Happily ever after?

Is it really better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all? Sometimes I wonder... My aching, painful heart would argue no - it would rather not feel at all some days. The deep and gaping emptiness, the waves of pain and sadness are sometimes so overwhelming.

I stupidly chose to watch a cheesy favourite movie tonight, Notting Hill. (I know, but I can't resist Mr. Grant's charming accent and self-deprecating humour.) I should have remembered that happy endings make me cry at the best of times. This is not the best of times - it is the worst of times! Happy endings and fairy-tale weddings only remind me of what I lost when Chris died. What we had for so very short a time.

Why couldn't we live happily ever after?! Hadn't we had enough #@&$*% crap to last a lifetime!! Was it too f****ing much to ask for even a few years of tranquil, domestic married bliss before ripping us apart forever (or until whatever interpretation of afterlife turns out to be reality)! Each January 1st for the past several years we had been saying "This year will be our turn-around year!" But each of the past few years were tinged with with tremendous losses and challenges: the death of both my parents and my uncle; Chris' increasingly uncertain health; etc.

We thought that getting married and buying our little dream house were the beginning of a new chapter of a long and satisfying epic not the closing chapter of a bittersweet novella. I feel like we'd taunted the fates, living our lives instead of cowering in fear of the next blow. I don't taunt them anymore, I just try to quietly get through one day at a time. Live life to its fullest each day, enjoy whatever little pleasures come along, because it may indeed be the last time.

It's very late and I'm feeling dark tonight. Empty and sad, angry and lonely. No more romantic comedies for awhile...
.