth sailing. At last. We can do this, I thought. We're out of the rough patch. Gosh we're so tough, and we've been through so much, but our marriage is stronger than ever and we got this. It felt so good to be coming out of that storm and to feel safe, secure, invincible. Hope bursting out the doors of that Hobby Lobby Christmas section.
We loaded up the babies and the Christmas decorations and picked up a pizza and went home to eat the pizza and put the babies to bed and decorate the home to be Christmas.
But the storms came back, the rocky got rockier, the invincible, suddenly, so heartbreakingly vincible. A clear realization that we would never need those extra stockings.
And I'm left in this Hobby Lobby, looking down a row of tacky Christmas ornaments wondering when these memories will stop assaulting me. When the hope that we are strong enough to make this marriage work will finally give up and die already. In my head the hope is dead. Put to rest and sleeping peacefully six feet under. But in my heart that hope is more tenacious. Still yearns for life. Frantically tries to jump out of my chest and begs for another chance.
Leaving my marriage is essentially the painful job of forcefully saying goodbye to that hope. Of knowing that giving the hope life again and again and again will not ulimately give me the life I want or deserve. I tried. For seven years. Oh how I tried.
Letting hope die.
Who would know that's the hardest part?
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