my abusive ex-relationship

I have a relationship that I’ve ended that I can’t seem to completely get out of.

It’s with music.

It was a long term and very serious relationship, but we had a lot of problems. In the end, I broke up with her. It’s the only way a relationship like that would ever end; she’s the kind of girl who only occasionally rewards you by gracing you with any interest but when she does you become hopelessly addicted to it. She’d never end the relationship herself, she’s always willing to have you there, provided you understand your place.

Still, I knew all this going in, or at least early enough down the line that I made a conscious decision that it was worth it. So, while it would be easy to blame the end on her I know the problems we had were mine. I brought them with me into the relationship. It’s just that the relationship encouraged those problems until, like an episode of Outer Limits or a Ditko monster comic they became so monstrous that nothing could stand before them.

I may be mixing too many metaphors, here.

So, sitting here these days I know, most of the time, that I did the right thing. But still she comes around. Actually, that’s not really true, it’s the topic of her existence that comes up: Constant reminders of our former relationship; friends who only knew us as a couple and who, when they find out we’ve split, can’t imagine us apart and subtly and not-so-subtly try to convince me of the “rightness” of our relationshipand how they KNOW we’ll end up together in the end. I find myself second-guessing the choice. It’s even worse when I see her with someone else. So I start to think about it again, I start to imagine the ways in which it could work this time. Honestly, I was really good at it, and we deserved more. It’s such a cliché.

But what’s funny is that once I strike up even the smallest conversation with her I am reminded of everything bad about our past together and the prospect of the effort involved in rekindling anything of our former romance seems so huge and so tiring. So I go from being convinced that “this time I can really make it work” to “boy, did I ever get out of THAT relationship in time” in the space of just a couple of hours. But then a part of me wonders if I won’t go back just because I don’t want the hard work that IS a relationship with her. A part of me wonders if I won’t go back just because I know there are those who I’ve given lengthy reasons to hate me who believe I don’t DESERVE the relationship I had with her. A part of me wonders if I only want to go back because being with her made me seem cool.

The worst part is really how it affects my other relationships. I know there are potential relationships all around me. But I can’t commit to them because I don’t want to have to go through those awkward early days of the relationship, or I don’t want to commit and then have it fail, or find that she isn’t what I thought she was.

And so my life lingers on hold and I can’t/won’t/refuse to move, all over this ex-relationship that I can’t put a final bullet into.