Blue

My dad had beautiful blue eyes. He was also my hero, very sensitive, so funny and he loved to cuddle me to sleep, but none of that stopped him leaving me when I was six. 

Even so in my teens, twenties and beyond I was only attracted to men with blue eyes, but just the ones who were sensitive, funny and liked to cuddle. Also like my dad they soon showed their true colours. I learned that sensitive meant weak, funny meant they had baggage but I kept searching for the right man. I was convinced he was out there but time after time it was the same old story. Until, when I was twenty three, and about to concede defeat and live a life alone, I met Mr Seductive. 

He had beautiful blue eyes and there was an immense sexual attraction from the start, the feelings between us so tangible we both felt the sparks. This had never happened with any other blue eyed man. Sleeping with them, even kissing them, left me cold and no I hadn't been looking for a father figure, I wanted a true, full on sexual relationship that would make my heart sing. Mr Seductive had everything else on my shopping list too without the weakness and the baggage. He was consistently funny, cuddly in the extreme, plus he was an amazing kisser and we had lots in common. In short I felt as if I'd finally struck gold and found my soulmate. 

He was sensitive but strong too and oh how he loved me! Too much, way too much. Quickly his blue eyes would turn to green. His jealousy knew no bounds. He was overly possessive and if I moved into the orbit of another man he would immediately pull me back, glue me to his side, admonish me. He made my brown eyes red. This caused many fiery rows between us but we always kissed and made up. Then after a year of alternating rows and bliss he chose a promotion over me. He said he wouldn't have the time for a personal relationship. There would be too much extra work to do.

I felt like I wasn't enough. Just like I hadn't been enough for my dad to make him stay. 

I'd never been dumped before and I hadn't seen it coming. I felt that life wasn't worth living and I drank a bottle of vodka with pills, lots of pills but I was devastated when I woke up the following morning with the headache from hell, feeling even worse. I was terrified I'd get into a vicious circle of doing this until I succeeded so I confessed what I'd done to my doctor and he had me admitted to a psychiatric ward. I had the blues so seriously that I was kept there, heavily medicated, for more than a year. I was like a zombie but at least I couldn't feel and I loved it but it couldn't last. Within a year I was fully weaned off the tablets and discharged but I had to attend very intensive out patient therapy sessions for a long time after.

My psychiatrist finally said I no longer needed the therapy as soon as he thought I was ready to start socialising again, but I very soon discovered I hadn't learned a thing from my past experiences or the therapy. 

I stupidly continued with my search for the right blue eyed man, albeit this time with a heavy heart, but I'd reached a point where I'd decided the blue eyed men I was attracted to were all I deserved, so I even married one of them. Like the others before him the sensitivity became weakness and the funny was just hiding the baggage. On top there were constant rows about me being controlling but he was so wishy washy he could never make a decision! 

The non-existent sexual attraction on my part didn't help. I managed to dissociate myself whilst in bed by pretending he was Mr Seductive, but my heart wasn't in it and I stopped sleeping with him completely after six months then spent as much time away from him as I could. 

So he went off and had affairs he thought I didn't know about. He even had a child with one of the women and left me for her within two years which suited me fine. 

I carried on with the dating though, determined I would find the one. After all the pills and therapy I still couldn't see that I was irreparably broken so far as men were concerned.

Then the unthinkable happened. When I was thirty my dad died aged just fifty two. I'd had a scant relationship with him since the age of six but even so my brown eyes turned red again, much redder. I accepted that I needed more therapy when I could hear the pills calling me, only much, much more loudly than before. 

After another five years with a different psychiatrist I reached the stage where I could finally stop crying every waking minute, but I never healed. 

My dad was gone. For many years he had left a gaping hole in me that no blue eyed man could ever fill, although I'd tried so hard to replace him and had lived a truly miserable life through doing so. He had torn my heart to pieces by leaving me twice but I finally accepted he hadn't been such a good dad after all. A child is for life, not just for six years. So at last I decided that my quest had to stop.

In the present day, here I am basking in a different kind of blue. Bright blue skies, reflected in the bright blue water, waves crashing on the shore. I love living by the sea. I have one blue eyed companion but I know that he loves me unconditionally. He's Milo, my streetwise cat, who I found as a stray kitten and raised myself. He regularly disappears for a while but in four years he's always come back.

There's a bar round the corner that I sometimes go to. The blue eyed bartender has been eyeing me up for some time but I just buy my drink and sit at an outside table in the shade. When I'd finally realised and accepted how I'd wasted my life and caused myself so much suffering, on top of that already caused by my dad, I found I wanted to distance myself from it all. Really distance myself, but before I acted on moving to another country I made myself a promise. That I would leave all my unhappy memories and self-destructive behaviour in England where they belonged. Alone is the real me and alone I'll stay.

So now it's blue all around me everyday and for the first time it's a happy, unmedicated, completely alone blue, part-time cat notwithstanding. It took me a long time and lots of unnecessary heartache to get here but at last I'm deliberately single, I love it and I'm home. There was a happy blue all along. I just needed to look for it in the right place.