putting the damage on

Sometimes I read things that I wrote and think

how naive can you be, really?


Incredibly, apparently.
Wow, past, how you slid right in beneath my radar and corrupted me into scenes of love, leaving me, ultimately, with sienna-tinged memories that belie the truth I could never--

then--

see with my eyes open, closed, squinted, or blinded.

Love, & its shades, its forms & malformations: each time, yes, it was love.
But each time was different. I think
the body, the mind/heart
train us to forget the straight-edge fine-line details
and live instead in a smear that shows
feelings existed
but little detail to frame a reference.
This is better than the last
or that was nothing compared to this
I think lies I told myself once upon a handful of years ago.

But:
This (here/now/Her) is incredible love.
Its excitement rivals any other because
there is no doubt, no fear,
no shades of grey.

In vino--- veritas

6:26 pm: Commence live-blogging of my night with plastic cups, wine, and maybe a Xanax because my neck still hurts and I can't seem to release its tension. I just purchased $63 of wine. No, I will not drink it all by myself in one night. See how I did that? Added that qualifier__ in one night. Amazing!
So here's what's going on. I'm dating myself. I've done this before; it's a great way to prepare myself for something/one. Not that I'm actively doing that. Slyly. Because the sky's cloudy. It's peppered with flecks of sunlight but I see lightning, too. Do I ever not speak in metaphors? I mean, seriously.a
For the record, I'm drinking out of a yellow plastic cup from Mama Kwan's in Kill Devil Hills, NC. Mama Kwan's is in Kill Devil Hills, that is. Not me. I'm in fucking blustery Northeast wherever.
Last night, I went to see Girlyman. Probably one of the most amazing Girly shows I've seen- and I've seen them, easily, 12 times. This is the fourth time I've seen them where I saw them last night, and I love it there because it's so incredibly small & therefore intimate. Love love love.
When I left, I realized I didn't want to talk to anyone. I was suppose to meet my friends, out. I didn't. I do that a lot. I went home instead and couldn't care less.

6:32 pm: My plastic cup is empty. I don't really wish I could say that my heart is empty. Because it's not. It's alive.

6:34 pm: Glass half-full; just killed the Blue Fish ... Riesling, I think. It was mostly killed from that night last week. The hot one. I don't think I drank any of it, then.
When I went to refill my glass NO MY CUP MY PLASTIC CUP, I found my black & white cat on top of the refrigerator. Convinced she was trying to steal my food. Asshole.

6:43 pm: I'm fine all day, I think of you at night. I. Love. Girlyman. When they played "Hey Rose" last night, which I totally quoted after aforementioned hotness of nights, Ty said: "This is my don't-knock-it-till-you-try- it song." KNEW IT. So appropo.

6:50 pm: Okay, let's talk about Vermont for a minute. "Everything's Easy" sometimes makes my heart jump a little, nothing major anymore. But I always think of Great Lakes when I hear this song. Obviously. I think it's really fucking great that I don't miss her. I also think it's really fucking great that I learned a lot from that relationship-- things that I will carry with me for a very long time.
What I find "not great" is the fact that my heart is so goddamn brittle. I don't particularly want to love anyone but that's almost a lie but anyway. Trust is a huge, huge thing for me now. I don't know how to trust anyone with my body, with my heart, with my anything. So I build these awesomely towering walls and push people off whenever they get too close to the top. I've done that a lot since, um, April. I don't really want to let anyone in. Okay, so that's a lie, too, but the truth: I don't want to let just anyone in.
What I also find "not great" is how I still want to punch that cunt directly in her lying psychotic face. Let it go, woman. Let it the fuck go.

6:58 pm: My plastic cup hath emptied itself. Again. I hope the next victim is cold enough for consumption.

7:10 pm: I finished the last bit of the Blue Fish-- which was actually a Pinot Grigio. Just opened the Yellow Tail Riesling. I think I preferred the Pinot.
Here's something I have some feelings about- this song: "Sleeping to Dream." It was played recently, after a night that I would like to call the Missed Opportunity of 2009 that Later Turned Into the Great Night of Holy Shit You Kiss Like You Mean It of a Few Days Later 2009. SO about that.
I have a lot of feelings about this, obvs, because I'm not suppose to have feelings about it, so of course I have feelings about it. That's how I roll, friends. That "not suppose to have feelings" part comes from a conversation that one or both parties may have muddied in the week that has passed due to wine and rationalization, however, it was said: No Feelings. Well guess what.
Wait, I have feelings about suppose. Is it supposed or suppose? I feel confused. Let's talk. I mean it. Not in that "we need to talk" doomsday way, but: let's talk. Let's lay it on the table with our hands (do you remember reaching for my hand?) and our words (we have plenty of those but mine tangle away whenever you're around but you talk a lot, especially after some wine, and I think that fucking rules I am sooo ordering a pizza in like 10 minutes). OH JESUS CHRIST GUESS WHAT JUST CAME ON MY iTUNES. I don't know why it's so hard to consider this
But back to my feelings about SLEEPING TO DREAM. I really liked waking up next to you. I liked waking up in those 2ish hours of sleep from near-daybreak to dawn when our arms were smashed together, sticking together actually, and I didn't want to peel away and you know what I don't think you did, either. Because you didn't.

7:17 pm: RT @TheDailyLove: If you want to move forward, forgive yourself, forgive them, accept that it happened, and learn from it & move. No moping.
Also: love Catie Curtis' "Strange."

7:31 pm: I want you. Yes, you. You know exactly who you are.

It's 7:44 pm and I'm drunk. DAMMIT! So. Want. Her. In. My. Bed. Right. Now. And may be drunk enough (hah not really) to text that.

8:02 pm: BBM from me to K --> Godfuckingdammit I **** **r
K responds: I know
I just ordered a pizza
HI DEEJ!!!!

8:14 pm: Eagles/Cowboys on the teevee behind me. Gino just Fbook im'd me re: my crush.
Let's talk about My Crush. She is beautiful. Singularly beautiful. She is such a ridiculously cool woman. We have a lot in common. We're compatible. I think she's wicked hot. I don't exactly know how she feels about me. I try super-hard to have zero expectations, and I do mostly okay with that, but listen, about those feelings: I cannot lie, here. I have feelings.

8:59 pm: Okay, everyone. I have consumed some pizza and decided that DEEJ and I are getting married, so I hope no one is offended by that. If you are, you better fucking speak up.
But, okay, truth: I cannot marry Deej when I so obviously want someone else. Deej, I adore you. And if things cease to exist between me & the Obscure Object, you know, we will fucking run away and be amazing together. :-)
I should stop drinking wine now because my stomach hurts already. WOW amateur.
But anyway, about those Feelings That I Said I Don't Have. I lied.
I was just told that if I didn't have feelings, I'd be a cold-hearted bitch. Which is for sure the truth, but the person that told me that doesn't know what I'm talking about, so...

Dear You:
I find you to be completely fucking amazing. I know you don't like hearing that- you seem to not know how to take compliments- but you are beautiful. Every inch of you: beautiful.
The parts of you that you don't like: beautiful.
I could, and will, luxuriate there all day/night/ever.
I wish you were here now.
Listen, seriously, I know I said I don't want feelings involved but I think you know I already have them. And I don't feel like hiding them. But I do because I'm doing this thing where I sit back and be "cool" while you process or do whateverthefuck it is but hang on my bff is here and she is kidnapping me so I have to go.

All around me are familiar faces / worn out places, worn out faces

What is it about you, October?

You've brought such extremes to my life over the past four years. In the first, it was sugar-high love, the kind you can never get enough of. But even with the sheen of love, life exploded- mania exploded. I remembered, today, the extremity of the Pumpkin Carving of 2006. One wasn't enough. Nor two. Nor three. I distinctly remember driving to buy more pumpkins because she hadn't carved enough. I thought it was cute. I thought it was good: creative energy. But the carving segued into seed-roasting, staying up late to percolate the house with garlic and dill, cinnamon and sugar. Five or six pumpkins' worth of roasted seeds, and we never ate them all, but I knew, for her, it wasn't enough.

October 2006 was also the month of the minor car accident and my distorted/hopeful thoughts that she would always be that compassionate. It was also rolling over in bed the morning after the car accident and feeling so terribly unsafe but not knowing how to say that without ruining everything. Instead, I cried. I shelved the anxiety and she held me and I felt safe again but that moment was off and running before I could so much as focus in on a mental picture that would pull me, lull me through confusion.

But that night, carving on the wooden floors of my parents' kitchen, laughing and loving and her saying: "You are enough. I have no doubt that I love you. I have never been this happy. I have never been this happy."

Is it a lie when you say something without realizing that you actually have no idea what you're talking about because you're saying you're something that you have no concept of? But you're saying it because you want to believe it: "I don't know what happy is, but if I put air into my lungs and exhale with a word (happy) maybe it will be real and I can say all along I knew what it was but had never felt it until I said it and I said it because I want to be. I want to be happy. With you. I want us to be happy."

Here is the truth: I don't think I ever really was.

I know this because June and July, 2009, I finally opened my eyes to happiness. Each morning since then, each half-smile and sparkle of the eye, each deep breath on Saturday afternoons-- I realize, yes, I am happy.

But in October, I have been notoriously unhappy because I have been frequently blindsided and led astray by extremes. In 2007, Columbus Day gained new meaning and now I refer to it as The Columbus Day Massacre of 2007. She said she'd never forget it, and for a while she apologized a lot for it, but she doesn't have to open that closet door multiple times a day and if just for a moment recall that image, that punched-through-the-stomach-into-the-throat feeling, that complete loss of rationale and understanding. For her, it is probably just another step in her unhealthy journey of attempts to forget herself. But I remember the shaking. I remember the blood. I remember my total and complete lack of movement. What I also remember is the anger.

That should have been the last October- it should have been the last of many things. But despite that, despite the following corrupt months of tension and instability and push & pull, DESPITE APRIL... despite my heart arching elsewhere, aching to bloom in spring but instead being drowned by not tears but by hope: October 2008 existed. And it existed for us.

Two things happened in October 2008: she came here, and I went there. The stretches in between were roughed with knowing the end was near and not knowing how to escape it or embrace it. So I avoided it. Because that is what I do.

When she came here, she left a present of blood on my garage floor. I don't know where it is anymore (I stopped looking for it long ago) but I know it's there. There were demons and manic impulses, there was a clear sign of things being anything but right. I pushed, that time. I pushed hard. But my heart is weak, and in the end, I pulled like hell. I tugged with every ounce of my being until I found myself lying alone in bed, feeling the sinking emptiness of our love streaming out from my pores. It needed to be aired out. It needed to be freed.

There was one night in particular when she packed her things and was ready to go. It was late. I was worried. She'd been slipping in and out of consciousness/sanity and I didn't realize until December that what I'd been so worried about was most likely an act of psychosis, in that nothing was wrong with her other than the fact that she was crazy, knew she was losing me, and yet again was pulling extreme measures to try to keep me. I fell for it, then, but only part of me. The other part was too far gone already. Too aware. Too ready to leave and be safe again.

When I went to her, at the end of October 2008, we were sitting on the bed, she was unusually sweet, I was in a horrible mood, and she said our next step was to get married. An extreme leap, again, to maintain us, to push us forward. Never mind that the logical next step was for one of us to move. Or for us to get counseling, together. Or for me to go. I know I didn't say yes, I know I couldn't hide the look of slightly irritated surprise that shocked over my face.

Marriage never came up again.

It couldn't, as no more than two weeks later, she avoided me steadily for a few days and then we broke up. Finally. And I must have known it was coming, after that last visit. Because in the same moment everything felt warm and I was so, so starkly cold.

Last October, in 2008, somewhere between her being here and me being there, I went to a pumpkin patch. I remember writing about it last year. I recall a particular woman, a lesbian at that, and I remember trying to get her to look up and catch my eye. I can't remember if she ever did. Today, I went to that same pumpkin patch. Today, I found myself sitting on a bale of hay on a trailer attached to a tractor, and I looked up to meet eyes with two lesbians sitting directly across from me. They had an elementary-aged girl with them- the daughter of the taller woman. The women alternated staring at me. I don't know what their motive was. Yes, thank you, I know I'm gay and I don't need you staring at me and getting me to curiously look at you for me to suddenly realize I like women. No, I'm not really attracted to either of you and that's why I'm not staring at you. Obviously. As you are staring at me, for whatever reason and no, thank you, I don't care for an explanation.

Today, mid-fall, I saw fall. I surveyed the light blue sky, alit with puffs of clouds, crushing against the burnished pale yellow stalks of corn. I searched for the globes of orange rolling about the crunch-beneath-your-feet landscape of farmland. I felt the wind whipping around me, through me, taking with it memories and leftover pain. I can see and feel these things, I can hear fall puncture the air around me, because October 2009 radiates with the extremity of absence and of silence.

Why does October always feel so cold? I see the warmth radiating between people, and people in-love. I felt that warmth last night: hour upon hour till all I wanted to do was sleep- and I was grateful every second of the night. I have been entertaining, again, the running (north this time: uncharted territory) but sometimes I simply have to be reminded of how lucky I am to have what I have. I am almost ready to admit how much I want that warmth back. I've touched glimpses of it over the past eight months, but it hasn't been enough. It hasn't been the warmth I crave... or the warmth I need, and I don't say that very often but with this whole happy, self-aware, confidence thing comes the reality and admittance that I do have needs and I don't particularly feel like suppressing them ever again.

I could settle. I know this. I could settle very easily, and the only reason I don't (everything there is pretty great, yes, except: ) is because while there is love, I am not in love, and I'm not going to compromise that. So beyond that, beyond the minutiae of my options (diverse as they are), beyond my lingering affections for the Obscure Object, I wonder: where is mine?

Maybe next October will be different. Maybe it won't be extreme. Perhaps next October, in 2010: maybe it will be mine.

this may be interesting only to me

I just hit a new level of letting go: I realized that I don't want her- in any capacity.

I don't even yearn for one last demon-dusted sexual encounter. And I always, always craved sex with her. I can understand, now, that one of the reasons I craved it so much with her was because it was so infrequent. I was absolutely, 100%, wildly attracted to her (and this was a feature in my problem in letting go of her, post break-up). Would I still be, if she were to cross my path now or in the future? I imagine so. Sexual attraction goes a long way for me. Whether or not I want to act on it is a different story.

Truthfully, I haven't "wanted" her for months. That stopped somewhere at the end of spring, and I was filled with a sense of relief in no longer wanting her back as my girlfriend. Once I began to allow myself to see all that had actually gone on in our relationship- once I recognized and labeled my hurt- once I allowed myself to realize that she is surely not the only woman that will ever want me in any capacity- it got easier. There was a shift that ebbed within me throughout the summer: and this summer, it was made entirely of healing, experience, and forward movement. I wouldn't trade a moment of it.

She is gone from my life, and has been been since May. While she still merges into my dreams on occasion, my waking thoughts are focused on other things, other people, other curiosities. I no longer care what she's doing, or who she's doing it with (and I haven't cared about those things for a while). I'm healthier, so much happier, and confident.

The letting go: it has always been difficult for me. I just went through it over the last two weeks with C. It was hard to walk away from that for the simple fact that I knew she wanted me. It's an undeniably good feeling to know that someone likes you. But I wasn't there- and that wasn't fair to either one of us.

With Great Lakes, I never felt safe. I only ever felt wanted in her stretches of needy-mania (typically the pre-self-destructive stages, not the stages of solitude and every other breed of mania that threaded through her) and in the rare sexual encounter. We never had solid ground, and we never found ourselves on the same page. I think, in some ways, the unsteady ride is what kept me hanging on- I wanted to believe it could, and would, get better, and I wanted to be there to see it happen. I always saw so much potential for us.

But potential-- that isn't anything to build a life off of. The here & now is infinitely more important. This isn't to say I don't believe that things can't get better in relationships, whether romantic or otherwise. The measure of betterness comes with the terrain that these "things" are built upon. No one should ever spend so much time being unhappy, uncertain, full of love but with nowhere to direct it.

And the truth is, I cannot fathom driving myself open-eyed into another long-distance relationship. So much of the time that made up my last 3-years-long relationship was spent apart from one another. Had we been closer together, I imagine we would have self-combusted much earlier than we did. Or maybe things would have been different (I doubt that). But I know now that when I enter my next relationship, I want a stronger sense of normalcy, and a much shorter commute to see one another.

Other than that, I don't know what I want. I think that's become fairly obvious over the last month or so. I know what I don't want, and in my case, I think that's more important than its counterpart. Do I want someone who gives as much as I do? Absolutely. Do I want mutually unbridled attraction and adoration? For sure. I want a safe body to lean upon, to rouse from sleep, to nudge into the morning. I want a brain as fueled as, if not more than, mine. I want compassion and respect and laughter and understanding and release and reprieve and excitement and learning and the desire/action to move forward-- together. I want more.

And do I want my Obscure Object? Yes, without a single doubt, I do.

To The Ends

You may not understand this, the way my verbs

stick to nouns and decapitate adjectives

as they hurtle themselves up from my throat.

This glitch in communication-

the part where I couldn’t force

ripples of truth from my depths of discontent. Because

I never told you this, and it seems I never will, I can say it

now. Love doesn’t cover those years

but I don’t know what does. I wanted

your body. I wanted you to be

whole.

I wanted to grasp your demons and shatter them,

rip them limb from limb with the nakedness

of my fingers,

the same fingers that warmed the lengths

of your body, the ones that coursed you between

crashes of orgasms, the very fingers

that enclosed your hands

into my palms. And I never managed

to hold you tightly enough. Strapped to me like a bungee cord

and my heart suffered the lurch and drag

of your eclipsed mind from my waning strength, your charred

sense of truth from my hopes

for (our) balance. The stillness of destruction

would not let me breathe.

Process(ing)

Yesterday, my Voice of Reason told me that I'm living my life (finally?), and it's clear that the chains that tied me to her (great lakes) have been broken. Busted. Shot apart.

On one hand, I completely agree. I am being spontaneous (ie: trip to San Diego this weekend), social (spending a lot of time with my friends, especially Quack, and even going out), and the truth is, I do feel happy. Happier? Happy. I can't tell the difference, but I know I feel different.

On the other hand, I completely fucking disagree- but only on the chains being broken part. I dream about her (GL) far too often. About twice a week. And in every dream I have about her, we are getting back together. There is always kissing, and usually a segue into sex, if not flat-out nudity and sex. Her mom is almost always there (not during the sex, thankfully), and she makes a point to tell me how happy she is that I'm giving her daughter another chance. One dream, last week, her mom told me that she knows her daughter is doing better, but she's still not great, and she is simply grateful that I'm trying again.

I'm not trying again. There's been no contact since I told her to stop contacting me, and that was at the beginning of May. My birthday went by- no word. Her birthday eclipsed without me giving in. For a while, the fact that she didn't contact me hurt like hell. Some days, it still does. Most of the time, I'm grateful for the clear break.

But to say that the chains are broken... I wish with all my heart that I could agree. 98% of my heart, anyway. There is that lingering piece that still loves her and cares about her, even after all the hurt and bullshit she contributed to. That part, I really can't figure out except that she played such a big part in the past 3 years of my life, and to completely cut off my emotions is quite difficult for me. Don't get me wrong... if I could do it, I would. I know there's no sense in that 2%. It's not a desire to have her back in my life, or a want to pursue her again. It's just feelings that haven't let go.

So maybe the chain has lost its steely bind. Perhaps it's been replaced by fishing wire. Invisible, but it cuts. Those mornings, like today, when I wake up from a dream of reunion? (Last night's took place in my bedroom, but bigger with a sofa, and both of her sisters, and her mom [again, happy], and these weird poster-sized fragmented drawings from presumably the girl that she is with [whether just in the dream, or reality, too]. I ripped up one of the drawings. She then threw both of them away; they were scrawled with childlike writing [ironic] of how much this person loves and misses my ex. After she threw them away, she was struggling to take her shirt off, and she had quite the belly, and I said, "Wow, my love has gained some weight!" And I didn't care, I just wanted her, and we were together. Again.) The mornings don't hurt- they simply weigh heavy on my heart.

But I am moving on. I will see C today, continue to get to know her. I've pretty much dismissed S because of her weird little "I'm not psycho like that" thing, after seeing something that she assumed was something it wasn't. Sounds oh just a bit too similar to Great Lakes.

As for the Obscure Object? I'm at a loss there. My mouth and heart are itching to spill it- especially after what I was told last night, about her spending the least amount of time possible at home. But my brain resists, maybe knowing my heart better than I'd ever thought.

I just hate how I was feeling great over the last week, and today I've got this plague hanging over my head. All because of the tricks my mind plays on me while I'm sleeping.

what will you wake up and see

Booked my flight this morning. Still have to figure out where I'm staying, but I have an option to fall back on if nothing else pans out, so I'm not worried. And I have to rent a car, but again, not worried about that. The flight was the agent of nerves. I suck at planning, and in the middle of my tab-flipping this morning, I lost the perfect flight for the perfect price. But all's not lost because I ended up with a very similar flight for about $20 more. Whatev! It's done, and I'm getting a mini-vacation out of it since I've decided to fly down Thursday night and come back Monday evening. & the conference itself is Friday night-Sunday afternoon. So I'M EXCITED!

In this morning's madness of planning, I realized that I've managed to lose one of my credit cards, and I cannot figure out how this happened. It has a balance of zero, so clearly it's somewhere in the house, but it's not anywhere where it should be. Got a new account # already, whatever, I'm over it.

But as I was searching for the card, I found a fortune cookie fortune that makes the most fucking sense ever: "No one is standing in your way anymore, it is time to move forward."

HOW FUCKING PROPHETIC IS THAT. Other than how the , should be a ; -- I can look past that and realize that I needed to find this today. After I almost let my ex piss all over my happy fucking parade on Friday, I needed to read that fortune. She's not standing in my way anymore. She was, and I let her, but now... no one is there. The only person that could be in my way is myself, and I'm not willing to do that to myself any longer...

...hence the proactive nature of forward-thinking and planning for this relatively major event. I've obviously never done anything like this before, and it seems that everyone I talk to about it thinks it's a much bigger deal than I do, which is funny because I tend to exaggerate things, but it makes sense-- because if I allowed myself to realize how kind of huge this is, I'd be completely freaked out and I'd stand in my own way. See how I did that? That's what we call PROGRESS.

And anyway. The whole thing makes me feel really fucking smart and, oh I don't know, progressive? Necessary? Validated. I'm still amazed.

all you really want is to be here with me

Love is foreign anymore. It used to come in sweeps complete with rushes of infallability and tiny rips of inadequacy but now, now it's wandering elsewhere. I don't want it to come home anytime soon, and if it does, I plan on being away and/or deaf to the persistent knocks against every tendon in my heart-swollen body.

I wish I could say with finality: I DON'T LOVE YOU ANYMORE. But I'm afraid of lying because I hear it's a disease; I lied a lot when I was a kid, too young to understand the tangles of my own tongue. My mind lies to me, sometimes, but I can't envision reality because I swear it evades me. Kind of like lost stars on a blinking night sky: they move without wind or reason, and I can't touch them no matter how high I reach. My arms have never been long enough, my chest has never been big enough for my whims of infatuation.

Mostly I remember your skin overlapping my own, your mouth crushing mine, words firing between grasps and whispers of nightmares. You were most loving when you were half asleep. You couldn't think, then, with your brain stuffed with sleep. Words came easily, promises flowed without second thought. I love you, I want you, there is no one but you, I've never loved like this.

On the kitchen floor, with the serrations and seeds surrounding us, we aimed for the perfect photogenic kiss. We always disagreed on the best shot. All I ever wanted to do was broadcast our love.

And now, my dreams have bloomed into making out with Melissa Ferrick, which is completely weird but admittedly not a bad dream to have (two nights in a row, nonetheless). You don't need to trail me in my night visions. You are always there in the daylight, shimmers spread over my radar though I've tried again and again to turn off my signal, to shut down, unplug, abscond.

I've never been good at letting go. Never. When I fall, I fall without limits and boundaries. I don't know how to make myself stop. Maybe, I think, this could be a good thing, someday, when I'm ready and when my heart won't need to seal itself up months, years later to edge into the healing (again). And I know what the fear is. I don't know how to believe that there is someone(s) who will not force me to lock my heart and swallow the key. I don't know how to think that love may not always end up hurting me, and that someone(s) might be worthy of letting in.

So I stumble about with my hands taped to my shoulders, arms crossed, heart blocked. I can't breathe in this collapsing makeshift shelter; I wish I'd learned along the way how to run, how to fly.

love pull your sore ribs in

I'm choosing to look at yesterday as an enormous blip on the radar. I don't know what she thinks she wants from me-- I also don't want to know.

Why, suddenly, she's lavishing me with sweet nothings and calling just to say hi... and then engaging me in a text-a-thon wherein I invariably over-shared and let my vulnerability blaze through... I'm not sure. I can't even tell if it's manipulation or another moment of her realizing what we lost, etc etc.

I wish I was stronger and therefore cared much, much less about the possibility of her sharing her body with someone(s) else. I also wish I hadn't slipped and brought that up last night.

Maybe it's just the human need to know you are wanted, that people have feelings for you. Because letting go is something I am awful at... and even I feel better knowing she still loves me. But I can't shake the feeling that whatever positive progress we made this past week-- I may have blown it last night by sharing so honestly what I think about and how I try to avoid the things that make me think about those things.

Because now, of course, she hasn't responded. And I'm not going to reach out.

where i come from, where i'm going

from my old livejournal : 08.30.04
I never realized how disgustingly hard I am on myself until it was recently brought to my attention by upwards of 4 people. I hate it too, and I know it's getting old, hearing me constantly beat myself up/down. I will try to break myself of it. Truth is, I'm pretty sick of hearing myself talk like that. ... Throwing up my hands.. throwing it in. I'm serious this time. I need a major attitude adjustment. I refuse to be so hard on myself, and I don't want to run my mouth anymore. I want to be better, eventually be good.



Five years later, and I think I'm actually harder on myself.

08.26.04
Why do girls like me? I'm a mess! I was talking with the Cynic last night and listening to myself made me want to cringe. And then later, talking to KH, I seriously wanted to slit my wrists right there. I mean, sure, I've done a significant amount of healing (and realizing what all I "went through" over the past year or so), but there are some heavy, ugly things lingering in the background. I want to be good. I really do. And I'm still working on getting there. I guess it's normal to have moments where you realize how much it fucking sucks, and how bad it can still hurt. But I keep plowing ahead because I know it's not all grey matter... there is goodness, clarity. And I do deserve it. I deserve someone who will treat me well and tolerate my sarcasm and dorkiness, maybe even embrace it. I don't need that person to drop out of the sky tomorrow, but I would like her to appear sometime. Maybe soon.



I had a lot of feelings in August 2004. And the parallels- as far as the necessary healing- to where I am now are obscene. Have I really not made any progress in five years? No... no, I definitely did. But then I got dismantled/I stayed and allowed it to happen. And now I get to heal again. Is that what life is? Falling apart and building yourself back up? Ad infinitum?

08.19.04
I realized then that I'm tired of fighting with and against myself. All actions from this point on might seem unusual for me, a bit uncharacteristic if you will, but I'm sick of holding everything down. What do I have to lose?


I can always, always think of something to lose. But if I don't risk anything, I'll never get anywhere. I just don't think that right now, I have anything to risk.

& I just realized (again) that I date fractured women. Women who need fixing, need to be taken care of. I am so fucking sick of this that it makes me want to punch myself [but as I was punched 3 times Friday night by my idiot friend, I'll abstain from the self-violence]. All of the beauty I've given to others: I want it back. I want it given to me- by someone other than myself.

farewell... to the old me

but there's a catch-- i can't bring myself to see
who i am, and i sense that's because
i'm not entirely sure who i am
these days, especially compared to who i've been
for the last almost three years. and i've come into my own
more than ever, but i've been thwarted and suffocated
beneath layers of lust-fed love (lust that was
flotsam on her stripped floorboards: the first to go
overboard when there was no room left to breathe).
i've been misled and tangled. and she said she lost herself
but she never had herself. i did.
and i haven't relocated the lost fragments yet.

but this is all part of the process and there is space to fall
to realign and trip and repose. i am with no one but myself.
no one's rules but my own. no mind to challenge but my own,
no muscles to flex but the ones i've lately neglected. and the thing is:
i don't want anyone else's anything in my everything. i just want
me.

so the search begins for the roots
of who i am. and strength supercedes the will to look back,
a sinewed stretch forward instead. this is what
i have: mind, body, soul.
education: completed and continuing.
career: a job, multiple certificates, summers off, opportunities elsewhere.
family: solid. supportive. inspiring. fucking funny.
friends: waxy but tangible. some closer, some better,
some here just for distraction and entertainment.
car & home. solitude. space to live.
words to craft, words to refine.
my health.
my will and tenacity. my inherant stubborn nature.
my easy smile and (over)active mind.
and i have my own possibility: endless, unmapped, uncharted, infinite.

i basked in beautiful noise last night. i'd marry the former in a
heartbeat... the curved beauty, incredible voice, obvious and endearing
slightly self-deprecating humor. and she carries a slightly surreal
resemblance to the woman who has blindly carried the pulse of my heart
for close to three years.

there are moments, too few for my liking, where i realize that
i am exactly where i am supposed to be. unattached. healing.
deeply introspective (perhaps too much at times).
rolling in intensity. fumbling to rediscover myself.
aware. awake. shaken, stirred, overflowing.
real. selfish. spiked with shards of happiness
mixed with stripes of anger/disbelief/sadness/hurt.
recovering. breathing. inhale, exhale, close your eyes.
unravelling neatly and retying with each step and signal.

i'll get where i need to be. it may not be where i think i should go
but it will be where i'm supposed to be, and when i'm supposed
to be there.
that's all i know.

new

I am still waiting for the realization that it's a new year, and time for me to accept my healing.

remember this

Three Christmases. Two victimized by the relationship, one tormented by its aftermath. Three Christmases burdended by unnecessary tears. Three should-be-happy seasons crushed under the blow of mania and push and pull, a plauging uncertainty and continued hope for the better: the better that showed its head every few weeks but never stayed for more than two consecutive days. It's not your fault, and it's not mine. It's just who you are. I simply wish you would have warned me earlier, or never saw my name, or that I could have been stronger and less tolerant, that I would have understand the weight of what you couldn't allow our love to be. And I wish I'd known earlier the art of walking away.

I bought a card for myself once, a Quotable, because I like reminders that keep me centered. You thought this was silly. But you didn't use that word. You probably said stupid, or laughed and rolled your eyes, but not in a "Oh, I love you and you're cute but weird" kind of way, but something far less endearing. Or maybe this was early in our relationship and you did think it was stupid but cute. I can't remember. It doesn't matter.

One of my friends bought me this for Christmas. It's the quote from the card that I bought for myself however long ago. And when she gave it to me, she didn't know I'd bought the card (and currently don't know where it is, when, of course, I absolutely need to remind myself of those quoted thoughts). But she knew it was something I needed to remember.

What I'm realizing now, in this once-strong, suddenly-and-obnoxiously-weakened state of the break-up, is that you couldn't get out of your head for long enough to really know me. I think you tried, but you failed. I admire your attempt, but I think you could have tried harder. I think you could have done a lot of things differently between you and me, and I'm slowly coming to accept the fact that you didn't, you wouldn't, you won't, and that's how it's supposed to be. I don't wish you any harm, but I don't yet wish you happiness because you crawled into my life with the allure of connection and desire, neither of which could sustain us, but once in, you shrieked apart my reason and my happiness. It was always about you. I get that, now. It was never about me. My needs were nonexistent. I bent into yet-discovered yoga poses to try to make us work, but I failed. I wasn't meant to succeed. Not with you.

So I'm tired of the hurt and the anger, tired of your unjustified reactions and skewed perceptions. I shouldn't expect anything different since that's how it always was: no steady ground. A rock one day, a roll the next, a plateau silver-lining into a brick wall the very next. I want you to understand this: you did this. You did it. I was not the perfect girlfriend, but I never pushed you away with the force and frequency that you did me. Remember that.

sound mechanics

So much of who I am and what I've experienced is built around music.

Last week, she said she'd look them up, I said that's ridiculous how about I make you a cd of their music, she said absolutely and i'll find something for you. So I did. And she is.

Tonight, I'm caught up in not wanting to go to sleep. I'm stuck in the fluctuation of semi-flirtation and the collapsing of my still aching heart. I've been sifting thru my iTunes, pulling together a cd for A.M. and tossing songs into a playlist called 1_. I have a feeling I'll be making Her another cd, since this last one was business. & "business" has changed... which at first I was so not happy about, but now, I almost fully believe it's better this way.

I talked to my ex tonight. First time in, oh, a week. As much as I've been trying to avoid/cut off communication with her, she keeps worming in for various reasons. Wait, I lied. I talked to her earlier this week, and it was not pleasant. Tonight was only better in the sense that we weren't yelling at each other. Tonight made me cry. It was a closing of a door, her doing, despite her saying that she loves me very much and she's sorry for everything that's happened, and that she'll never love anyone like she loved me, and there's no one else, and she doesn't want to give her heart to anyone else. I'm not stupid; I know what happens when people move on. She caught me off guard with all of this, and she's Leaving, she said. For an indefinite period of time, to an indefinite place. If we were still together, she said, This Wouldn't Be Happening. This was a rift in our relationship; I never understood this part of her life. I still don't, but I don't have to try anymore. I cried tonight, though, because it was a bigger goodbye than we've ever had previously. And I'm going back and forth between believing her, and wondering if she did this/said this to get me to move on because she's moving on. I suspect the former, actually. It hurt. The whole thing hurt. And even if it is the latter, I really don't want to know, just as she said that she wouldn't write to me because she doesn't want to hear about me moving on.

I don't know what to make of that. Now I really can't wait to leave tomorrow. I have a weekend chock full of people who love me and who can set my head back where it's supposed to be.

All this, and She still swarms over me. Things have only intensified, in a sense, over the past month. She keeps me on my toes in a healthy way, which is a nice change. I'd swear she's flirting with me, but there is the gray area between "straight" women and gay women: sometimes the hets think flirting is safe. I don't necessarily think that She has absolutely no idea that I'm totally into her, but I doubt she comprehends the extent (and length) of my ... into-ness. She doesn't need to know as far as I'm concerned. I'm cool with this friends thing. The flirting, though? I'm not the only person who sees it. And that makes me wonder.

The songs I've thrown into 1_ are some of my favorites, songs I always try to pass onto whomever comes into my life. I've noticed myself being careful, though, because as much as I would love to stack this compilation with subliminal messages, I know better [looking at circumstances, mainly hers, as mine are open aside from my healing heart] than to test my limits like that. Cool & calm. Constant reminder.

I was going somewhere else with this, but I'm tired and lost it.