Resuscitation

Things you do when you have just been broken up with:

Not eat. Drink alot of tea. Smoke alot.

Look at their face book page. Imagine everything they say is an encoded message to you. Cheer up. Or to someone else. Back to wanting to die.

Check your phone.

Do sudoku. Alot. At night. When your bed is a hot enemy and sleep is a rumour.

Plot your new, successful, perfect life. How happy you will be. How achieved those goals will get. How good you'll look. How in love you'll be. How better the next relationship will be. How self sufficient you'll feel. Good hair. Great clothes. Tiny waist. How beautiful your blue and white china sitting on the wooden bench with sunlight filtering over it in your perfect kitchen. Feel wind in your sails. Lie on your bed and cry.

Feel a jolt of painful electricity in your chest when your friend tells you she just got engaged.

Run. Run. Run. Believe that the pain in your legs is the pain ebbing out of your heart.

Not clean the bathroom.

Check your phone.

Not change the sheets for too long. Then change the sheets. Sniff your pillow case on it's way to the washing pile. Sob once as the smell of their greasy head and the knowledge of their goneness wrenches at your soul. Toss the sheets into a pile with the sharp angry flick of resolve. See the sheets drying and wish you could hadn't washed them away.

Cut your hair. Love your new hair. Hate your new hair. Cry.

Over dress in too sexy clothes, go out, get too drunk, kiss someone ugly, fall into a bush.

Tear up when you see animals show affection.

Watch sex and the city. Every season, every episode. Laugh and cry. Think you will be alright.

Write a sad, epic song about them on your guitar. Know that if you could just sing them this song they would understand everything, the burnt bridge between you would be resurrected, they would flood into your life again, touched by your depth of feeling and deep insight. Think about sending them an MP3 file of this song. Restrain yourself.

Write a list of reasons you didn't like them and you're glad you're broken up.
Tell yourself you are over them.
Imagine the list they'd write about you.
Wish you'd been nicer, shared more, less jealous.

Write them an angry, furious, vehemnous, raging email of hatred, blaming them for everything. Send it.
Write them an apologetic, jokey email. Begging them between the lines to take you back. Send it. Promise yourself never to email them again.

Have a moment of happiness. Know that things will be alright.

Sing along loudly to love songs that come on in the car and supermarket. Wonder if God put the songs there to fuck with you.

Check your phone.

Get heart palpitations.

Spend four hundred dollars at the mall. Wear your new expensive mohair cardigan for 24 hours straight. See it in the corner a week later. Regret two things.

Go on a health kick. Start with a green smoothie and lemon water. Have a coffee at lunch. Then a bacon sandwich cuz you're so hungry. Then twelve cigarettes. Start health kick tomorrow.

Call a friend you haven't spoken to for ages.
Tell them everythings great. Hang up and wish you hadn't called them.

Call an ex-flame you think never got over you. Find out they're married. Hang up and cry.

Get thinner. Put on pants you haven't been able to fit for awhile. Tell yourself it will be alright.

Check your phone.

Throw out your ugly underwear. Wish you hadn't worn it around them.

Plot your own suicide, the fictitious imagining of which centres around how sad your ex will be that you are gone. Picture him at the funeral, realise he will get sympathy that he doesn't deserve, and that you had to die to get him to shed a single fucking tear. Decide not to kill yourself.

Check your phone.

Have another tea.