Pushing the Bruise

Ha, I commented on Facebook that I keep "pushing the bruise" but am getting better at doing it less. The reference is from a song by The Weepies. The last time I parted with someone I had fallen for, I referenced the song in an entry here.

The specific reference is:

I keep pushing the bruise
'cause I don't wanna lose
what I loved about you

When you no longer have any tangible form of the tenderness and, dare I say, love you both saw in someone's eyes and felt for them, when it's nothing but a cherished memory you didn't want to end but they did, the only feeling that approximates the sweetness and intensity is the conjured pain of the loss which in turn reminds you what it is you lost, or why it hurts so much.

But I haven't been doing it on my own: I've had "help". Photos from happy moments together. Triggers of memories, like a location, phrase, or little plastic toy from a cereal box on your car's dash (I threw it away yesterday). People expressing their sympathy. Songs which became anthems, of sorts, for the relationship, which now only remind you of what you've lost (my main one, for the last few weeks of the relationship, was Billy Joel's The Longest Time):

If you said goodbye to me tonight
There would still be music left to write
What else could I do
I'm so inspired by you
That hasn't happened for the longest time

Once I thought my innocence was gone
Now I know that happiness goes on
That's where you found me
When you put your arms around me
I haven't been there for the longest time

I'm that voice you're hearing in the hall
And the greatest miracle of all
Is how I need you
And how you needed me too
That hasn't happened for the longest time

Maybe this won't last very long
But you feel so right
And I could be wrong
Maybe I've been hoping too hard
But I've gone this far
And it's more than I hoped for

Who knows how much further we'll go on
Maybe I'll be sorry when you're gone
I'll take my chances
I forgot how nice romance is
I haven't been there for the longest time

I had second thoughts at the start
I said to myself
Hold on to your heart
Now I know the [person] that you are
You're wonderful so far
And it's more than I hoped for

I don't care what consequence it brings
I have been a fool for lesser things
I want you so bad
I think you ought to know that
I intend to hold you for the longest time

Then there are songs which take on new meaning after the break-up, much like songs came alive while you were together, but with a sting instead of that sunny feeling. Some songs are on still the sweet side of bittersweet, like Rachael Yamagata's I Wish You Love, which I originally heard on Prime, a movie I really like (it's bittersweet *wink*):

I wish you bluebirds in the spring
To give your heart a song to sing
And then a kiss, but more than this
I wish you love

And in July a lemonade
To cool you in some leafy glade
I wish you health
And more than wealth
I wish you love

My breaking heart and I agree
That you and I could never be
So with my best
My very best
I set you free

I wish you shelter from the storm
A cozy fire to keep you warm
But most of all when snowflakes fall
I wish you love

My breaking heart and I agree
That you and I could never be
So with my best
My very best
I set you free

When I posted that I keep pushing the bruise, it was after going to a friend's performance in The Scarlet Pimpernel. When the character Margeuerite started singing When I Look At You, I braced myself. Sitting by myself in the crowded theater where nobody knew me, I didn't much care if people saw me getting emotional over it, but I didn't want to make a scene. I didn't. Just some tears welling up in my eyes was all. As she sang, I identified because our last conversation was almost businesslike, like talking with a completely different version of the person I fell for with a similar but colder, detached voice, without the warmth, the trust, the light, or the familiarity to which I'd become so completely accustomed, a change which took place, as far as I know, in a matter of a day or two:

When I look at you, what I always see
Is the face of someone else who once belonged to me
Still I can hear him laugh
And even though that melody plays on, he's gone

When I look at you, he is standing there
I can almost breathe him in like summer in the air
Why do you smile his smile?
That heaven I'd forgotten eases through, in you

If you could look at me once more
With all the love you felt before
If you and I could disappear into the past
And find that love we knew
I'd never take my eyes away from you

When I look at you, he is touching me
I would reach for him, but who can hold a memory?
And love isn't everything
That moonlight on the bed will melt away, someday

Oh, you were once that someone
Who I followed like a star
Then suddenly you changed,
And now I don't know who you are

Or could it be that I never really knew you from the start?
Did I create a dream?
Was he a fantasy?
Even a memory is paradise for all the fools like me

Now, remembering is all that I can do
Because I miss him so, when I look at you

Yeah. I had to get a grip and chuckle at my own pathetic emotionality (pathetic in the "arousing pity, esp. through vulnerability or sadness" sense). As I leaned back to put myself behind the peripheral gaze of those next to me, I rested my cheek in my hand, which immediately reminded me of that cheek I loved to feel in my hand and the lips which always kissed my palm. I instinctively, without thinking, put my own lips in my palm and felt my heart skip a beat at the memory, and I immediately stopped when I realized I was conjuring the past, then sadly closed my hand in a loose fist as if you hold on to that feeling, to not replace that sensation with any other, to cherish it one last time. And I sighed and let go a little more, and it was OK.

At intermission, I sent a text to my friend in the show: "Ha, damn that 'When I Look At You' song!" During intermission and after the show, I had trouble not thinking about the lost relationship, being so geographically close but so infinitely distant. I laughed at myself as I thought I was waxing nearly as melodramatic as the show had in parts. And I posted my comment about pushing the bruise. I'm learning, and it's helping. But I'm not quite ready to let the bruise heal completely. Sue me, I'm not always the best at letting go.