Second Sunday: Silence Is Deafening

Endings should look like a cinematic montage: rain-streaked windows, a dramatic drink thrown in a bar, a fabulous outfit for the final showdown. But, as I watched his belongings slowly disappearing from the house we called home, I realized that a real-life break-up doesn't come with an emotionally driven soundtrack. Sometimes, it's the hollow thud of a cardboard box.

It started with the small things.

His side of the bathroom vanity—once a chaotic landscape of a beard trimmer and balms—is now a gleaming white desert. There are no longer stray beard trimmings to wipe up. His nightstand? Empty. His clothes no longer occupy the other half of the closet leaving a vast, echoing vacancy next to my solid, neutral wardrobe. It’s funny how a separation can feel like a slow decluttering of the soul. As his belongings migrated, the house began to silently echo. The hallway carries sound a little further than it should. But for the first time in years, those echoes aren't heavy with a residual "we need to talk" or the sharp sting of the garage door slamming. There’s a new, quiet atmosphere settling between the walls: peace.

In retrospect, we haven’t been "us" for a long time.

We were two polite ghosts haunting the same square footage. He went left, I went right. He looked up while I looked down. We practiced social distancing long before it was a global mandate. What were we really doing? Avoiding the hard conversations about his addiction. And, we were good at it. We were so good at giving each other space that we eventually drifted into different solar systems—emotionally, mentally, and spiritually. Now, physically.

Expecting him to be here and not seeing him is deeply painful. But, my step-daughter moves through the rooms with a lighter step. She feels safe. I feel safe. It’s remarkably anticlimactic. I expected a tectonic shift, but instead, it’s just... quiet. There was no dramatic confrontation; it was a break-up of habits that will have its finale with a pen scratching a divorce decree. Something we are denial about and another conversation we avoid. I realize the marriage isn't the only thing that disappeared over the years.

I had edited myself down so much there was barely a footnote left of the original woman.

I was so busy playing the role of the wife who was "keeping it all together" that I didn't realize I’d checked out of my own story. I was the lead character in a life I didn't recognize anymore. As I walk through these vast, familiar rooms, I’m realizing this isn't empty square footage; it’s the set for the most important "meet-cute" of my life: a re-introduction to the woman left behind a decade ago.

I’m finally re-meeting her. She has a few more grey hairs, some "wisdom lines" that definitely weren't there in my twenties, and she is in desperate need of a stiff cocktail—or at least a very large glass of Pinot Noir. But, you know what? She’s pretty fabulous. I’m finding that the only thing more liberating than "moving on" is "moving back in"—to my newly decluttered soul. It’s going to take some time to navigate this new soundtrack of silence, but I’m learning that sometimes you have to turn down the noise of a failing marriage to hear the sound of your own heart beating.

The house got uncomfortably quiet tonight, so I headed to the kitchen for comfort.

While he took the hand mixer and my favorite mixing bowl, he couldn't take my appetite for sugar. Pure, unadulterated, granulated, processed sugar. I pulled out laminated recipe cards for chocolate chip cookies given to me by a dear friend. When she gave me her "world famous" recipe, she said something that lives rent free in my head, "the world has just painfully opened up for you." She was right. It sucks and it hurts. But, tonight. Sugar can heal these wounds.

So, if you find yourself standing in a silently echoing hallway where the quiet feels deafening, head to the kitchen. Bake. And, for heaven’s sake, eat the sugar. Comfort eating isn't the long-term answer to a break-up, but for tonight? It’s the only answer that makes any sense to me.