Strange Jump

The last time I wrote here I was full of anticipation of moving to Laramie, Wyoming, to start my new life with Jeff and our dogs, Shelby and Dally. After living together for a month, Jeff proposed. Happily, I accepted. We set a date for July 3rd, reasoning that if we felt solid enough, why not make it official?

If things had gone to plan we would be in Estes Park tonight, readying for the most joyous day tomorrow at 4 o' clock.

Jeff broke up with me on June 22nd, on our way down to Estes to pick out the wedding locataion.

The day started badly, with our dogs being attacked by a loose boxer while Jeff took them on their morning run. On the way down, a person in an SUV started riding our bumper, flipping us the bird though we were going just above the speed limit. Jeff became more and more angry, so I tried to turn attention to the wedding, something positive to focus on. He started to fume, asking why we were having a wedding in Colorado at all, when I said I didn't like the front range because of the traffic. I replied because he wanted one, and therefore, we would have one.

He became eerily quiet for a moment, and then asked if I wanted one. "No," I replied, "not unless you want one. Weddings for me are not important--"

Before I could finish my thought that weddings are not important to me unless they are important to the people involved, and therefore ours was sacred, Jeff exploded with temper. He said that we were "not on the same page," his voice rising to a scream as he pounded at the steering wheel with his closed fist. I shrank in my seat, confused, frightened, and shaking with terror while the dogs cowered in the back seat.

"Okay, okay," I said, my voice a high, thin thread of panic. "I'll learn to like weddings for you Jeff, all weddings. If that's what you need I will learn to like them."

I knew I was babbling because I was trying to say anything that would placate him at that time. I was terrified of being hit. I was terrified of this new, sudden Jeff that shredded the man I knew. I was bewildered because our wedding not being important never even entered my mind, and I didn't get why he, a cultural iconoclast, thought weddings in general as being so important. In my mind I was clear, but in the moment I was in great fear.

He broke off our engagement then, and still has not spoken to me, beyond telling me I needed to get out of the trailer. I had one week, and he'd be back, and I better be gone. This was a repeat of last November, but this time I had nowhere to flee. I needed to be out in a week, or my things would be out on the lawn and Shelby and I would be homeless.

Thankfully, God sent Levy and Julia, my friends from Shoshone Lodge, whom I had come to think of as brother and sister the summer before, when I was a housekeeper there. Levy was the cook and Julia was a waitress. They have a good apartment in West Laramie, where Shelby and I can stay. I have a good little room overlooking a field of swaying grasses, and a view of the ribbon of sunset. There are dirt roads amd a large park to the west.

Looking back, I knew in some sense that this was coming. In the time after he proposed there were only two days where he looked happy and content. After that he would not return my smiles, just "Hm," if I looked at him with love.

In retrospect, I know he was looking for a way out, instead of telling me how he felt. It was common.

So, in less than a week my life as I knew it has changed. I saw the man whom I already thought of as "husband" leave me. I saw the future children in my mind's eye and heart disappear. I lost a family that I loved, a niece and a sister-in-law. I lost Dally. I lost almost everything save for my friends and my family.

Thank you all for your help and offers of help. Just knowing you were there helped keep my heart together.