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5:10 p.m. | Sept. 23, 2007

This is supposed to be a journal for one thing and one thing only, but I find myself in a place where I have so much to say, so much emotion to let go of, and I have nowhere else to put it where it might be safe. I'm not even sure if this is a safe place, but I'm going to assume it is, and write here.

I'm stranded in England. I have no money, and my original ticket home isn't for another five days. I can't even afford to stay in this hotel for one more night. Check out is at noon tomorrow. I have great friends who are willing to help me, but they aren't made of money either. Just knowing that and knowing what they are doing for me makes me appreciate it so much more.

I'm angry and I'm hurt and I'm constantly on alert. My body has switched from mostly cool and calm, to fight or flight mode and has been in flight or fight mode for the past almost 48 hours. When we first started to fight. I'm not crazy, and he's not crazy, but we both sure acted as if we were crazy. We fought and fought and fought. Screaming and yelling. Horrible things that came out of our mouths. He took my laptop away. He paid for it, why shouldn't he. I didn't let him until the very end. Wondering why I was hugging it to my chest so hard, as if it were the last thing I was giving up. As if in giving up this one thing, I was giving up everything. I didn't even care about the laptop in the long run, I just wanted to get under his skin. I wanted to keep the one thing he kept fighting for. Because he certainly wasn't fighting for me.

As much as I hate to admit it, in the end when he said he didn't really want the laptop, that I could have it, I wish I hadn't refused. It would have come in handy in getting online here at the hotel, it would have helped keep me sane and in touch with my friends, and it would have kept me entertained since I had games and movies on it.

And the more I think about that, the more I think, shouldn't I be worried about something else?

I love him so much, it hurts. It's like a physical pain being away from him. Everytime I allow myself to think about it properly, I involuntarily start to sob. I love him more than I've loved anybody, I've shared more with him than I have with anybody, and now we're done and over and it doesn't even feel done and over, but it has to be. We can't continue to fight like this. I can't handle it. Our relationship can't handle it. For now, I will curl up in a strange bed in a strange hotel room, and watch strange British television and read my book. When my book is done I'll go buy another. My life has been reduced to pages.