As I drove to the coffeehouse, I thought again about my Ex's terse attack the night before and thanked God that I don't have to sleep with such anger and judgment.

[By the way I think in most cases the term "Ex" should just be "X" as in X-rated...only suited for those who view others as "meat" as either a means of financial gain or immediate, but distant gratification. But, that's just me. Personally I care about my "Ex"s. If they were ever in trouble I'd be right there. But, my guess is, they'd have to be in a helluva lot of trouble since they went to great lengths to make sure I would never be "right there".]

My mistake was to choose to drink to dull the pain…which of course only lasts for a short while. You wake up the next day in the same pain and you feel even worse. In the end you are just inviting more, and also helping them store up venom to spray you with.

When I finally started to deal with my own stuff, the self-loathing, shame, drinking and all the rest, my counselor said that I was "paying for other people's sins." A euphemism for sure, but interesting.

Personally, I have to take responsibility over my own body and actions regardless of others. Anyway, after Denise's blistering remarks the night before, I made the mistake of staying up too late and imbibing too much. It's stupid. Let them pay for their own sins and let Jesus pay for mine.

I often ask myself, "How did I end up right back here?"

I thought that as destroyed as I was back in the late 80s (and I was) that I had at least escaped living with an angry woman with a flair for persecution. So I married Denise who soon added violence to the equation and was even smarter and meaner.

Nobody ever gets away with anything.

Then I thought I had broke out of all of that last year with sweet Linda, until she turned on a dime, spat acid in my face, and watched me broil in the hot sun with her new boyfriend in the shade.

I preferred it when she jumped into the car and ate me.

*******

But back to my first failure.

Back then I could see clearly that my first spouse was doomed to repeat.

Now, years later, they rarely speak. It appears they are clawing to escape one another and yet are caught in a giant Chinese finger trap. Since both of them are "not at fault" in their previous divorces, they need the other to be the fall guy.

It just gets tighter and tighter and quieter and quieter.

It's a damned shame. They are both good and fine people, they just take themselves too seriously and grace not seriously enough.

*******

After I betrayed my first wife, I made the obvious next move of marrying an adulteress and then had the complete audacity to look surprised when she betrayed me and often loved other men.

Nobody gets away with anything.

But what about me? Was I not an adulterer also doomed to repeat?

Yes to the first part, but no to the second because I owned it. That is the first key to possible escape from Karmic retribution, or what Nietzsche called "eternal recurrence".

I was horrified by my ability to betray, a lot like the Daniel Stern character in City Slickers whom as they are all introducing themselves for the first time says something like, “I’m Phil Berquist and I committed adultery.”

So you have to fully own it and guard against a repeat by simply owning exactly where you fucked up and guarding against that very thing.

More tomorrow.
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Continued tomorrow: Own, Rinse, But Do Not Repeat

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© 2005 Azotuscafe.com

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