Am I still chasing fairy tales?

Work in progress ... again


Is it so hard to really decide what I want to do? Am I so unsure that I can't even trust my own dreams? Would I really be happy living what the masses consider the perfect life?

When I was a little girl I thought I would live the enchanted fairy tale, I would find my Prince Charming and live happily ever after, this is put in your head at a very early age with books and stories such as Snow White and Cinderella. I began to fantasize and dream, and to believe those dreams could come true, but eventually I grew older and a bit of reality sank in, the fairy tales slid more toward the shows I was watching on television, a perfect marriage, with two kids and a dog, in the perfect house with white picket fences. As I reached puberty the confusion started, I was now interested in the opposite sex, and from what I had learned I thought they were the key to happiness.

As a young teenager I had many friends, and was well liked, but I was clumsy and overweight, so I didn't attract many boys. When I was thirteen I got my first "boyfriend" I was so excited that I wrote his name all over my notebook. The other kids at school used to pick on him, and the teasing we were taking from this was too much, after only six days I had to get a new notebook. The cruelty of kids at this age takes a toll on a person's self confidence and I was no exception, I was teased about my name, my freckles and of course my weight. I left a lot of my self confidence in my old gym bag in junior high, but I still survived with dreams of a fairy tale romance in tact.

I chased that dream straight to the alter at the age of eighteen, I had found true love! Unfortunately it was not long until the fairytale was over and reality hit, real love is nothing like the idea I had in my head, it takes work and compromise from both parties, and I was not getting either. By the age of twenty four I had four year old twin boys and another son age two, not to mention a husband that shared no interest in my needs or my dreams. This was my first failure at the living the fairytale, I was miserable! I had nothing in common with my husband any more and was feeling trapped and unappreciated. How can this be what I was meant for if I was so unhappy?


This is the point in my life where my biggest regret lies, I lost primary custody of my kids. Since my husband would not leave our house I moved in with my mother and he agreed to keep the boys until I could get us a place. My mom was in the process of getting a divorce from my father and had just moved into a small apartment. In the meantime my husband filed for divorce and claimed I had abandoned my kids, as a young and naive woman who didn't know how to get the help I needed to fight him in court I ended up with only non primary custody, which meant he would be raising my boys. The fact that I was not raising my own kids has been an emotional roller coaster that I have had to deal with every day since. I felt like such a failure, unable to handle a marriage and to stupid to handle a divorce! I let this get me so down that I learned what it felt like to hate myself.

My perception of love was never to be the same after that, but still the root of the fairy tale lingered, and as a damsel in distress I fell into the arms of a man that I thought would rescue me, he allowed me to laugh and forget about the guilt for a while. It turned out that I was definately living in a fairy tale then, in reality he was glad to find me so far down in the dumps, it made it easier for him to push me further. He was not a big man, not any taller then me and very thin, but he was mentally abusive. I wasted the next two and a half years of my life being convinced I was worthless and that I deserved nothing even close to love until I was almost suicidal. After much contemplation I realized that I could never kill myself, another failure that I am now very thankful of, so I decided to fight for myself instead. It took my six more months to get away from that situation and I buried myself in my job.

I decided to gather myself up and use what I knew to start my climb up the ladder of success. If I couldn't be the perfect housewife I should be the perfect Career woman! I was promoted at my job and worked like a dog all hours of the day and night. The stress level was high and the time to unwind was short so I turned to the bottle to relax, that partying lead to more potent means of relaxation and the trouble began. I lost my job that I had worked so hard for and had to find a means of support, I had learned many things in my previous position and knew I didn't want a lot of stress so I decided to try bartending. I loved it, it came very easy to me and I made good money, I now knew that I could always support myself, and who needs fairy tales anyway.

Still single at the age of twenty nine I decided it was time for my first real vacation, I drove down to Savannah to see my father for Father's day and spend a week. During this venture I met an interesting fellow that showed me a sunrise on the ocean and the beauty that was Savannah. The tall trees draped in Spanish moss forming an archway down the streets, the fountains in the squares nestled among the many colonial homes, the cobble stone streets along the river full of street vendors and entertainers. I extended my vacation long enough to find a job and a place to live, within two weeks of returning home I was moving to Georgia! Talk about spontaneous. It was great to be in a new place, all the different things to see and do and being away from the watchful eye of my ex-husband made it even better. I learned a lot in those three years especially about the bible, and southern religion. My boyfriend grew up in a very strict religious family, and now played in a gospel band, he was extremely well versed in the bible. After a year of working in town I decided to learn to drive the semi and go on the road with him, we went all over the Southeast and spent quite a few weekends in Florida. We had many hours on the road to talk about the meaning of the bible and how we felt about God, he was a very good teacher, but left me to my own beliefs.

I had became very close to his family when his father was diagnosed with cancer, I immediately volunteered to help care for him. I stayed home and took shifts at the hospital listening to him talking as if it were 50 years ago and I was a friend or relative from his past. He would look at me every now and then and say "Dawn I'm not crazy", and I would smile and say "I know". After a few weeks we brought him out of the hospital to care for him at home, it was hard but I didn't mind, he was a wonderful man. He went down fast and it was only a few weeks until we lost him on the afternoon of Thanksgiving. I feel privileged to have went through this with them, it was a heart wrenching experience yet comforting at the same time, to have held his hand for the last three hours of his life after having been there to listen to him relive most of his life was an amazing experience. I felt like I was supposed to have been there at that time to help to ease things for all of them.

The three years I was in Georgia had opened my eyes to a larger version of life and love and the joy and sadness that it can bring. I also realized just how much love I had to give. The time I had for spent with my boyfriend was full of enlightenment and discovery, but never full of passion or romance. I think we felt like we had both gained the things from our relationship that we were meant to, but he also knew that I had not been able to see my kids very often being so far away and I was really missing that love, and ready to face the guilt I had been trying to ignore since I had left them with their father. He understood when I opted to return to Kansas, and although the move back was hard, my boys made it well worth it. I had gained some self confidence in new areas of my life and was ready to figure out what I needed to do with it.

I found a job working for a girl that used to work for me, we had connected then because we were both getting out of abusive relationships, but didn't get the chance to really get to know each other before we were off to other things. This time it didn't take long to find out that we had much more in common and we became the best of friends. Her family is now my extended family and she is the sister I chose to have, I love her for who she is and accept her faults as she has mine. We have different views on some things especially how to deal with relationships and men, but for the most part she has brought more love to my life than any man. We joke sometimes that ours would be the perfect relationship if only one of us was a man. I guess we are both still searching for that fairy tale, just keeping each other company along the way. I used to think I would give up anything for the perfect relationship, but now I realize that some things no matter how hard they are at times I could never give up.

My friend and I got an offer to open a new bar and grill for a guy she knew and we jumped at the chance. I was to run the bar at night and she ran the grill during the day, this made it hard for us to have much time together and I began to run around with the guys from the bar. I was feeling pretty self confident for a while and was dating quite a bit, but the crowd that I had mixed into was very into partying and I got caught up quick. Before I realized what hit me I was in trouble again and it was getting harder to look at myself in the mirror each day. It is amazing what drugs allow you to do without thinking, and I was not thinking. I talked to my friend about it and decided to get away for a while and get myself back in order before I reached the point of self hatred again. I moved back to Georgia.

I didn't have much time for dating then as I worked two and three jobs to survive on my own. I put away the fairy tales and tried to find myself, it was just what I needed and I got back on my feet. I stayed in contact with my friend and was glad to move back to Kansas only one year later when she offered me a job at the country club in which we met. It seemed rather ironic that I was working for her this time at the place our friendship had started. I was home again.

It was great to be back and my spirits were high, things were going good at the country club and soon I was sharing an apartment with my friend. She and I got along well and living with each other fell into place rather easily. We spent many a night sitting around the fireplace drinking wine and laughing hysterically, but it was also fun to have her there to share hopes and dreams with. Life was good, but we both thought we were ready for our prince charming to come along.

The country club sold and after doing office work for a while I decided to take it easy and do something fun so I started tending bar again. I felt right at home doing this and I got to do my favorite things, meet people, be in the fun atmosphere, and make money to boot. That was a turning point for me I gave up on the idea of being a career woman, I realized that I was good at what I did and enjoyed doing it. That was a big stress lifted for me, to feel like I was doing what I was suppose to and not just wasting time playing. I decided to allow myself to be comfortable with my job.

I enjoyed myself there and things were going good, I had ran into an old teenage flame at work one day and he was now single again. We went out as friends to see what might become of it and after a few attempt at dating I thought that the attraction was just not there until the day my world went spinning. I felt like something was wrong that morning when I had gotten up, but had no idea what. The weather was stormy and for some reason I left my windows of my apartment opened a bit, something I would not normally do, then I called my old flame and asked him to come to the bar that night, another move that was not normal for me. The weather got worse, but I was not really worried about it until the tornado warning came on the television and it was straight down the street! I stayed behind the bar, locked the cash drawer and told the few people left in the bar that when the building starts to rock I was running for the cooler and anyone that wanted was welcome to join me, but everyone stayed put including my old flame. It was over as quick as it hit, and we had heard all kinds of commotion as it passed and had lost the electricity. When I went outside I realized that it had came up right across the street in front of the bar and had taken out the trailer park that was there. I started getting calls on my phone and heard all kinds of horror stories of what all it had taken out, and my apartment complex was in question. After helping me close up the bar my old flame offered to try to take me home, it was chaos, the sounds of every kind of siren, the smell of natural gas and then seeing the devastation as we left was heart wrenching. We had to get on the highway to try to get back to my apartment as there were electric lines down everywhere, This gave me the chance to see the six or eight trailers in the lake that they sat by and most of the others that I could see in the dark were destroyed. We tried a couple of ways to get to my house to no avail, and no one could tell me anything about what was damaged and where. I had an overwhelming feeling of mortality and I cried sitting there in his car, he hugged me then took me home with him. The next day we walked into the area to see if I had an apartment any more, and it was the hardest thing see the people trying to clean up and salvage anything that they could at the trailer park. I knew that there had been nine deaths over there and a lot of people lost everything. Upon making it to my complex I was relived to see it standing for the most part. A large tree trunk had gone through the side of my building and into the apartment directly behind mine, then the pressure had collapsed the roof, only two foot over and it would have been in my dinning room. My apartment was fine and I even had things on my balcony that hadn't moved, but I was to be without water or electricity for days and the offer to stay with my now rescuer was welcomed.

I was emotionally devastated by the thought of all these people that lost lives, loved ones, and everything they owned. I felt guilty for having lost nothing except a few days of work, I could not believe that I was on one side of the tornados path and my apartment on the other side and I suffered no harm. My knight in shinning armour comforted me and I was touched by the way he had swept me up cared for me. I began to feel like this had to be a sign, I had been handed a second chance and he was it. He was very sweet and was so caring, I knew he had been through a tough divorce several years ago, so when he proposed less than a week after the tornado I was shocked. I was also feeling like he could take care of me and the feelings of mortality helped me to jump right in.

He had rekindled the desire for the perfect romance. It had been ten years since my first divorce and since we both had three kids thoughts of the Brady Bunch filled my head, maybe I was cut out for this and I had not given myself the chance to enjoy it. I quite my job at the bar because he didn't like the idea of me flirting for a living, and planned the wedding. I was going to try for the white picket fences and all this time. I went back to office work and began to take over the house and the caring of his eight year old daughter that lived with us, partly because I felt like that was my roll and partly because he felt like that too. The first problem we had was that he was too hard on my kids, he blamed them for anything that happened and was just rude to them in general while his kids were perfect angels in his eyes. When the newness wore off our relationship he was not so sweet, and a pretty negative person, I tried to make it work for just over a year then gave up and moved out. It took me another year and a half to get divorced from this man, as he thought it amusing to avoid being served or what ever other excuse he could use to delay the process. During this time I realized that I was more upset at myself for the failure of not making it work than losing the love I knew that it was not meant to be in the first place. I tend to blame this one on the tornado and the complete surrender of my independence.

Having gone through a second divorce I thought that I would never marry again and based my next relationship on physical attraction and we agreed to keep this on a friends level. I was happy with this arrangement due to the fact that I could keep my independence and still have the contact of a man. After a few months and much to the dismay of my friends and family the intensity of the physical aspect of our relationship bleed over to the emotional side of it. I find it very hard not to become emotionally vested with someone that I am sharing so much with physically. We started spending a lot of time together and when he quit his job it was not long until he was staying with me and becoming financially dependant on me. Then shit hit the fan when the mother of his kids had him arrested for domestic violence. He convinced me that he didn't do anything and begged me help him get it straightened out, I agreed. A few weeks later he was back in jail and this time they set the bond at ten thousand dollars to get him out. I called a friend of mine and put up one thousand dollars to get him out, he had promised me that he could sell some things and get the money back to me shortly after getting out. For the next two months he came up with many excuses why he didn't have a job and why I didn't have my money back, in the mean time he was costing me more money every day, and Christmas was coming. I finally realized that he had been lying to me all along, and that he was not being at all faithful to me. The decision to kick him out of my house was an easy one to make by then, he had used me more than I had ever been used and that lesson cost me quite a bit of money and some more heartbreak. It was hard to believe that some one could be so fake and I didn't see it, could I be that blind, or am I just stupid? How someone can say they love you and treat you like that is beyond me. One thing I got from this relationship is that I was going to think twice before letting go of any money for a man. I had went back to tending bar and sank myself into my job.

I had decided not to really date for a while and was enjoying my job, I was tending bar at a hotel and meeting people everyday. One day I went to work and we had a group in for a class reunion, they were all Oversea Military Brats and I hoped to be busy. It turned out that I was not all that busy, but I did have a few people in the bar, one gentleman had gotten my attention, he was very polite and pleasant. He was dressed in overalls with hair hanging all the way down his back, he was a bit short and somewhat heavy, but cute with a genuine smile. He spent most of his stay in the bar with me when he was not busy with reunion events, we had talked a lot and understood a lot more without saying anything. There was a connection there that I couldn't explain I knew I would get to know him better.

He had given me his phone number before he left, but I decided to look him up on the internet and emailed him a letter instead, he wrote right back and we exchanged more letters, soon we were talking live on the web, but after a while we wanted more and it turned into conversations on the phone that lasted hours. It was so easy to talk to him about real feelings, he was really interested in what I had to say and we laughed easily together. He was genuinely nice and seemed very honest and when he asked me to come visit him I was only a little reluctant and that changed.

Out first visit turned out great even though it started out a bit awkward, this was the first time to face him after sharing so much personal information with him on the phone. He went what seemed to me to be out of his way to make me comfortable and before long we were laughing and enjoying each other. I had felt a connection to him the first time we had met and I felt that again, he was spoiling me with attention and compliments and pampering me at every opportunity. When I went home the calls got more frequent and lasted until the wee hours of the morning. It was good talking to him as he would prompt me to talk about things that I had kept bottled up for years, we got very close on the phone and my feelings for him grew stronger, we were talking nearly every night, but dating long distance is very hard and very costly.

We had only actually been together a couple of times when time for my vacation had arrived, I was going with my mother to England to visit family. I was worried about missing him while I was gone, but when I got over there my family kept me so busy with the sights and gatherings, it had been twenty five years since my last visit so the joy of seeing them all again was enough to keep me happy and content, I did miss the conversations with him, and I did manage to talk on line with him once while at my cousins house. Upon my return home I called him to find out that his father had passed the day before, I went to comfort him the next day driving five hours still sick and exhausted from my trip home. I didn't really mind going and he was glad I was there, we ended up taking care of each other as I was already ill and got worse once I was there. This trip was the longest time we had spent together, it was a nice visit and I enjoyed him, but in the end I found myself ready to go home. I was getting tired of the constant pampering and beginning to feel a bit overwhelmed.

I became nervous around him in person, then it became harder to talk to him on the phone. I was not sure how to deal with this and didn't know what to tell him. We had a couple more visits, but each one grew harder than the one before. I was not sure that I could handle being around him all the time. My last visit was for a hot air balloon festival, I had told him that my mom had always wanted to go for a ride and he said he would see what he could do. I told him I would love him forever if he got her a ride since it was almost her birthday. I was surprised and thanked him for the effort but since it would cost around three hundred and fifty dollars to buy a ticket I didn't really expect it to happen. He did get her a ride from one of the advertising sponsors so I took my mother to his house. The ride took place early the morning after our arrival and it was great. My mom really enjoyed it and we both thanked him, then he told her and several other people over the course of the weekend the story of what I had said and that now I would have to love him forever. I felt like I had just been sold for free ticket to ride in a balloon. I know he didn't mean for me to feel that way, but I also knew then that he would love me too much and I would feel as if I could not breathe. I didn't want to get any further into a relationship that I couldn't take all the way, and I told him that we could no longer be romantically involved. I love him for who he is, but we would not fit into one life. We had agreed in the beginning to try and stay friends no matter what happened, and we are very good friends now, although it took some time apart for us to be able to talk, we now speak on the phone regularly. I do not regret having gotten romantically involved with him only that I hurt him by not being able to stay that way. He has given me a lot of love and is such a caring person that I can't imagine my life without him in it.

I've had one other short relationship with a man that I knew was not right for me in the begining. I think I was just wanting attention from someone and convinced myself that he was it. I didn't share much about it with my friends as they also knew that I was just fooling myself, and the end of it came as no surprise to me or them. It is always hard to realize that you did it again and I have been fighting to see the pattern. This is why I started this story to write it all out for myself and see what I am doing so wrong. There are many things that I have done wrong in my past relationships and much more to these stories than written, but don't think I am laying blame for each split on the other party, I just want to figure out what I need to be happy. Am I expecting too much from a relationship or why am I falling for guys I know can't give it to me?

These are the questions that I need to answer for myself before I get into another relationship. I've been told to spend some time alone and concentrate on being happy with myself, this is good advise and something I have strived to do in the past, but I crave affection and I long for the touch of another. This is usually why I end up getting involved with someone when I should wait, my will power is not very strong and I give in to the want. I am a very passionate person and give my heart fully, because of this I end up getting involved too deeply and too fast.

At this point in my life I am once again trying to work on myself, a job that is never ending, and trying not to concentrate on having a romantic relationship right now. When I am ready to give it another try I will be more selective and try to take it slower, I have got to change the way I look at a relationship and not become so involved with it that I lose the rest of my life. I am optimistic that I will find love again and thankful for the love I have found already in my life, but I still have to wonder, am I being relalistic or am I still chasing fairy tales?

Through the heartache of my first divorce, the embarrassment of my second, and the realization that I've only a couple of years before entering the fourth decade of my life; I still want to entertain the thought that some day my prince will come. I don't think that dream ever dies.