I only post here when I really need to get something sorted out in my head and other options, like actually talking about it, seem to fall horribly short of comforting and take a pretty long detour around resolution. I also think this may be the last post, as it truly defines the title of this blog and kind of marks the end of a full circle...it really seems as though it may have been quite a caricature this time...
That being said, I appreciate outside opinions; any perspective that can be weeded out of other's experiences is a product built of heartstrings and fragmented pieces which, when shared, might just help to make a little sense of everything. Unfortunately, it has come to my attention that no one in my life has really encountered what it is that I'm trying to process. The result is me incessantly babbling and being met with endless skepticism.
Here's the thing about skepticism: I am an almost equal balance of jaded cynic and hopeless romantic; consequently, if I am ever lucky enough to meet someone amazing in this hell hole, chances are I'll want to believe that they're amazing, but the devil on my other shoulder won't let me. So far, that's worked out well, because guess what?! SURPRISE!!! They actually weren't amazing and that pesky horned little fucker was right. Lucky me.
Enter: man of my dreams. Very likely everything I've ever wanted in someone. Not perfection, but perhaps perfect for standing by my side and plotting world domination with me. Now what? Both the little angel of romance and Mr. Cynic with a Pitchfork are standing on opposing shoulders, not quite sure what to say. So I told them both to fuck off and went my own way; I was instantly zen, just having someone awesome to talk to who seemed to have an infinite supply of wit and brilliance, and yet was open and accepting of my bizarre notions about life. He's attractive, artistic, thoughtful, well-read, crazy, spontaneous, and threw the dead baby jokes at me before I even had a chance to line up my best ones. The hopeless romantic was sitting wide-eyed in the corner, having been thrown from my shoulder thinking "Holy shit, where has THIS guy been?" The jaded devil peered through slits for eyes, trying to convey his weariness as things are never what they seem.
As we can see, the perfect balance of two opposing sides is pretty far from perfect; being the hopeless romantic lets one continue thinking that they just may find that person who fits with them like a puzzle piece, but the jaded cynic will look for any reason to flee or believe that it's not as it appears. In this case, I didn't need skepticism from the outside. For once in my life, I needed someone to quell MY cynicism, because unfortunately, skepticism is not going to prohibit me from getting hurt, but it WILL prevent me from being fully happy, even if only in the moment. All I wanted was to believe I had met someone amazing and relish in that until something changed my mind or until I got a chance to know him better. So that's what I did. I basked in every second of intelligent conversation, being free to be me and free to get to know someone who was actually worth knowing. I quelled all expectations the best I could, but never extinguished the little flickers of hope that it may eventually be something more; given that this 'meeting' occurred while residing in two different countries, there was no danger of me feeling stifled and I actually formed some sort of connection with someone without the normal tendency to flee elicited by the fear of being smothered. I actually wanted this person around. And I'll admit it, I was facetiously planning the graveyard wedding in my head. I expected those around me to see that this was a mere girlish assertion of the fact that I was thoroughly impressed by someone; not that it was a memo to go buy a bridesmaid's dress. But no, I don't get to be impressed. I don't get to hope, because I'm the jaded cynic, the independent female who intimidates everyone, the "I need my space, stop smothering me," no-relationship girl.
Well, let's fast forward to today. I was right: I met someone amazing. I was also right to not have expectations because expectations almost inevitably lead to disappointment; yet lastly, I'm human, and I was right again: being cautious did NOT prohibit me from getting hurt. Because after six weeks of assertions that this person thought I was amazing as well, I let myself get a little excited. I let myself think that there was someone with whom I could be in the room for more than five minutes without looking about for sharp objects to impale them or myself. And being right about all of those things didn't prevent me from being wrong about the most damaging one: that the feeling was reciprocated.
I do recognize that my assumption of being wrong is an assertion based on sheer emotion, completely outside of the logic that i know exists somewhere in the situation as plenty of extenuating circumstances must be afforded to the party who doesn't get a chance to speak here; I honestly don't have a clue what to believe, perhaps it is just a matter of time and I over-analyze. That doesn't change the fact of how it feels. In my head, it all inevitably equates to one thing. I can sit here, re-reading messages, reiterating the things that made my heart skip and my breath catch, and I can make excuses for lack of contact, and I can be understanding, and I can look at things from a logical perspective...and really, all that adds up to in my mind is "He's just not that into you," or a million other cliches that tell me I didn't balance it quite right, and that the hopeless romantic angel was riding the giddy monster in that last lap, speeding toward the finish line, while the jaded cynic had to stop at the Gatorade stand. Unfortunately, the giddy monster suffered cardiac arrest, the angel landed in the dirt, and who came bounding over the finish line, dixie cup in hand? You guessed it. The devil wins.
I'm not looking to be passive-aggressive; there's thankfully only about a 1% chance that said person will see this, much less make it to the last paragraph before deciding I'm bat-shit crazy and cutting off the iota of contact we had left. If I couldn't say it out loud, perhaps I shouldn't say it, but I'm honest to a fault and it is what it is. Again, this is just how I process things as saying it out loud IS pretty crazy. I may have been a bit silly to have thought a connection, one of any sort, could really be created from 6000 miles away, and maybe even a bit sillier to believe it could seamlessly transition into real life like I saw it in my head.
Unfortunately, all I can do is speculate, because asking directly will most assuredly come off as some bizarre sense of entitlement, expectation, or just level 5 stalker for admitting that I felt something that likely seems too intense for the context thus far. I barely know this person and I sound like I'm drafting the epitaph for my heart; but when you're a hopeless cynic and a jaded romantic, sometimes it IS like that when you find yourself fooled. I didn't need serious; I didn't need overdone; I just needed to continue interacting with this person on the level I had been, perhaps in a face-to-face fashion, or to hear some assertion that although life sometimes gets in the way, I wasn't being tossed aside. Well, look at that...of all the things I wanted to believe existed, I only ended up with the "Too good to be true" demon who hides under your bed and steals your dreams. If nothing else, there were six weeks of amazing conversation that made me smile more, and sleep more peacefully, than I have in years. I suppose if there's a silver lining, that means there are clouds present, and for that, I'll always be happy.
Tuesday, July 12, 2011
Monday, May 2, 2011
Reset button
It's been too long; too long paying for mistakes I've made, too long letting others influence the way I choose to live my life, too long spent being afraid to go after what I want. I live how I wish, but I care for the people in my life and I make every effort to remain a good friend and a good person, overall. However, nothing should come at the expense of my own peace of mind. I wake up every morning with instant anxiety. I rarely sleep enough because I can't switch my brain off and the best I can do is restless tossing and turning between short bouts of shut down. I constantly assert the level of space that I need, being a solitary person, but too often sacrifice this when someone asserts a need. I put my own neurosis aside, painting it with that label, neurosis, somehow assuming that I don't have the right to such eccentricities of character, and thus put the 'needs' of others first. No more. I am self-aware enough to state exactly what I need and I refuse to let the neediness of others shove that to the back burner. I compromise and will continue to do so for those I love, but will not feel guilty for putting my needs first. I own my life, I've gotten to this point by myself; I've had a lot of help, and I will continue to always help a friend in need, day or night...but not at such a high price that what I need is outweighed and overlooked. Toxic people: the switch has been flipped. Poison doesn't fit through the strainer I'm using, so please just move along. People whom I love: bear with me, because I've done the same for you.
I have goals I need to tackle, habits I need to eliminate and others I need to cling to, and decisions to make for myself. I need to live again, and currently, bullshit keeps getting in the way of me doing that to the degree at which I thrive. I am who I am and as Marilyn once said, "If you can't handle me at my worst, you sure as hell don't deserve me at my best."
I have goals I need to tackle, habits I need to eliminate and others I need to cling to, and decisions to make for myself. I need to live again, and currently, bullshit keeps getting in the way of me doing that to the degree at which I thrive. I am who I am and as Marilyn once said, "If you can't handle me at my worst, you sure as hell don't deserve me at my best."
Sunday, March 13, 2011
Get in the ring...
I despise the moment when the only thought running through my head is “I give up. I GIVE UP. I. GIVE. THE. FUCK. UP.” I’d like to think that I’m a pretty strong individual; I’ve never been a proponent of throwing in the towel when shit gets hard. More often than not, I’ll put up one hell of a fight for whatever I believe in, even in the face of impossibility when it just may be a good idea to actually call it quits and accept defeat. I think the one context in which this though consumes every pathway in my brain is when my heart hurts. It’s a strange feeling of apathy, given the shit that I’ve overcome. I’ve been a mess, lying on the floor in the fetal position, balls-deep in a panic attack because one of the only people I had ever loved just really couldn’t seem to muster anything close to what I felt. There was a long string of interactions in the years following and I was able to realize pretty quickly that no matter how deeply someone cut, or how much I may have wanted the fairytale ending, there wasn’t a damn thing I couldn’t overcome and hell if I was going to waste my time dwelling on what could have, should have, would have been. For some reason, I’m on this god-forsaken planet and I’m hell bent on making it worth every minute.
The amount of times I’ve seen my heart dragged through the mud, thrown out of car windows, left lying in a puddle of my own metaphorical vomit…you get the idea, there have been countless crash and burn situations, whether I drove the car into the wall or not, it still hurts. I can get through anything and I pride myself on the ability to feel deeply, but bounce back quickly; unlike a lot of lucky people, I learned how to do it pretty late in life. Sometimes I get worried that no one will ever make a big enough impact to get me to give up a life of complete selfish solitude. I do what I want, when I want, and my actions don’t have a significant direct impact on very many people. I like my freedom to be who I am. IS there anyone out there who might love me without stifling me? I hope so. But hope hasn’t been very good to me lately. The times I find that I want to give up and become a hermit cat lady living in a decrepit old house with a black wrought-iron fence, a creaky gate and weeds for days, are the times when I really think something is worthwhile, and I let the walls down, usually pretty quickly in these instances (don’t get me wrong, I hold onto a few defense mechanisms) and then I find out I was wrong. I made a vast error in judgment, misread a situation and came out on the other side wondering what kind of lenses of delusion I had happened upon to make me think that the situation was coming even close to making me happy. I tend to think it’s everyone else I want to give up on; that humanity as a whole has disappointed me so many times, that the next little scrape on my heart was just the last straw. However, it’s much more a level of disappointment in myself that makes me think, “Huh. So you’re STILL trying to be something other than an emotional idiot and pretending you can commit to someone if the right person came along, huh? You’re STILL a hopeless romantic that thinks you’ll get the happily ever after if you just give one more person a chance?” Hmmm. How can such a jaded cynic be so naïve?
I am a walking contradiction: Far too stone-hearted to love the way I do, far too jaded to be such a hopeless romantic, far too serious to be so adverse to any sort of plan, boundary, or commitment, too solitary to live a life rooted in love, too hopeful to be so jaded…and so I get to the point where it all goes out the window, I sigh, and I want to just. Give. Up. Because one more person hurt my feeling when I thought I could trust them not to, or failed to acknowledge such when I thought that hurting me was accidental. We all hurt the ones we care about; unfortunately, it’s usually inevitable. I think the difference that keeps me in the ring, fighting for what I want in life, is the people that are there with me. If you hurt me, it’s because I let you; I let you in, I opened my heart, and unfortunately that gives you a much easier pathway to come in with guns blazing and leave a few bullet holes. I guess the bottom in line is that I don’t give up; not on me. I’m going to misjudge people, I’m going to make shitty decisions, but every day is another chance to live, and that’s what I’m going to keep doing. Maybe I have a rough time giving up on something I thought was worthwhile, but cutting ties is much better than holding onto the ropes bleeding and pleading for a TKO.
I may be too neurotic, too hopeful, too analytical, too human…but I keep trying and the people who understand me get all of the good that comes out of the fact that I’ll never stop fighting. I protect what I love. I protect who I love. That includes myself and my heart. I will give you everything I have if I’ve decided to let you past the walls and the padlocks, but if you make it into the ring, you better be prepared to be in my corner. It might be bloodbath that sometimes gets in your eyes and clouds your vision, and you might even take a few swings at me, because the fight can get a little messy at time, but if you’re in my corner, you’ll never lose the fight.
The amount of times I’ve seen my heart dragged through the mud, thrown out of car windows, left lying in a puddle of my own metaphorical vomit…you get the idea, there have been countless crash and burn situations, whether I drove the car into the wall or not, it still hurts. I can get through anything and I pride myself on the ability to feel deeply, but bounce back quickly; unlike a lot of lucky people, I learned how to do it pretty late in life. Sometimes I get worried that no one will ever make a big enough impact to get me to give up a life of complete selfish solitude. I do what I want, when I want, and my actions don’t have a significant direct impact on very many people. I like my freedom to be who I am. IS there anyone out there who might love me without stifling me? I hope so. But hope hasn’t been very good to me lately. The times I find that I want to give up and become a hermit cat lady living in a decrepit old house with a black wrought-iron fence, a creaky gate and weeds for days, are the times when I really think something is worthwhile, and I let the walls down, usually pretty quickly in these instances (don’t get me wrong, I hold onto a few defense mechanisms) and then I find out I was wrong. I made a vast error in judgment, misread a situation and came out on the other side wondering what kind of lenses of delusion I had happened upon to make me think that the situation was coming even close to making me happy. I tend to think it’s everyone else I want to give up on; that humanity as a whole has disappointed me so many times, that the next little scrape on my heart was just the last straw. However, it’s much more a level of disappointment in myself that makes me think, “Huh. So you’re STILL trying to be something other than an emotional idiot and pretending you can commit to someone if the right person came along, huh? You’re STILL a hopeless romantic that thinks you’ll get the happily ever after if you just give one more person a chance?” Hmmm. How can such a jaded cynic be so naïve?
I am a walking contradiction: Far too stone-hearted to love the way I do, far too jaded to be such a hopeless romantic, far too serious to be so adverse to any sort of plan, boundary, or commitment, too solitary to live a life rooted in love, too hopeful to be so jaded…and so I get to the point where it all goes out the window, I sigh, and I want to just. Give. Up. Because one more person hurt my feeling when I thought I could trust them not to, or failed to acknowledge such when I thought that hurting me was accidental. We all hurt the ones we care about; unfortunately, it’s usually inevitable. I think the difference that keeps me in the ring, fighting for what I want in life, is the people that are there with me. If you hurt me, it’s because I let you; I let you in, I opened my heart, and unfortunately that gives you a much easier pathway to come in with guns blazing and leave a few bullet holes. I guess the bottom in line is that I don’t give up; not on me. I’m going to misjudge people, I’m going to make shitty decisions, but every day is another chance to live, and that’s what I’m going to keep doing. Maybe I have a rough time giving up on something I thought was worthwhile, but cutting ties is much better than holding onto the ropes bleeding and pleading for a TKO.
I may be too neurotic, too hopeful, too analytical, too human…but I keep trying and the people who understand me get all of the good that comes out of the fact that I’ll never stop fighting. I protect what I love. I protect who I love. That includes myself and my heart. I will give you everything I have if I’ve decided to let you past the walls and the padlocks, but if you make it into the ring, you better be prepared to be in my corner. It might be bloodbath that sometimes gets in your eyes and clouds your vision, and you might even take a few swings at me, because the fight can get a little messy at time, but if you’re in my corner, you’ll never lose the fight.
Monday, November 8, 2010
Greed is a bottomless pit...
There is no end to greed; However, I find it interesting that greed and selfishness seem to be infinite in our society, yet those who chase after it with such fervor and disregard for all else, still manage to become bottom-dwellers. How does one lurk upon the bottom of a black hole? Amazingly enough, the egocentric sloths find a way to drain all others around them, and seek satisfaction from a source of infinite emptiness...and yet still find time to ponder why people treat them poorly, omit them from their lives, or why on earth life isn't smiling on them in the fashion which they desire. Must just be bad luck right?
Why do these soul-sucking wastes of space still manage to exist in our lives no matter how much we refuse to accept bullshit from people? Because they're a sneaky breed: part ninja, part vampire, part parasite, this particular creature sneaks beneath the radar with their ninja skills, sucks kindness like a vampire, and then latches on, somehow tricking their host into believing they NEED to be fed.
Thankfully, the genuine people of the race can usually use their own Ninja skills to avoid these filthy, spirit-siphoning leeches; I however, have not always been so lucky.
I've got a well-constructed suit of armor that protects my heart. Keys to surpass it are available, but are not easily obtained. Once you've passed the test, however, you're rarely denied entry. It's one of my biggest flaws. I refuse to take bullshit and I cherish those who have managed to secure a place inside my heart. However, sometimes I misjudge and accept a leech disguised as a decent person; Once I become aware of said misjudgment, I fall upon the same quandary that likely occurred in the first place: everyone fucks up, everyone does things which they later may not be proud of; isn't it my obligation to stick by those whom I call friends, even when they screw up? It's a blurry line between repeatedly screwing up, epitomizing selfishness, and just falling off of the right path and acting like an ass as a result. The former looks a lot like the latter; until it finally goes way too far.I'm trying to sharpen that line. Selfishness is an affliction I'm not willing to deal with. I try my utmost to be a good person and to treat people with respect, kindness, and understanding. I will continue to do so, but in order to alleviate the tension that this attempted soul-sucking creates, I have to sometimes throw it out there in hopes that I'll allow myself to gain a greater understanding of how to combat it sooner.
Bottom line: I will give until I have nothing left; however, the people who deserve it are there to replenish the reserve. For the bottom-dwellers, I only have this: Tread lightly on the backs of those you trample while you try to get to the top; chances are, they'll eventually walk out from underneath you and you'll plummet. Good luck flying.
Why do these soul-sucking wastes of space still manage to exist in our lives no matter how much we refuse to accept bullshit from people? Because they're a sneaky breed: part ninja, part vampire, part parasite, this particular creature sneaks beneath the radar with their ninja skills, sucks kindness like a vampire, and then latches on, somehow tricking their host into believing they NEED to be fed.
Thankfully, the genuine people of the race can usually use their own Ninja skills to avoid these filthy, spirit-siphoning leeches; I however, have not always been so lucky.
I've got a well-constructed suit of armor that protects my heart. Keys to surpass it are available, but are not easily obtained. Once you've passed the test, however, you're rarely denied entry. It's one of my biggest flaws. I refuse to take bullshit and I cherish those who have managed to secure a place inside my heart. However, sometimes I misjudge and accept a leech disguised as a decent person; Once I become aware of said misjudgment, I fall upon the same quandary that likely occurred in the first place: everyone fucks up, everyone does things which they later may not be proud of; isn't it my obligation to stick by those whom I call friends, even when they screw up? It's a blurry line between repeatedly screwing up, epitomizing selfishness, and just falling off of the right path and acting like an ass as a result. The former looks a lot like the latter; until it finally goes way too far.I'm trying to sharpen that line. Selfishness is an affliction I'm not willing to deal with. I try my utmost to be a good person and to treat people with respect, kindness, and understanding. I will continue to do so, but in order to alleviate the tension that this attempted soul-sucking creates, I have to sometimes throw it out there in hopes that I'll allow myself to gain a greater understanding of how to combat it sooner.
Bottom line: I will give until I have nothing left; however, the people who deserve it are there to replenish the reserve. For the bottom-dwellers, I only have this: Tread lightly on the backs of those you trample while you try to get to the top; chances are, they'll eventually walk out from underneath you and you'll plummet. Good luck flying.
Monday, September 6, 2010
The Fortune Teller's Tent
You wander into the tent, a little skeptical, a little curious. You may know where you're going, but do you really want to know your final destination? You want to know what will happen with your career, your family, your whirlwind social life? I think that everyone wonders; everyone dreams of a perfect life in which they are able to achieve every goal and desire. Some may even be inherent; i personally think the desire for love is inherent, and that life is about fulfilling it. It's a multi-faceted road through chaos that we're living, but that happens to be a pretty significant facet in the lens through which I view life. So let's take a gander into the crystal ball, shall we?
Giddy infatuation, butterflies, need, desire, passion, insatiability, curiosity…
Constantly thinking about someone, missing them when they’re gone, thinking about someone when you open your eyes in the morning, allowing them to invade your head while you complete menial tasks, not wanting to sleep because a dream will likely fall short.
It’s not love. But it could be; if you’re one of the lucky ones who finds the person for whom you’d risk your heart, because one minute of the feeling in the depth of your soul is absolutely worth that risk. If you’re lucky, you might find it once. If you’re really lucky, you might find it multiple times. And others just might not ever run into what some consider to be the reason to live and breathe. It isn’t about success in a career, about the hobbies you love, about the places you go…all of these things might help to comprise the person who you’ve become or who you long to be, and thus I make no implication that these types of things are unimportant. However, the intangible, the things which you feel so deeply that they remain imprinted long after twinges of emotion may have subsided, the daily interaction with people who make an impression so deep that you think of them long after they’ve disappeared from your life, or continue to think about them with such incredible levels of affection, even after seeing them every day for years…it’s these things that make life worth living.
And then slowly, like a burglar creeping in through the window, or a spider weaving a web in the corner above your front door, life gets in the way. One forgets to kiss the one to whom they came home, fails to ask about the day they’ve had. They forget the times they’ve been hurt, devastated, heart-broken, betrayed; and they begin to lose sight of what it means to love, to care about someone, to think about them and consider their feelings within each action. They crawl into bed at night, a car length-divide between two disconnected bodies; two sets of eyes, staring at opposing walls, listening to the guarded breathing of the one whose back is turned to them in a stilted effort to ignore the sneaking wonder of what went wrong. Love can be everything, but to some people, it’s a state of being which they never seem to grasp; one through which they can never wade because they are too caught up with the only life preserver they have…the one for themselves. People change, evolve, life happens; but actual love is so deeply rooted that when the shit hits the fan, it may waver, it may become shaken and damaged, but it doesn't end. This is where I find issue with marriage, commitment, social interaction in general; too many humans lose sight of how to treat each other and the indescribable value of finding genuine, amazing people with whom you can be yourself.
Love is that moment when in the middle of an angry, disagreement, the object of your affection smiles at you and the anger dissipates. You remember how lucky you are to have found something so pure. You look at the way he smiles, hear the way he says your name, and you remember that life lies within the ability to love and be loved.
The people at Hallmark have been trying to put the most effective words to use for years, to display love in a way that can illuminate the feeling that makes a heart continue to beat. I’m truly not trying to do such. I don’t wish to define love or preach about how it feels or the importance of it. I merely voice my opinion to express how important it is to me.
I fight commitment like an onset of the swine flu. I like to be alone, I need space, room to be who I am without question and criticism; but also room to grow and improve and thrive with people who understand my flaws and love me for them, not just in spite of them. I fight the idea of relationships because I think that there are too few people in the world who truly understand love and view it in the way which I’ve grown to see it. I don’t imply that my way is the only way, or even the right way. However, it is my way. My armor is more reliable than my AmEx card and you can bet your ass, I don’t leave home without it. It’s a tough fucking world and I don’t take kindly to being wounded. However, I don’t wear the armor out of fear, I wear it to fight off the wounds that don’t even deserve to touch the skin; then I have time for those that are worth the pain, because as a wise man once mentioned: everyone is going to hurt you, you just have to figure out which ones are worth the pain. So I make my way through the world, happy with who I am, happy with the life I’ve built for myself and the interactions I’ve been privileged enough to have encountered. There have been some ugly ones and there are quite a few dents and gashes in that suit of armor, but they merely show that I’ve lived and haven’t spent my time afraid to step out onto the battlefield.
Life is about balance; striking a balance between your own needs and the needs of those whom you love; balance between work, family, friends, school, hobbies, errands; balance between the cooking, the cleaning, the sleep and the waking; the driving, the thriving, living and dying. Life is a house of cards, waiting for the slightest breeze to send those which are not properly balanced, tumbling to the ground. I don’t want to be alone forever; I think the need for companionship is inherent. However, I’m happy, I’m not incomplete, and I’d choose to be alone before I’d settle for anything less than actual love. I know it because I’ve felt it. There’s nothing like it in the world. If I don’t find it again, that’s ok. I’m going to live every second like it’s my last and have a damn good time doing it; but I’m ok with a little twinge of a dream that there’s someone amazing out there that can live up to the adventure and never take life or love for granted. Either way, I’m gonna have the time of my life, because you only get one and it’s ending one minute at a time.
Giddy infatuation, butterflies, need, desire, passion, insatiability, curiosity…
Constantly thinking about someone, missing them when they’re gone, thinking about someone when you open your eyes in the morning, allowing them to invade your head while you complete menial tasks, not wanting to sleep because a dream will likely fall short.
It’s not love. But it could be; if you’re one of the lucky ones who finds the person for whom you’d risk your heart, because one minute of the feeling in the depth of your soul is absolutely worth that risk. If you’re lucky, you might find it once. If you’re really lucky, you might find it multiple times. And others just might not ever run into what some consider to be the reason to live and breathe. It isn’t about success in a career, about the hobbies you love, about the places you go…all of these things might help to comprise the person who you’ve become or who you long to be, and thus I make no implication that these types of things are unimportant. However, the intangible, the things which you feel so deeply that they remain imprinted long after twinges of emotion may have subsided, the daily interaction with people who make an impression so deep that you think of them long after they’ve disappeared from your life, or continue to think about them with such incredible levels of affection, even after seeing them every day for years…it’s these things that make life worth living.
And then slowly, like a burglar creeping in through the window, or a spider weaving a web in the corner above your front door, life gets in the way. One forgets to kiss the one to whom they came home, fails to ask about the day they’ve had. They forget the times they’ve been hurt, devastated, heart-broken, betrayed; and they begin to lose sight of what it means to love, to care about someone, to think about them and consider their feelings within each action. They crawl into bed at night, a car length-divide between two disconnected bodies; two sets of eyes, staring at opposing walls, listening to the guarded breathing of the one whose back is turned to them in a stilted effort to ignore the sneaking wonder of what went wrong. Love can be everything, but to some people, it’s a state of being which they never seem to grasp; one through which they can never wade because they are too caught up with the only life preserver they have…the one for themselves. People change, evolve, life happens; but actual love is so deeply rooted that when the shit hits the fan, it may waver, it may become shaken and damaged, but it doesn't end. This is where I find issue with marriage, commitment, social interaction in general; too many humans lose sight of how to treat each other and the indescribable value of finding genuine, amazing people with whom you can be yourself.
Love is that moment when in the middle of an angry, disagreement, the object of your affection smiles at you and the anger dissipates. You remember how lucky you are to have found something so pure. You look at the way he smiles, hear the way he says your name, and you remember that life lies within the ability to love and be loved.
The people at Hallmark have been trying to put the most effective words to use for years, to display love in a way that can illuminate the feeling that makes a heart continue to beat. I’m truly not trying to do such. I don’t wish to define love or preach about how it feels or the importance of it. I merely voice my opinion to express how important it is to me.
I fight commitment like an onset of the swine flu. I like to be alone, I need space, room to be who I am without question and criticism; but also room to grow and improve and thrive with people who understand my flaws and love me for them, not just in spite of them. I fight the idea of relationships because I think that there are too few people in the world who truly understand love and view it in the way which I’ve grown to see it. I don’t imply that my way is the only way, or even the right way. However, it is my way. My armor is more reliable than my AmEx card and you can bet your ass, I don’t leave home without it. It’s a tough fucking world and I don’t take kindly to being wounded. However, I don’t wear the armor out of fear, I wear it to fight off the wounds that don’t even deserve to touch the skin; then I have time for those that are worth the pain, because as a wise man once mentioned: everyone is going to hurt you, you just have to figure out which ones are worth the pain. So I make my way through the world, happy with who I am, happy with the life I’ve built for myself and the interactions I’ve been privileged enough to have encountered. There have been some ugly ones and there are quite a few dents and gashes in that suit of armor, but they merely show that I’ve lived and haven’t spent my time afraid to step out onto the battlefield.
Life is about balance; striking a balance between your own needs and the needs of those whom you love; balance between work, family, friends, school, hobbies, errands; balance between the cooking, the cleaning, the sleep and the waking; the driving, the thriving, living and dying. Life is a house of cards, waiting for the slightest breeze to send those which are not properly balanced, tumbling to the ground. I don’t want to be alone forever; I think the need for companionship is inherent. However, I’m happy, I’m not incomplete, and I’d choose to be alone before I’d settle for anything less than actual love. I know it because I’ve felt it. There’s nothing like it in the world. If I don’t find it again, that’s ok. I’m going to live every second like it’s my last and have a damn good time doing it; but I’m ok with a little twinge of a dream that there’s someone amazing out there that can live up to the adventure and never take life or love for granted. Either way, I’m gonna have the time of my life, because you only get one and it’s ending one minute at a time.
Friday, July 30, 2010
The Joust tent
“Perhaps your knight in shining armor is a mere boy in tin foil…”
I hear so many assertions that chivalry is dead, but I don’t buy it. Chivalry didn’t die, it just went on a long vacation from the shallow, bar-traipsing bitches who disease the world with a sense of entitlement merely because they have breasts; they taint the common opinion for the rest of the gender. However, men tend to do the same for their poor species; my male friends constantly complain that there aren’t any genuine, intelligent, worth-while girls to date, yet when they find them, they act like complete idiots.
I’m not necessarily looking for a knight, and I’d certainly like to do without the armor for once. I’m independent, I need an extreme of space, and I certainly don’t need to be rescued. In the inventory of armor, I’ve got plenty for the entire occupancy of the Round Table, it’d be nice to find someone who allowed me to shed it and perhaps let it get a little rusty.
I suppose that level of worthiness is completely dependent upon my own willingness; I hate to shed the armor and have to lift it all back up again when people prove to be ready to merely impale me with their sword, in nowhere near the way that such an innuendo could prove to be positive. No, we’re talking blood, and guts, not a flurry of erotica out of an Elizabethan romance.
So. Long story short, I shed the armor. I lost the joust. The knight walks out of the arena as though he’s won, when really, he overlooked what the prize really was. He spilled blood, yes. Not many have done so, congratulations. But he missed the actual main event.
Someone once told me that I presume too often, while I claim to merely assess the information that I’ve been given, and determine my own opinion based on such. I honestly am still unsure what other choice I have in a world where people cover themselves with armor and refuse to stand in the arena and just fight. If the opponent is kept hidden, I don’t know what I’m up against and I have to form a strategy accordingly. Or die.
I wanted a shield. I wanted my armor. But I took it off, and I got wounded. Now, bleeding, in the middle of the dust, crowd on its feet, I get back up. I stepped into the arena, I fought for what I wanted, and now I'll walk away, head held high because I did so. My opponent thought he won. Unfortunately, he failed to see, we should have been fighting together.
I hear so many assertions that chivalry is dead, but I don’t buy it. Chivalry didn’t die, it just went on a long vacation from the shallow, bar-traipsing bitches who disease the world with a sense of entitlement merely because they have breasts; they taint the common opinion for the rest of the gender. However, men tend to do the same for their poor species; my male friends constantly complain that there aren’t any genuine, intelligent, worth-while girls to date, yet when they find them, they act like complete idiots.
I’m not necessarily looking for a knight, and I’d certainly like to do without the armor for once. I’m independent, I need an extreme of space, and I certainly don’t need to be rescued. In the inventory of armor, I’ve got plenty for the entire occupancy of the Round Table, it’d be nice to find someone who allowed me to shed it and perhaps let it get a little rusty.
I suppose that level of worthiness is completely dependent upon my own willingness; I hate to shed the armor and have to lift it all back up again when people prove to be ready to merely impale me with their sword, in nowhere near the way that such an innuendo could prove to be positive. No, we’re talking blood, and guts, not a flurry of erotica out of an Elizabethan romance.
So. Long story short, I shed the armor. I lost the joust. The knight walks out of the arena as though he’s won, when really, he overlooked what the prize really was. He spilled blood, yes. Not many have done so, congratulations. But he missed the actual main event.
Someone once told me that I presume too often, while I claim to merely assess the information that I’ve been given, and determine my own opinion based on such. I honestly am still unsure what other choice I have in a world where people cover themselves with armor and refuse to stand in the arena and just fight. If the opponent is kept hidden, I don’t know what I’m up against and I have to form a strategy accordingly. Or die.
I wanted a shield. I wanted my armor. But I took it off, and I got wounded. Now, bleeding, in the middle of the dust, crowd on its feet, I get back up. I stepped into the arena, I fought for what I wanted, and now I'll walk away, head held high because I did so. My opponent thought he won. Unfortunately, he failed to see, we should have been fighting together.
Friday, November 13, 2009
The Blood Bath Tent
Strangely enough, as jaded, cynical, and bitter as I can be, I seem to have escaped all of the bullshit without too many unresolved trust issues; however, I’ve definitely got at least one: I don’t trust the request for complete honesty, because as much as people ask for it, they usually can’t handle it. I possess, and frequently use, a level of honesty that makes people extremely uncomfortable. Based on this, I’m too often labeled as intimidating, bitchy, or whatever negatively-denoting moniker people choose to fling at me. Plenty of people claim that they want to know the truth; they want to receive the information that makes the cogs turn in other’s heads. Yet when they get it, the reaction is much closer to that which would be produced had one gotten a bizarre form of sheep AIDS.
In any case, for the sake of my current thought, I really couldn’t care less about those people. Sadly, they probably comprise somewhere in the range of 90% of the general population, but I say fuck ‘em. What seems to be currently bouncing around in my gray matter, are the ones who have the balls to listen to and accept what they ask for. I’ve recently gotten closer to someone who can do that with such a level of maturity, sensitivity, and understanding, that it blows my fucking mind. So lo and behold: I’m NOT intimidating. I’m NOT too honest. Everyone else just happens to be scared shitless of the truth. I’ve not only been lucky enough to encounter someone who is brave enough to handle honesty, but who also clearly accepts me for exactly who I am. The result is the most open, bullshit-free, peaceful, thought-provoking, line of communication I’ve seen in a VERY long time.
So to a point, I’ve been consensually stripped. I’ve opened up more than I do on a regular basis, even within the common context of my blatant honesty. I’ve admitted weaknesses, I’ve spit in the face of the stigma regarding how people are SUPPOSED to interact with one another, and have been allowed the freedom to just be.
In the absence of trust issues, I’ve still admitted that I’ve got plenty of others; most prominently, commitment issues. Stemming partially from the hatred of unwanted obligation, the real core of the issue can be visibly seen upon my proverbial sleeve. My heart sits on the outside, and it resembles the cutting board in a butcher shop, after all the valuable parts have been swept away and put up for sale in a fingerprint-smeared glass case. Bottom line, my heart has been stabbed, obliterated, lacerated, walked-on, tread-through and smeared as much as anyone else's, and eventually, I mopped it up, shoved it all back together, and decided that another instance wasn’t worth the risk. I put the walls up, and put the heart in a tomb that even the most torqued-up chainsaws haven’t been able to penetrate.
So what happens when one comes along with a skillful scalpel? One so sharp, shiny, and precise, that I spread my arms, look the surgeon in the eye, and allow them to cut?
Palahniuk said, “In order to be truly happy, one must risk being completely cut open.” For so long, I held the armor in place anyway, because I didn’t believe the happiness was worth the risk. I’m happy with who I am, and I really questioned how another boot heel to the heart could potentially alter me too greatly.
Free from the drama, free from the bullshit games, I was given the chance to consider within my own twisted soul, whether or not I was right. And I was. The risk has never been worth it. And I’ve never let myself be cut open; until now. So I’m lying on the cutting table, with a few incisions, and I’m wondering what to do next. Because the scalpel is so skilled, and so brilliant, that I wonder if I may let my skin be stripped off, piece by piece, slowly and methodically. It must be slowly. And looking the surgeon in the eye, I’m not scared.
At times, I may still jump off the table and cover myself back up, like a frightened child under the covers. Or I may shiver a little at the thought of a particularly difficult cut over some previous scar tissue; but for once, I’ve allowed the cut to be made and I’m willing to bleed. I think I'm willing to lie on the table, willing to risk the pain, if the surgeon decides to continue cutting.
In any case, for the sake of my current thought, I really couldn’t care less about those people. Sadly, they probably comprise somewhere in the range of 90% of the general population, but I say fuck ‘em. What seems to be currently bouncing around in my gray matter, are the ones who have the balls to listen to and accept what they ask for. I’ve recently gotten closer to someone who can do that with such a level of maturity, sensitivity, and understanding, that it blows my fucking mind. So lo and behold: I’m NOT intimidating. I’m NOT too honest. Everyone else just happens to be scared shitless of the truth. I’ve not only been lucky enough to encounter someone who is brave enough to handle honesty, but who also clearly accepts me for exactly who I am. The result is the most open, bullshit-free, peaceful, thought-provoking, line of communication I’ve seen in a VERY long time.
So to a point, I’ve been consensually stripped. I’ve opened up more than I do on a regular basis, even within the common context of my blatant honesty. I’ve admitted weaknesses, I’ve spit in the face of the stigma regarding how people are SUPPOSED to interact with one another, and have been allowed the freedom to just be.
In the absence of trust issues, I’ve still admitted that I’ve got plenty of others; most prominently, commitment issues. Stemming partially from the hatred of unwanted obligation, the real core of the issue can be visibly seen upon my proverbial sleeve. My heart sits on the outside, and it resembles the cutting board in a butcher shop, after all the valuable parts have been swept away and put up for sale in a fingerprint-smeared glass case. Bottom line, my heart has been stabbed, obliterated, lacerated, walked-on, tread-through and smeared as much as anyone else's, and eventually, I mopped it up, shoved it all back together, and decided that another instance wasn’t worth the risk. I put the walls up, and put the heart in a tomb that even the most torqued-up chainsaws haven’t been able to penetrate.
So what happens when one comes along with a skillful scalpel? One so sharp, shiny, and precise, that I spread my arms, look the surgeon in the eye, and allow them to cut?
Palahniuk said, “In order to be truly happy, one must risk being completely cut open.” For so long, I held the armor in place anyway, because I didn’t believe the happiness was worth the risk. I’m happy with who I am, and I really questioned how another boot heel to the heart could potentially alter me too greatly.
Free from the drama, free from the bullshit games, I was given the chance to consider within my own twisted soul, whether or not I was right. And I was. The risk has never been worth it. And I’ve never let myself be cut open; until now. So I’m lying on the cutting table, with a few incisions, and I’m wondering what to do next. Because the scalpel is so skilled, and so brilliant, that I wonder if I may let my skin be stripped off, piece by piece, slowly and methodically. It must be slowly. And looking the surgeon in the eye, I’m not scared.
At times, I may still jump off the table and cover myself back up, like a frightened child under the covers. Or I may shiver a little at the thought of a particularly difficult cut over some previous scar tissue; but for once, I’ve allowed the cut to be made and I’m willing to bleed. I think I'm willing to lie on the table, willing to risk the pain, if the surgeon decides to continue cutting.
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