Done with running...

And here I was… Just Blogging about how difficult it has been to get back to Blogging… And I was doing some Web research about an event someplace that I wanted to go to and there in the set of photos was a face that I used to know… One that by degrees of separation haunts me… Makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up and the pulse quicken beneath my skin… A face from the past that can link me to things best forgotten, people I wish I did not know, and a life I have been running from for the past four years.

This person can spread the word of me to those I keep from… And it would be so easy… And my first instinct would be to run… But I stopped running… Or I? Really? When the flutter of the heart finds its way into the throat, isn’t that really the same thing? That I am still in the same place? That I have not changed as much as I thought, or wished, that I had?

Am I going to spend the rest of my life looking over my shoulder, jumping at shadows, paranoid of the worst? But isn’t that what the worst really is? Never being able to walk away from a mistake? Or a bad choice? Or a life better left lost in the past for good?

But that is not how things really work… Not for the victims… For the criminals, they pay their debt and get to go free… They have much to overcome if they really mean to change, but they can go forward unafraid… It is not the same for those who seeking the worthless paper protection in the first place… The looking over the shoulder, the worries of loved ones, it just never ends… There is always fear and doubt.

Really though, I am not the victim… I mean, how can I be when I made the choice to allow such a person into my life? And then allow such a person to stay, day after day, year after year… Am I not to blame as well? For not valuing myself? For not knowing what it would mean to my life as I knew it? My future? My family? I am not the villain, the criminal, but I am not the guiltless either… It is not my fault that it happened, but I have some claim to the responsibility that I allowed it to continue.

Long after I stood up and said that I was not going to permit such things any longer, I am still paying for my innocence and naiveté… And sometimes, I am terrified that I will be paying for it forever.

The single unanswerable question I have above all others, is how do I put an end to it. The kind of end where no one gets hurt, or at least, no one else gets hurt… Where there is no more fear, no more jumping and hiding and paranoid precautions… How do I move past it far enough that it can’t ever come back to touch me again?

But I really do know the answer. I just don’t like it. The answer is, I don’t.

I move on, get stronger, smarter, keep my wits about me and never take a risk that could place me in that path of harm again. I never let my guard down, not even for a second, because that is a weakness that can be the one thing that re-opens the door I have devoted my life to barring shut. And I hope for respite in my dreams…

Terrible. I know. And fatalistic. But also, realistic. We have a good system, but there are so many holes and flaws it isn’t any other way for it to be right now. Things need to change… But the question is how? And by whom? And where? And to what end? (Okay, so that is more than one question, but they all are rolling around in my mind…) There is so much to do… To change… And not enough time to make such a big difference… So I guess the question is then, which part do I want to try to change most? How can I best make a difference? What can I do that matters in such a way that I can rest on the inside and sleep peacefully at night knowing that I have not wasted my life in hiding and fear? And is this the platform I want to take, the banner I want to wave about as if my life depended upon it? Is this the cause I want to sacrifice my life to, sacrifice so much for, suffer more for than I already have? (I know, again, more than one question…)

I need more thought. More time. More space. More information. More.

The adrenalin is gone from the initial jolt that started this Blog… It’s time for a cat nap to think it all over and re-charge… 15-20 minutes, tops. And then… And then, I don’t know… More research I suppose.

What I do know, is that I really am done with running…