My emotional state seems to deteriorate as the each week progresses. This is mostly due to lack of sleep, but I'm still finding it difficult to watch all four of the kids at my old house - it brings back too many memories, and I'm having other issues with it too. I don't feel like we're sharing quality time there, and life is really too short to engage in pursuits of questionable quality. I know that a lot of it has to do with my attitude, but some emotions are hard to overcome, and some situations just remain intolerable.

I love the kids. That goes without saying, and it's especially hard because I've helped raise three stepkids for the duration of the romantic relationship that Jen and I shared. Once the divorce has happened (and it has already, in spirit if not on paper), they are no longer my stepkids. Our relationships will still be what they are, but in some ways I feel like I've lost way more than just Jen (not that "just" is exactly the right word, but you know what I mean). Right now it's hard to be over at the old house with a smile on my face, pretending that everything is okay, when everything is patently not okay. Our lives have diverged, although in some ways they will be entwined forever. The engraving on our wedding rings read, "here we merge to form a river, and travel to the sea together", but now our streams have been sundered and we lie in seperate beds, still traveling towards the horizon but day by day forgetting what it meant to be together.

That said, we forgot what it meant to be together quite awhile ago. Fault lies on both sides, and blame is not given. We ended up being incompatible in some very basic ways. I think both of us knew this early on, but chose to ignore it. That's how it often goes, doesn't it?

Thank the fates for sending some old friends back into my life, not to mention all of the newer friends who make things more bearable on a daily basis. I'm feeling much more open to newness at the moment, and I'm finding it all around me. It's a good feeling.

Now I just have to find a way to comfortably deal with the death of a long relationship, and the resulting emotional fallout.

Maybe if I get more sleep. Maybe if I forge ahead. Maybe...