Dawn has fallen on a new year, according to our complicated and seemingly arbitrary calendar. It came in with a gray drape of clouds and the sun piercing through in a white glow. Most people spent the first day of the new year in shorts and t-shirts, sweating from a walk or a short run. As the day left, the temperature freefell to freezing, much like the first day I took the road to the Beast the first time. I just hope it is not an omen of things to come.
The calendar we know is not the only one in use in our modern day. Many cultures around the world still observe different new years, different cycles, even different year counts. The only part of the calendar that ever made sense to me were the solstices and the equinoxes. The measure of the length of day and where the sun rises and sets remain constant (more or less). Yet our calendar doesn’t seem to acknowledge these. The first day of the new year is not the Winter solstice. I think it would make more sense if it were.
Regardless, a new cycle has begun. People make goals and resolutions, picking a specific yet arbitrary day as the first mile marker for the next cycle, whether they are successful or not.
I’m not any different. People assign meaning to days: birthdays, holidays, first days, last days, sometimes death days. And of course: anniversaries.
Now that the paperwork is submitted and the decision made, I should make it known: I am divorced. Our anniversary was New Years Eve, and we spent it separately and alone. It’s been a strange path, one I never thought I’d take. But a path nonetheless and a path many before me have traveled, so at least I know I’m not alone. There were many things leading up to the split, some things I should have seen, some things I didn’t see, and now I don’t see what the future will bring.
And so that cycle has ended. Now I have to begin again. I feel like I’ve slowly been reinventing myself over the past year or so. Some might call it a midlife crisis. And now that I am single I will continue to reinvent myself, or at least acknowledge things about me I’ve been hiding or designing.
I do know a few things: I have started therapy and making connections and discoveries I never realized. I also have reevaluated my relationship with alcohol which will not only help me on this year’s path but also my general longevity.
My goal for this year is to complete another Spartan Trifecta. That is, a Sprint (5k) Super (10k) and Beast (14+ mile) in a calendar year. The last time I did this was 2017 which was probably one of the hardest years of my life.
At the beginning of 2017, I thought life was good. We had a new house, good jobs, a healthy son. We were establishing a life that had potential. It wasn’t without hardships, but for the first time in my life I felt content, happy. That’s when I set out to do the Trifecta the first time. The first 3 months went on without a hitch, then in March everything came crashing down.
My wife was pregnant, and we were looking forward to our son having a playmate. But within 2 weeks, we found out our daughter had a heart defect and my father was diagnosed with cancer. My unborn daughter’s future was uncertain, so was my father’s. A year and a half later, my daughter would be home from open heart surgery on her first birthday, and my father would be buried.
And so my first road to the Beast started on a peak and ended in a dark valley. A valley which I have been dwelling in for a long time. It is a valley of ghosts, of anger, of self destruction. I thought I was out of it, but I realize now I am still in it, I’ve just been surrounding myself with enough artificial light to pretend I wasn’t. And when that light goes out the dark is overwhelming.
And now I am divorced. The events leading up to it, and shortly after, extinguished all light I used to hide in, and now I have to confront the dark.
Therapy is helping, but it’s a long road, a precarious one. This time, my road to the Beast is starting opposite the last. It starts at the bottom, it starts in a dark place, it starts with me made of soft clay and wet mud.
I don’t know what the year to come will hold. It might lead me on the path I’m looking for. It might show me a way but I could diverge. It might drop into another valley I’ve never been in, or one I was afraid to return to. There’s only one way to find out. This time the Beast is more than a race. It was more than a race last time but I didn’t realize it. The Beast has been with me a long time, cuddling me with deceit and distraction. I am armored against it now, ready to fight.
Come with me, dear reader. We’ll fight it in the dawn. We’ll make it shrink away. There is a Beast fighting against all of us. Better to fight it together.