Someday You'll Own A Home

“Someday you’ll own a home. That’s as big as a house.” John Prine

Prine writes so fucking well. He always gets me with one little line. And this one is perfect. Home. It’s what we all seek, right? What we all dream of. A safe place where we can be our true self. We don’t have to fucking pretend or try to look good, we can just be.

So, I was picturing the house when I was married. Keyword house. Not a home. God damn that place was so uncomfortable. The exact opposite of how home should feel. And church…church was the same fucking thing. I can still picture my breaking point, walking the fuck out in the middle of a church service and praying “God, I’m out. fuck this. come get me if you’re real.”

It really was a defining moment for me. I wasn’t going to settle. I wasn’t going to live out this deal where Jesus is all full of grace and close to the people who are fucked up and church is all let’s “be joyful always” and act like we have our shit together. Pointing fingers? Fuck that. Listening to people’s real shit? I’m in.

Because motherfuckers, we’re all fucked up. No exceptions. We all have stories of heartbreak. And I can’t fucking relate to perfect people. Ha! I was telling a girl last night that I don’t smoke, but have been smoking the last few weeks, because the smoker’s patio is where you meet the good people. And same goes for the neighborhood bar in general. Or that strip club that saved my life.

And my story is just fucking crazy. And I’ll go back to another john prine lyric to set it up. “once I was lonely. Nobody but me. My heart in a prison.” My Christmas card with my “happy” family said the opposite of that, but my heart was in a prison and I was so fucking lonely in my marriage. All that’s great about me got muted.

But, then that lyric ends with “love set me free. God woke up. He heard my plea.” And that was my moment. Me walking out of church was the right decision. I was an outsider. “get your shit together matt,” said my bible study. “No one gets me”, I cried to myself.

So, I said fuck this. And eventually ended up at a strip club. And when everyone has their shit together (liars!) at church but you’re the only one who is fucked up, it feels like hallelujah when a stripper smiles at you and actually listens to your fucked up story.

I just messaged her the other day. And as I did I was in tears by myself on the sullys back, back patio. Seeing her happy 9 years later. It means the world to me. Because, she was the fucked up kid who saved my life. My Christian therapist called her an angel. I was done with life. And done with friends. And impossibly alone. But, god woke up and I actually got an answer to “come get me if you’re real.”

I’m fucking alive.

I’m a recovering Christian. And I had some bullshit story like everyone else at church about how I went to summer camp and got peer pressured into accepting Christ as my savior. Zzzzzzzzzz. Come on. Who can stand to listen to nonsense like that? Give me something real.

Like the time I said “fuck this” in church and actually found my way back to life. I believe in God because of it and I’m never going back to church because of it. My two houses…the one I had growing up and the one I had in the marriage…church was a big part of both. And both houses broke my heart into a million pieces.

And that’s what I realized when I was writing earlier. Every time I have a heart to heart with someone…an uber driver, a bartender, a broken hearted dude, a pretty girl…one of the little pieces of my heartbreak gets put back together.

There’s so much fucking beauty in the pain. I have conversations at the bar that I could have never had at church. And I was telling my ex-stripper friend that she was my original story time friend. Getting shit out. I wrote another friend yesterday encouraging her to “scream till I die or the last of my bad thoughts are finally out.”

It’s insane. I look back on all the story times i’ve had. and realize how much everyone needs to express the shit that most people keep bottled up. over and over i end up having the most beautiful moments with people. the ahhhhhh moment where two stories come together and you understand someone else on a deeper level.

Like...the broken hearted kid that I hadn’t talked to since college going through a divorce. He knew I’d relate, because of the blogs he'd seen me write. Or the girl who messaged me after my fb post about my uber driver who told me the story of his attempted suicide. She was making sure I was okay. I’ve never met her in real life. But, she writes and we met on twitter. So fucking random.

Or the angel of a friend I met at clarette club who was just passing through kc for one night. The support she’s given me. The number of story times we’ve had via fb inbox. It’s meant the world to me.

Or my friend battling cancer and going through a shitty divorce. Brief story times at the keyhole led to this whole different level of friendship. Or my “colder weather” friend. Or the bartender who misses our “heartbeat to heartbeat” talks.

God damnit. Now I’m in fucking tears. All the inboxing I’ve done over the years with other heartbroken people. Seriously I could go on and on about all the people whose brief little, seemingly random conversations have actually meant the world to me. It’s what I live for.

That’s my home man. I really can’t imagine getting my happily ever after with a human girl. But, man…I wouldn’t trade any of the hundreds of great conversations I’ve gotten to have since I stopped being my wife’s Christian puppet and went out searching for real people.

And maybe if I see john prine’s lyric that started me on this tangent as this moment like when William Miller says in Almost Famous, “I have to go home.” And Penny Lane waves her hands and says, “You are home.”

Fuck…I titled a blog post “Unlonely” the other day. And that other Prine lyric that I mentioned above is from a song called “Unlonely”. I’d never heard it before. And the whole thing with me catching time with that exact Uber driver the other night and heart to hearting and crying together about just being alive.

Life’s not random anymore. It’s not awful. And lonely. About a year ago I was in the fetal position daily over that last break up. And I took a good 6 months of mostly never going out and just writing and crying my way through it. But, I’ve resurfaced and am ready to get back to enjoying life.

I had an old friend ask me to hang out last night. And she gave me a couple things that I needed to hear. One was “it’s your own fault. You brought a girl into a man’s world.” She was talking about how I deserved what I got with Sarita, because I should have known better. I was pissed. But, this morning I realized she’s right. I can drop the anger. And just face the shit that I did wrong and not repeat the same mistakes.

The other thing she did for me was to drop way too many compliments on me. God damn I needed that. The one that got me was something like “you might be single for a while, because you’re like the guy every girl wishes she was with. And there aren’t that many girls who deserve you.” Shit. I’m still blushing.

But, see…I think I picked Sarita, in part, because she was there and hot. We could relate on a “my past is fucked up” level. But, she hadn’t taken the time to do what she needed to do to overcome her past yet. I gave no thought to whether or not she was capable of giving me what I deserve. And because of that the kids suffered. And I suffered.

So finding the right girl to fit the great home I have with the kids is going to take a miracle. But, come on. I’ve already lived one miracle. You can say fuck in church and get sent a stripper/angel. Hahahaha. Oh man…my fucking life. But, really it feels so great to be really alive again. I am home with myself these days. I am unlonely again. I’m catching stories right and left and meeting great new people.

I don’t know what I did to deserve the shit I went through as a kid. Or in the marriage. Or with Sarita. But, what if none of it matters at this point? I’m on the other side of it and I have a story to tell. And maybe me and other fucked up people can piece our broken hearts together one story at a time and find home that's as big as a house right there in the moment.