Deteriorated-Installment 4 March 10, 2008

Two for the price of ONE!!! I just want to get what I already have while I’m editing the the newest part.

 As Cold As…
It’s cold.  I hate the cold.  Edward loves the fall and winter, but I don’t see why.  Snow is nice, but the cold doesn’t agree with me.  I have the blades on my feet and I’m slightly anticipating stepping onto the ice.  Okay, so maybe I’m not a full winter hater.  I do love ice skating.  I don’t know why, but I do.
I step onto the ice and my first couple of moves are tentative.  I brace myself for a fall that never comes and then, surprisingly, I’m relaxed.  I move fluidly on the ice, sometimes jerkily, but mostly fluidly.  There’s something about ice skating that I can’t explain, but somehow my soul leaps at the chance to sail upon the ice.
I speed up.  I slow down.  I watch as my skates cut a thin line in the ice. I see how the ice almost welcomes the blade.  It seems to melt a layer away and allows the blade to come further into it’s body. It’s allowing the blade to search it and become a part of it.
I lift my face up to the sky with my arms held out.  I have let Edward and the rest of my group to go and do what they please, but here am I.  I am me.  For this precious moment, I feel free.  I feel like I can soar past all of the ugliness that is trying to touch me and just be me.  I speed up.  I pump my legs and then glide.  Blade to ice.  Ice to blade. One.

To Break Through the…
I try a hockey stop and have ice spray all over my friends.  They are laughing and now beginning to skate away, but I know they will come back to try to get even.  I skate slowly as I scan the crowd for Milagros.  When I see her I almost stop.
I see her skating with all her heart as she goes faster and faster.  She has this brightness in her eye that shows her life, a life that has been missing lately.  Like the sun breaking through the clouds, I see this new life shine through.  She lifts her face upwards and has the biggest smile I have ever seen.  She lifts her hands up and it seems like she is trying to spin around.
I see a wobble and then she hits the ground.  I hurry over to her.  I hope she isn’t hurt.  When I get there, I find that she is laughing, this full laugh that makes me laugh with her.  She stretches her hands out to me and I grab them.  I pull her up and when she gets on her feet she looks straight into my eyes.  Her face is glowing with some kind of energy that has been missing for quite some time.  Her eyes.  Her smile.  Her laugh.
This is what I fell in love with.

Deteriorated Installment 3 January 18, 2008

Another Day…….
I look over at Edward and I smile.  He’s in the corner of the room, talking with all of our friends like always.  It’s always the same after every meeting.  The group breaks up into it’s cliques.  We are supposed to be united, but the opposite seems true.  We stay in these groups and our lives revolve around them.  Maybe there are a few who drift in and out of the groups, but mostly the groups are permanent.  Memberships change, but overall everything is the same.
I feel like I have special access to these cliques.  Most of these people have been together their whole lives, while I am only a blip on the radar screen of their history.  Yet, it allows me this awkward outsider access.  I am a part of this group, but not.  They just seem like another acquaintance.  Just another name on the list of people I know.  It just seem fake.
Edward is different.  He doesn’t have this awkwardness like I.  He is a part of the group.  He has that membership card that I lack.  He was born into this church.  He was born into this group.  He has a lifetime access to this family.  The hardest part is that since we began dating, I feel like I’ve been granted extra privileges. This relationship has given me a new status and an upgrade from outsider to slightly inside.
I walk around.  I converse a little here and a little there, but not really connecting to much.  Not allowing that extra time to connect.  Just enough.  I’m the great actress who makes you believe in what is false.  You believe you know me and have access to this private life of mine, but you are mistaken.  You are not given access just like you refuse access.
I make my way to Edward’s group and let myself into his circle.  Partially in the group, but partly excluded because of the physical diameter of the circle.  I listen to the friendly banter and just soak it in.  I may have a comment or two, but I keep it to myself. I listen, but keep exploring the grouping that unveils in front of me. I see Mitch, Jake, Nelle, Jen, and Ava sitting together.  Mitch and Jake are doing something that Nelle and Ava find hysterical, but that I may just find gross and maybe a little sexual.  I look over to Elizabeth and Arnold talking together, deep in a conversation that can only pertain to their own relationship matters.
I look at Jessica and Sarah, the wives of the pastors, talking about something.  Jessica is animated and Sarah is looking like she is trying to counter whatever Jessica’s animation is conveying.  Edmund, Will, Ken, and Carlos are talking about who knows what, but from what I can tell it must be theological in matter for these masters to be together.  Catherine wanders into that group and whispers something in Edmund’s ear.  He nods and continues.
Edmund always makes me wonder.  He is one of the newest member of our leadership team, but he fits in with the old regime so much better than I.  It’s not even his relationship with Catherine, but something else.  Something I may lack.
I fall back into the conversation as I hear Edward asking me if I wanted to go ice skating.  I say yes and find out that a group is going and that’s it not only Edward and I.  I’m a little saddened, but figure it is better this way.