I'm already gone.

I think that this has been the year of self-preservation.

I look back on the pagan calendar and I am thinking about my journey from the last Samhain.  It's been a long, dark road before me, wrought with perils.  I am sure that there is a lot about me fundamentally that hasn't changed, but I would have to say that there is a lot about me that's changed too.  I've made a lot of hard decisions in the past year, about the people I will keep in my life and the friendships I will let go.  It sucks, because people I call 'friends' have great aspects about them.  But I've come to the point where I'm realizing that even though I see the potential of a person, that doesn't really mean they will live up to that full potential, nor that they even care to.  I'm weeding out those people who do not enrich my life in any way, or people that seem to take from me and never give back.  One-sided, unhealthy relationships.  I am brushing away those that would speak kindly to my face, but bitch about me behind my back.  I am turning my back on those who offer nothing but their outstretched hand.  Those that never seem to care about me, because the world revolves around them.

Maybe that sounds a little selfish.  Maybe I deserve to be a little selfish.

Since the focus moved from my community (those I hang with) to my family (those I live with, save for a scant few tried and true friends), my family prospers.  My husband and I are doing really well and able to do more and more for our family.  I'm not driving in the middle of the night on rescue missions, I'm not trying to cut it close to life expenses versus bailing someone out of jail.  I'm not over-exerting myself outside of my household.  And things have never been better.

Some days I think about what I have lost, and I mourn the loss of people.  Of their potential.  But the greatest of that potential lies with me and my family.  Had I seen that sooner, well...

...would of, should of, could of.  It doesn't really matter.  This past week has been a bit of hell at work, but in the end, it's worth it.  Even if it's just me and the cat in the middle of the night.  We get past that short spell, and on with the living.  I got at least one of the two things I wanted most for my birthday this year.  The reasonable one was spending a nice, quiet evening at home with the family, celebrating my birthday.

The second one was the impossible, but it doesn't mean I couldn't wish it.  The second was I just wish my sister could have called me to wish me happy birthday.  I hope that she would be proud of me.