To be happy

As the end of the year draws close it is always a time to reflect back upon what has taken place throughout the past year, reflecting on those thoughts, hopes, dreams, expectations and goals set at the same time a year ago. I am inclined to think that this happens to me at this time of the year even more so than others because my birthday falls so close to Christmas and the new year so I tend to feel this as if it is a milestone in terms of my age as well as the calendar year. Given that I have always been someone who hates, loathes and detests my birthday on a number of levels and for reasons which have changed over the years, but have now become more about my resentment of the aging process - it is always a reflective and somewhat emotional time when I feel I am looking back at the losses and most importantly the goals I have not achieved. Once again Christmas this year represents time of immense sadness for me. I feel empty, lost, lonely and feeling like I am always looking at strangers and wishing I was them......far more than I normally do....the reasons for this become well defined during the festive season; what I could have had and have failed to make possible in my life.....what others have that I wish I had....not in a material way but certainly in an emotional way, the lack of love in my life, not just from a romantic partner but also from family and the lack of them in my life, including to a large extent children, not having them, knowing I will never have them and just not being in the company of anyone in my family who has them - the innocence and happiness of children at Christmas can make it a very special time and the lack of this at this time of year becomes more pronounced, at least this is the way it feels for me.I spend time thinking about the years where my Nan and Ted were alive and we had a Christmas celebration at their house, despite the family arguments and the stress and feeling as though I could snap at any time and kill or seriously maim certain members of my family from time to time, I reflect back and know how lucky I was to have those experiences. I also reflect on the sadness of my sister not being there to enjoy these family events, she would always only spend half a day with us and after she left my dad and I would often cry. For both of us it was as if there was all of a sudden a hole that couldn't be filled, even if we tried our best to fill it with large amounts of booze and trying to be glad that we had her for at least a few hours. We always got each other through those days by promising each other that we would make next year really great and that it would be far better than the year before, we were optimistic, or at least trying to be. Now we don't see her at all for Christmas and despite the fact that her absence has been apparent for 20 years on that day now, the pain of her not being there seems as fresh as it was on the first Christmas she had to leave when her mother rung the door bell.I had hoped that by this stage in my life I would have something else to fill the gap, perhaps a partner, some children of my own, or at least working towards this,or something that resembled a life that I was happy with, but not having anything close to this and knowing that its just "me and dad" from here on out makes me wish they would stop celebrating Christmas because each year that passes it becomes more painful, especially knowing that at one stage it will be just me. Not having my own home anymore after working so hard to get it also raises some sad issues for me at this time. My home was my castle, so important to me because we don't have a "family home" since my grandparents died. A place that was safe, always there, always familiar, the smells the windows broken by wayward cricket balls during serious backyard cricket matches in years gone by. When the ex and I had Christmas at our house a few years back, at the end of the day he said 'this was the best Christmas ever, I want to have it at our house every year' - nobody could ever have moved me out of my home or made me sell it but when he said that, my mind was made up, I had to sell it - I wanted that happy moment to last more than anything else, I wanted our house to be the new family base, the home people wanted to be at, the place I wanted to have my family in, to hold Christmases and birthdays and to fill with happiness, as I remember my grandparents home being. My dad being sad at Christmas is something that fills me with guilt and shame. I wish I could have delivered him a better and happier situation, especially around this time of year. He has never been someone who pressured or asked about grandchildren, he doesn't even do that now, but now that all of his friends are spending Christmas with their grown up children, in their homes with their grandchildren, and having him tell me what others are doing, with a look of sadness about him, I feel disappointed with myself that I have let him down, not just because of the lack of children but because he feels responsible for my unhappiness, my broken relationships and my inability to ever have any of this. I wish, after all the effort he put in to raising me on his own that I was able to reward him with some happy twilight years.People often ask or seem dismissive when I refer to the fact that I will not have another relationship or children, they say 'you are still young enough' bla bla bla - perhaps so, but at this age when you are single the decision to get into a relationship and have those things really needs to be an aggressive one, making a decision to find someone, to actively seek them out is not a matter of sitting back and waiting for them to knock on the door. When you have made a decision NOT to not have another romantic relationship in your life, and NOT to enter into a relationship it becomes even harder. But not accepting it, as discussed in previous entries is simply a path to misery as well, neither option is easy.My decision to turn my back on these things as I have discussed in previous entries is a complex one. But above all else by ability to trust another human being has been completely eradicated. I think once trust is broken to the extent that it was in my case it is not possible to rebuild it, either with that person or with anyone else. Betrayal of trust and hurt that is deliberately manufactured with the intent to break you by a person who claimed to and was meant love you - which was the case in my situation - is soul shattering and destroying on so many levels and not something that can be forgotten.Other than that, the concept of the options available for someone of my age, being such things as speed dating (which I have done before some years ago and found it to be more nauseating than cutting up smelly animal organs in science class in year 8 at high school) or the online options, the most common of which being RSVP (once again, have made a mild attempt over the years, but have found shopping for groceries online to be more engaging and exciting, not to mention the fact the Coles online has far more items that seem to be more interesting and less "used" items than these sites) in short are horrible and despite other peoples stories about how happy they have become since finding the "love of their life" or their friend or their friend of a friend has become so happy since meeting with their partner/husband/wife and they have a wonderful relationship and great children and a great life through finding someone using this method, the simple fact is that it is just not for me. I may be old fashioned, in fact I know I am, but to me the organic method of meeting someone in a "normal" social setting is the way it is meant to be, and for someone of my age, accepting that this is not going to happen and that I have squandered my opportunities, especially those I had with brilliant and loving men such as my ex-husband, and the fact that I have allowed myself to be financially ruied by the men (the last one particular) and as such have very little if anything to offer anyone who might be sane, sober and seeking - well, it would be fair to say that I would be very far down the list of options.....This year past, like so many before, I have had too much meaningless sex with far too many men, I think the main difference this year that I noticed in particular is that they are older, they may have more experience but they also have more "baggage", they are more complicated, they want a relationship and they want "all that stuff" but they, like me, have been hurt too badly too many times and they have "issues" they never sorted out from their childhood, or something else they have experienced that has made them incapable or communicating, incapable of relating and certainly incapable of having anything the resembles a relationship, certainly the type of relationship I would be interested in having if I was to ever consider it again. These encounters are often sexually satisfying but unlike they were in my 20's they now produce an aftermath of self loathing, a reminder of loneliness and do little more than make me feel worthless.At the beginning of this year (or now last year, 2011) I also lost my friend, my rock, my reliable and true mate. When he left us I thought I might just die as well, although this may sound slightly over-dramatic, I can honestly say that I have no idea what I would have done and how I would have possibly survived the year before. However, despite the sadness, the loss, the despair and the wondering each and every single day why I bothered getting out of bed, because I can quite honestly say that there was not one day of 2011 that I even slightly enjoyed. There was not one day that I smiled and meant it, or laughed and felt like it was not completely forced, despite all of this, I got through the year. David may have destroyed my life on every conceivable level, he was in my life, my love and I wanted nothing more than to dedicate myself to making him happy every single minute of my eistance - and in 2011 I wanted him back even though during times of clarity (when I realised that he doesn't deserve so much as a "hello" from me, let alone my dedication, honesty and undying love) I said, and felt that I didn't want him back, next year (2012) will be different, because I need to make sure things are different.I spoke to my dad on New Years Eve. We discussed our hopes and dreams for the new year, and I reminded him of our pledge to always 'make next year better than the last, that next year we WOULD be happy', I told him that this had been my new years resolution for every year since back in those days. I told him that this year my feelings were different. This year, I told him, I no longer hope for a better year, I no longer dream of happiness or happy endings. This year I just feel like getting by will be enough. I told him that I have given up on believing that happiness is attainable. I told him that being happy or event content is a dream I need to let go of and just work with acceptance of my circumstances and my life the way it is. My dad cried. I was not wanting him to hurt, but I explained to him that we need to stop telling ourselves that "this will be our year" and that things will get better, because the disappointment at the end of the year and the sadness this creates for both of us is too heartbreaking, we have been telling each other this for too many years for us to keep believing that it is going to happen. I hate that I hurt him, I hate that he knows I was speaking the truth and making him face this, our reality, but I told him I love him more than anything and that the result of my life is not his fault, even though he thinks it is, he was the best father, the best parent and the very best friend he could have ever been. However, for some people, I think, life was just not meant work out the way it should have or the way they had hoped.This New Years Eve I did not go out. I contemplated life and all the universe has thrown at me and I felt like I wanted to dive into a huge clear lake, with the sun shinning onto every ripple and revealing everything about the water, which contains nothing, which to me represents what this world, in this lifetime has to offer me, nothing - its a pool of complete and total nothingness that holds me in its embrace of nothingness so I feel nothing at that one moment when I dive in and then when I reach the surface, taking a breath and realise that this is all there is, I remember the loneliness, the hurt, the loss, and the feeling of going to bed alone, waking up alone, and being completely alone.To be happy.....what would I need.....I don't know......perhaps I will never know.....but it sure as hell isn't anything I have had before and it is sure as hell unlikely to be discovered this year.