Entanglement - Prologue

Prologue

There are two paths that can lead us through life.  One is the path that the mind chooses.  The other is the path of the heart. Decisions of the mind are usually egotistical desires.  Decisions that spring forth from the heart yield great riches, beyond material and superficial wealth.  Deciding which path to follow is a complicated task. How much are we really in control of our lives anyway?  We may be controlled by something much more powerful than we think, in fact, more powerful than the entire human race combined. You might even catch glimpses of its power of it in your own life.  Who knows, maybe there are signs everywhere that go unnoticed. I have learned to go deeper and trust my heart.

*  *  *

The warning signs were everywhere around me.  I don’t know if I was too close to see them, or if I blocked them out.  Maybe I didn’t want to see them.  Or maybe I just didn’t believe.  But there was nothing I could have done to change the course of events.  As much as I’d like to think that I had any control over my life, the truth is, my life unfolded despite my greatest efforts.  What I do know is that once in the grips of love, nothing in the universe can untangle that imbroglio, for there is nothing more powerful.  I have heard it said that the highest vibration of all energy is love.  There is no doubt about its power.

My life was well established in the trenches of luxury, surrounded by a pretty home in a pretty neighborhood with pretty people.  For over a decade I had worked hard with my husband and built up a successful business.  We ran a high profile and prominent production company.  Our programs were winning awards and airing on national television.  To outsiders, we were successful entrepreneurs, infamous and talented producers.  We were a good team, Derrick and I.  He was the man everyone knew and respected.  He raised the funds and sold the ideas. I came up with the ideas and was the talent behind the scenes who edited and produced the shows.  We were members of the right clubs, served on the right boards, and mingled with high society.

It was late in the summer of 2010 when fate finally ripped the reins out of my hands.  Up to that point I had carefully engineered my destiny through my choices, efforts and actions.  I must have been looking the other way when my intentions derailed and that locomotive and drove me straight into the unknown.

I would have never chosen this track, rather I should say this train wreck.  It didn’t make sense. Everything about my decisions went uncompromisingly in the opposite direction of reason.  After all, I had my life mapped out and this rout wasn’t even on the map.  There was childhood, then the mildly rebellious teenage years, followed by education, marriage, children, career and I had hoped for a good, solid retirement when my loving husband and I could reflect on our life and pass along the wisdom gained from years of hard work.

When I met my husband, Derrick, thirteen years ago he told me that he was a recovering alcoholic and four years sober.  I had no understanding of the dynamics, characteristics, traits or anything about alcoholism at the time.  I just thought that he had decided to quit drinking because he had had enough.  Good for him, I thought and credited him for his decision and strength.  I knew nothing of the control that addiction can take over one’s soul, or the magnitude of the ever-potential impending destruction that it can cause.

The summer of 2010 was the beginning of the unperceivable tides of change. My three beautiful children and I had spent our summer days between the downtown park and at the pool down the street from our house.  We were limited in our options not only by the lack of things to do in this small town, but also by their ages.  Addison was only three and just learning to swim.  Alex and Cammy had been on the swim team since they were five, and the eight and ten year old girls often had different interests than their three-year-old brother.  We had been together every day while my husband submerged himself in research papers and school projects. As the long days grew shorter and cooler, the routine of school and hectic life rapidly approached, and tension mounted in our household. It had been only a few days after Alex and Cammy were back in school when things other than the weather started shifting.

For the past few years Derrick and I had been living off the royalties of our last great enterprise.  We had closed the production company, but the documentary we produced over three years ago was still airing.  There had been no projects since then and it was barely sustaining us financially.  Between the economic downfall and Derrick’s demise when he had turned to Lexapro and other anti-depressants, the production company was run into the ground.  After several months, he finally decided to get off the couch and go back to school.  I suppose it was all that medication that caused him to sleep on the couch day after day, but it was his addictive nature that caused him to later do what he did.

I was continuing to try to build my little business on the side of creating social learning games for kids, which I had started back when things began looking bleak.  Sales were steadily increasing, but it was nowhere near the financial level that the production company had reached.  I devoted as much time to it as possible after the full time responsibility of three young children.  Usually I woke up at around four or five in the morning to get some hours in, but the kids were generally up by six.

Things that had been hidden for years finally became clear at the end of that summer.  The light revealed itself.  I don’t know how I had lived for so long in the dark.  Maybe I didn’t want to see what was right before me.  Maybe the signs were so subtle in their progression that I had failed to notice.  My life had slowly evolved to a level of stress and discomfort that distorted my world, all the while adapting to the norms of my surroundings.  They say that if a frog is placed in luke-warm water and gradually brought to a boil, the frog won’t notice the heat increase and eventually burn to death.  Fortunately, through happenstance and serendipity the boiling water was brought to my attention before I burned to death. Maybe I should have noticed the rising bubbles, but even if I did, I wonder if it would have made a difference.

*    *    *