If Only Things Could Be Different!

After spending yet another Saturday alone at home slogging away at the keyboard I decided to escape the confines of my desk and PC and went for a walk on the farm.   And I started wondering…

 

It was a lovely evening tonight.  What started off as yet another cold, miserable and wet day morphed into blue skies with a brisk autumn wind.   As I walked over the hill towards the tiny lily pad dam I remembered the days when I went for long walks every day.  And I remembered all my hopes and dreams I had when I moved down here.

 

There were so many things I wanted to do, to improve myself, to make me a more rounded person.  I wanted to take art lessons, and learn to play guitar and learn Latin American dancing.   I wanted to have a herb garden that could rival that of Margaret Roberts' and brew potions and spells.  And a vegetable patch and a glorious indigenous garden, and, and, and…

 

Tonight the fact that I really do live in a beautiful part of the country was driven home.  Strangely enough, I have become very much a part of my surroundings.   As I walked I could identify all the birds I saw and heard and, after stopping on the top of the hill to admire the colours of the sunset I really felt at one with my surroundings.

 

After my walk I enjoyed a moment on the balcony watching the last of the sun's rays dip over the horizon with Houndus maximus lying between my feet.   And I thought a bit more.  I really do love the environment I live in.  What went wrong?   What happened to all those hopes and dreams I had?

 

I think I know what happened.

 

When I was faced with the decision to move down here, Flyboy and I were in the very early stages of our relationship and I had to make a choice.   And I made that choice based on who he was at the time and all the promises he made me.  He has changed so much since we moved down here that sometimes I look at him and wonder if I ever knew him at all.   All the promises he made to me amounting to nothing.  It's strange when I think back to the time more than four years ago when I had to make the decision, when I think about how he made me feel and what we meant to each other.   When we weren't together it felt like I couldn't breath, it was as if someone had snatched away my oxygen.  At the time I thought it was love but now I think I know better, it was panic and anxiety.   As I am sitting here typing this he is downstairs reading a hunting magazine and I am upstairs sitting at the PC, typing out a posting for my secret blog.   And this is the norm.

 

The second glitch in the road was money, or the fact that I don't earn anything that is worth calling money.  When I do earn something it gets absorbed into the household or used to pay catch up on those long overdue "Things That Have to be Fixed."  Of course, with that went all my hopes and dreams because Flyboy's money is for Flyboy's stuff.

 

I know that I am sounding very embittered as I type this but, that is not really how I feel right now.  I just can't help wondering what I would do differently if I knew then what I know now.  If I had the money and this farm was up for sale, maybe I would buy it.   I would do my art classes and paint the most dark, gloomy storm scenes.  I would find a guitar teacher, a proper one and actually learn to play that beautiful unused instrument.   Maybe I would even live my dream and be a freelance database designer, I mean these days you can do anything via the internet.

 

And I would never go near a relationship again.

 

If only I knew four years ago what I know now.  If only things could be different…