Dolo

Dear Lorenzo,

It's 11:18 p.m., Saturday night, and I'm up, watching Smelly Belly TV with your big-headed, needs-to-hurry-up-and-take-her-ass-to-sleep daughter. On nights like this I wish I'd never allowed you to extend her weekend bedtime to "whenever the hell she conks out in front of the TV" but since I am unwilling to take from her any tradition that the two of you once shared, alas...here we are.

Today was another good day.

I woke up at 6:00 a.m., put a load of laundry in, detangled my dense forest of hair, and then made pancakes and beans and rice for Amira to eat during the long hours in which I'd be at the hairdresser. After I finished cooking I worked out on the elliptical, showered, dressed, and headed to the salon with Amira in tow, as she'd decided at the last minute to tag along. Once there I had my hair cut, colored and flat-ironed. (It's reddish brown now and if you were here you'd absolutely hate it but you know how self-conscious I am about the grays, and I desperately wanted a change, and seriously babe, it's my hair, so you can just suck it!)

So today was a good day, but as usual, nighttime is hard. During the day motherhood keeps me busy enough to not have to deal with the fact that you're gone but at night...

That's when reality sets in.

I have friends who have also lost their partners unexpectedly and some of them are dating again but...I'm not there yet. I have no desire to find somebody new. I have no desire for anyone who isn't you. Is that strange? You've been gone for almost 3 years now but...I'm still not ready.

And if I'm to be totally honest here, missing you is not the only reason that I'm not "putting myself out there" and starting to date again. If being with you for so long has taught me anything it's that being in a relationship is hard fucking work and...my life is difficult enough right now. I already have one human being (besides myself) that I am 100% responsible for and frankly, I don't want another. And so for now, I'll continue to go through life on my own. Maybe one day I'll be ready to get back out there but...that day is not today.