Originally posted on June 6, 2006
[reposted because of this]

I had an MA, too. Literally. Same initials, same pathetic old story.

You all saw me in my darkest hour -- downing shots and shots of tequila to ease the pain, bawling on my bed in agony, heaving with a deep physical ache.

Oh, the stupidity of youth.

Yes, we have all laughed about it. The ridiculous pining, the insane wanting. Even Mark (who, by the way, happens to be an MA, too) teases me no end about my...er, lapse of judgment (to put it lightly). [For some reason, Mark finds it hilarious! Grrr.]

But looking back, in spite of the deep sense of shame that MA's memory evokes, I have to say that it was not all for naught.

Amid all the angst, amid all the anguish, I felt alive. For some weird reason, the self-mutilation enflamed me. It was the closest I got to an S&M moment -- an orgasmic rush simultaneous with an overwhelming pain.

No, nothing good ever came out of that experience (other than my cherry getting popped, but that would have come sooner or later...heheheh). MA did not inspire me to seek greater heights or scale the tallest mountains or some such wake-the-goddess-within-me thing. I did all that for myself. But my point is -- the agony was somehow comforting. I became fixated on the gnawing pain, the humiliating rejection, the hopeless stretch to an unreachable goal. It was like a potent drug that conquered me entirely.

And it wasn't even about MA. It was all about me. Me and my penchant for melodrama. Me and my addiction to misery. Me and my need to validate my existence by living in a makeshift world of tragedy.

Only when I realized that did I finally have the will to let go.

And it wasn't about letting go of MA, for he was just a whisper of a dream that my mind created. It wasn't about letting go of love either, for it had always been an illusion from the very beginning.

It was, quite simply, letting go of that story. It was simply a matter of writing the last sentence and closing the pages forever. That particular plot, I soon realized, was just a fragment of the anthology of my life. A prelude, if you will. It wasn't the entire book; it was merely an insignificant chapter.

Did I grow stronger because of it? Perhaps. But I refuse to dignify that experience by giving it undue credit. Much as I romanticized that story when I was living it, the years have given me a clearer perspective. And in retrospect, it was never a defining moment. It was simply one of the foibles of youth.

Jo, do you get my point?