They Dance Alone

By last night the pain of Friday morning's court session had landed on me properly. I was at home with my dad and my two boys and my husband was off to spend the night at his girlfriend's place as he does on his weekends off from the boys.

I spent the morning out and about doing some errands and bonding with one of my girlfriends. I still felt really tired after my emotionally draining week and my Friday night 'sort of date'. So I was glad to collapse on the couch and flick through the movies on TV. Found some chick flicks to settle down to and managed to shed a few tears during the sad bits. Still not enough to assuage the grief that is still sitting deep inside me, but enough, I guess, to let off a bit of the pressure. By the evening time I was actually aching to get some of my thoughts off my chest, and so set myself up to blog. But then I couldn't get my bloody wifi to connect to my laptop and so had no internet access - my husband had taken his 3G dongle with him.

I was struggling so with the buildup of emotional energy. And now I couldn't write it out. And I just really couldn't drag myself to the gym to work it all off either.

And then I remembered that it was Saturday night and my favourite radio channel plays "Saturday Night Bandstand' which is a lovely programme of music from the 30's 40's and 50's in big bandstand style. So I decided to dance it out. While I'm in recovery, I have a fitness commitment to myself: I agreed to make sure that I take at least 5000 steps a day (approximately 4.5km) which I measure on my smartphone with a fitness app I have.  Also, using my app, I have noticed that I'm suddenly starting to gain weight at the alarming rate of about 400g per week, even though I haven't changed anything in my diet - so I do need to keep my exercise routine going. It may be my Hashimoto' thyroid issue coming back at me, and if that's the case, I'm going to have to work very hard to make sure I don't load on 10kg just by inactivity.

I closed myself into the front porch, turned up the radio and started to dance. I danced about 3km according to my app. But it was such a bittersweet dance. Those old bandstand pieces are all about love - happy love, sad love, yearning, breaking, leaving, falling in... every single one of them touched a different sore place in me. The memories were flooding in from every place. I danced and danced and danced. Fast and playful. Slower and sensuous. Waltzes and Rumba. Samba and Cha-cha. All steps I've learned in dancing classes over the years. John-the-Narc and I connected over music like this so much. Where was he last night? Was he sad and alone like me? Or seducing his next supply? With romantic music playing in the background? Sore sore heart. Sad sad girl. Dancing alone. Trying to dance away her heartbreak.

The pace of the music started slowing down and became introspective and melancholy and I just couldn't bear it any more. I turned it off and made my way up to bed.

Sad. Alone.

Dancing Alone.