After the intensity of last week’s events, and all the weeks leading up to it since this resurfaced (thank you 20/20) in August, I took a much needed break over the weekend. A break that has now spilled into this week.
I think it’s important for me to mention that up until I was blindsided by a heads-up back in August, informing me that Bolin and his blushing bride were once again going to be on ABC that very night, I rarely gave this part of my life much thought. Frankly, for many, many years I’d rarely thought of it at all. I’ve thought of the victims, more often than anyone outside of my own head will ever know, but not the drama. I’ve been on with my life for a very long time. Doing my thing, concerning myself with the art of living, and with noticing all which matters most in this one, and precious life. And perhaps, somewhere along the way, even losing sight of my inner awareness that a death loomed on the horizon. In a story with as many legal delays, twists and turns as this one has had, it was easy to forget that most of the appeals had finally been exhausted.
As I’ve said, this “ending” has stirred up a plethora of emotions. Opening up wounds, allowing me to see my own life, from a perch that offers a view in which I’ve never fully taken in before this. One that’s up close and personal, more vivid, more real. I don’t mind letting in these moments of clarity. Of raw honesty. Of reflection. That’s who I am. That’s how I live my life. I’m not hiding from anything, and I won’t deny any feeling as it comes. But now, today, I’m just as anxious to release this. To let this part of my history go, to put it back in the deepest, healthy corners of my mind, where it belongs.
I hate to be redundant and keep using the words “heavy” and “intense”…but I will find no other words a better fit. Heavy is the only way to describe what these past days/months have been like. For me, as well as for those who love me.
If I haven’t said this already, I didn’t welcome any of this drama into my life again. It wasn’t welcome in 1987, and it isn’t welcome now. But it is what it is, and the story had to play itself out. And while I will forge on, honor my commitment, continue what I started in writing this blog, for truth and for clarities sake, I find myself growing restless. If something positive comes from this, what a beautiful thing. But I have to remain true to who I am today. And who I am today bears little resemblance to the twenty-year old victim of 1987.
When I say that I’ve refused to be defined by this, that means I have never allowed this one event to become my identity. And while I would be honored to think that speaking out could help anyone else, in any small way, and while I would always be there for anyone who needed me in this capacity, I refuse to allow it to become my identity today. Whatever anyone else’s perception, whatever anyone else tries to throw at me, it never will.
It’s been hard to get back into “writer zone”. But I’ll try to dig back in. Pick up the story where I left off, offer up those thoughts and opinions which inspired this in the first place, and move on. For you see, I already had. A very time ago.
I’ve received an outpouring of encouragement from a mind-bending number of good and decent people these recent dark days/months. It is for those people I felt compelled to come here this evening, and at the very least, offer up my gratitude. I can’t express how much the love and support has meant to me.
So it is for you that I say – I haven’t abandoned this. I just took a much-needed quiet step back.