Time Waits for Norman

Random title, I know, guess the reference. Challenge of the week.

This week is kind of a big deal for me, although I've been keeping it a bit quiet, unusually. Perhaps because it shouldn't be, or because it really isn't in everyone else's life. But it's been a year since the structures of my adult life were removed and I was sent crashing to the ground. I've been thinking through, day by day, what was happening this time last year. Today was the first day of the break. I remember the mundanities - separating the CDs and DVDs, ringing the wedding dress shop to cancel my fitting, ringing my parents, packing a suitcase - but it gets harder and harder to remember exactly how I felt. I remember crying endlessly, being so shocked and upset at one stage that I hyperventilated, sleeping for about 15 hours a day as emotional exhaustion hit me, but not how it felt to be there at that exact time. Although that must be a form of preservation, if I were able to recreate that feeling any time then I would never really grow away from it, however useful misery on tap would be for an actor.

It's been a strange year, all told. I have rediscovered myself, however stupid that may sound. MuleBoy and I had a conversation not too long before we broke up about how we'd changed each other. He was proud that he felt I'd changed a lot, becoming more cynical and negative where he had remained the same. That conversation made me really sad. For a start that he didn't feel I had had any effect on him at all after six years and also that he was so proud of what was a pretty depressing achievement on his part. I guess this year has been about me throwing off the shackles of MuleBoy's negativity and getting back to positive, optimistic Kitten. Obviously I am not the same as I was, for a start I'm 28 not 21 and I understand that things like growing older can impact on one's world view, but I feel more like myself now than I have for a really long time.

And today is a good day. I am meeting up with my soon-to-be-housemate, Big Blue, for an excited chat and giggle about our new place and after that I'll be seeing my new boyfriend, who shall be known henceforth as ToyBoy. Although I will remember 17th July as the day that something ended, it feels also like the day when something else began.