Should I Stay or Should I Go

Today was a rough one out of the gates, and it didn't get any better when I tried to get my kids to bike 6 miles each way to the Farmer's Market. A big part of the problem, which I recognized but could not help, was that I was, once again, dealing with my own anger, and that makes things that would normally be merely frustrating that much harder to handle.

When we got home, and we'd all had some food, I made a decision about how to salvage the day: we'd go to a movie. I looked online, and we were in luck: Despicable Me 2 was playing at my favorite theater. It was a pretty funny movie, and I was relieved to be there, but while it helped ease the frustrations of the morning, it did little to help deal with the general emotional anguish of my current situation.

In the movie, the girl starts to leave and then realizes that she really wants to be with her man, so she flies back to tell him that and they get married. Yep, that's just how it works in my fantasy, too (except it's the guy coming back), but not so much in my reality.

Add to that the feeling that I had when I saw a woman that I am friendly with who has always appeared to me to have the perfect marriage (of course, I know that there is no such thing), but they have four kids and always just seem psyched about being all together. Anyway, she had a newborn with her. Kid #5! In my fantasy life, I only had four kids, but still! It reminded me, just as the movie did, that my life isn't working out quite like I wanted it to work out.

This song wasn't in the movie:

Darling you gotta let me know
Should I stay or should I go?
If you say that you are mine
I'll be here 'til the end of time
So you got to let me know
Should I stay or should I go?

...but it came to me today after I read a bit more of this wonderful book I'm reading: Tiny beautiful things: Advice on love and life by Dear Sugar. The part I read today was a series of letters from people who were in relationships with good people that they didn't want to hurt, but a little voice kept telling them: Go. 

I've been there. I've had that little voice in my head, and eventually, I listened to it, because I knew that there was something missing from my marriage that wasn't ever going to be there. Sugar calls it "magic sparkle glue" which, like most of her writing, is an awesome way to put it because man, what a diference it makes when every part of you is saying "Yeah, right here, this is right where you should be. Stay here. With him. On him. In him. Right here. Stay."

And I had that feeling with my lover now departed, and I coulda sworn he had it with me, but magic-sparkle-glued-together, we ain't:

Should I stay or should I go now?
Should I stay or should I go now?
If I go there will be trouble
An' if I stay it will be double

I know those were questions at the center of his thoughts for much of the time that he was here, and I even think The Clash's assessment of the results of staying versus going are very similar to his assessment of staying or going. I don't know if it will actually work out that way for him.

What I know is this: I'm gonna have a relationship where every part of me is saying stay, and the dude I'm in that relationship with is gonna be hearing the same thing, and we're gonna get married and it's gonna be a magic sparkle glue kind of marriage.

I don't know when, and I don't know who, but I do know it'll happen. Just like in the movies, except better, because I'll get to live it...