3 posts tagged “personal”
I woke this morning and after feeding Mecca, I returned to the mirror and the bedroom and took a good look.
I didn't do what I normally would do, which would be to begin picking out each and every flaw I can find and wishing it wasn't there. Instead I actually admired the curve of my cheekbones, the shape of my lips, the alignment of my features, a face framed by unruly curls. And then I rested on my eyes, staring back at me.
A direct, strong and unwavering gaze. Not at all furtive. Not aversive...but without that twinkle of expectation. I saw the eyes of my mother when I was a child gazing into her face. Eyes of resignation and a gradual acceptance of things she wished she never knew. A filtered veneer that lets in just enough to keep her sustained, but little else. I studied those eyes, my eyes...my mother's eyes, and wondered if the world could see that quiet observation of everything moving around behind them.
I used to chase rainbows and grasp at butterflies without ever looking to check and see if my feet were on solid ground. While I miss that girl, I also know that this life brings many lessons that remind you of the importance of reaching up and staying grounded. These eyes are warm, but hazed. They are soft, but indifferent. They study...and watch...and hold safe the observations of everything moving around about them.
These are my mother's eyes and everything she held behind them. I understand. And now they are mine. I hope they lead me to a cool, dry place.
I have trouble sitting still.
When I wake in the morning, before I can do anything, I turn on the television. It's usually to protect myself from the thoughts that swam in my head to wake me up at the same hour and minute each morning.
I wake to the sound of his voice. Telling me things I already know. Whispering concepts my heart can grasp but my mind seeks to pick apart like separating chicken from the bone. It all begins to feel like its too much for me to comprehend and so I get up, feed the dog and turn on the distractions.
Still, there is all this content stirring beneath the surface.
If one were to read my journal, I would suppose they would think I was insane. It's page after page of the same topics. The same situations, through a variety of filtered lenses, each one making the image either more clear or impossibly fuzzy. My mind is my spirits Opthamologist, struggling to come up with a prescription that's going to give me the ultimate clarity.
Clarity shifts constantly. I hope that Opthamologist has the patience of Job.
This morning I sit in quiet, allowing all those swarms of incongruent thoughts to battle away at each other. I sit and wait for the ones demanding attention to swim to the surface. I grasp them and try to give them their proper audience to make the determination if they are good, or rubbish.
I received an absolute God-send this week. A random IM from someone I consider a gift. A voxer. And I keep this person anonymous for now because I didn't ask for permission to quote. I paraphrase with hopes they view this as a thank you. During a moment of squirming, this person told me not to take any grand action. To resist the temptation to take grandiose steps in an attempt to "heal something" or to "show progression" in my life. This person assured me that right now, in this space with all my questions and all my squirming, was as beautiful a place as there ever has been. It's the space where knowing is born. And there is no reason to fear...knowing.
I have been trying to put myself back in the 'dating' waters. But I have had great anxiety about it. Why? Because my mind is full and my heart is extremely wary. I asked my sister to describe me earlier, and she said I was someone who was wary, distant and hesitant to open until I know intuitively that it's "safe." So funny that I can bare myself in this space, and yet be so cryptic in others.
As I have different people respond to my profile, I've had some nibblers that I decided to initiate correspondance with. You've seen my questions, so you can see just how much I want to know. Catch 22 is...some people have the same reservations that I do. They are hanging back, offering trite conversational exchanges without truly giving of themselves. Toe-dipping. Just like me.
I squirm when I'm not being honest. With others. With myself. I am in the dating world...but I'm not yet of a mind to date as much as I am, study and eventually make new friends. I don't have this huge desire to go out in a blaze of flowers and romantic dinners and whispered suggestions in my ear. They strike a panic in me. I am not ready to be opened yet, and certainly not just by anyone. I want intimacy that does not come with expectations attached. Like...how soon will we be fucking. Maybe it's the type I draw...but it all seems to be a race to that. Fast talk, fast chat, motorized conversations designed to get us in a one on one personal space to delve into the physical embodiment of me.
I have my reasons for hesitation. I am a package deal. I respect those who aren't, and frankly I think they have more fun. But I squirm when I try to be anything other than who I am. A woman who's heart is tied directly to what's between her thighs and the pillows nestled in her bra. I am all...the same woman. And I can't give access to the physical embodiment of her, until the emotional/spiritual/mental part of her is truly sated and knowing that this person has the capacity to give, and love, and see and be with the same voracity. It doesn't take long, I know fairly quickly what most folks are made of. I feel it, deep with in me.
Relax. I've been told. Don't take yourself so seriously, I've been advised. Don't think so much. Funny...thinking actually has very little to do with it. For me. It's that sense. The gathering of something in the small of my belly. I reach for sincerity. Depth. Patience. Emotional maturity. A knowing that permeates chatter. I have tasted that sort of connection before. Beyond sight and sound and very easy to detect. This is the sense I use. I will give others the opportunity to show me what they're made of. And I suppose part of my struggle has always been trusting that what I sense, it real to me - and a justifiable reason to sit back for a moment, and quietly observe what others are trying to say.
There are somethings I experience with immeasurable intensity. And there's no sense squirming about that. It is merely who I am.
I’m goin’ higher and higher
I ain’t gonna sleep
Some times you just have to let it go (Let it go, let it go)
Leaving all my fears to burn down
Push them away so I can move on"
- Goapele
First time I heard this song, I was driving in my truck, a snowy winter day in Suburban Philadelphia, on my way to work. I was about a month away from my surgery date, and just a mess of different emotions. I can see it...feel it as if it was just an hour ago. The surgery was going to change my life. Some people give birth to 8 lb 7 oz infants. I was preparing to give birth to a fibroid tumor of the same size. I had a basketball in my abdomen. And I had no choice but to deliver it. The surgery meant so many things to me. It meant a major procedure, the first time alien metal objects would enter my body. It meant discovering if I would be left intact enough to bear a child, as opposed to a non-cancerous growth of the same size. It meant reevaluating my future with him. Could I bear his child? Would he ever want me to? Would my time run out before he decides?
I look back on that day and the moment this track began to play, because it was that eerie to me. As soon as I heard that 4th line of that verse, my eyes filled and spilled over liquid anxiety. Down my cheeks, leaving dark chocolate drops on my heavy winter coat. It was hopeful, but mournful, innocent but eerily wise. It reminded me that the hardest thing I would ever have to do, would be the very thing I needed to do. For my own survival, and happiness. I would have to let go.
I am a bleeding orange fire in a liquid sky.
I've always struggled with that. Acquiesing to the universe, and letting my God steer me with the faith that I have all I need to weather each storm. Unwilling to have a course move in any direction but the one I'm most comfortable with. I was trapped in an impudent belief that my journey has to follow a very specific course that I constructed. So why was nothing happening as I willed it? Why was my master plan so riddled with holes?
I can't make sense of ways bigger than me. Trying to, is missing the greater point. It's as bizarre as holding on to something you claim to want released. I am melancholy, sad and experiencing the most tremendous peace of my life, today. And I couldn't make sense of it if you begged me to. I have no net. I have no way of knowing what's around the next bend...but I'm not worried about, either. At least not today.
Yesterday, I required a nap. As I lay there, somewhere between asleep and awake a thought came to me, and I said it aloud.
"If I had to go back, and repeat all of these steps again - the pain, the loss, the sadness as well as the joy of knowing him, learning him and loving him and the entire evolution...I would do it. Without hesitation."
Those same tears came. The same ones that spilled so readily that day in the truck, years ago. My intuition knew then, what it knows now. And on those precious days when I let it speak to me, I experience the essence of truth and acceptance.
Sometimes you just have to let it go....and accept.
Your experiences. Your history. The pain. The joy. The heartache. The rise. The fall. To do so is to acknowledge that every little event has its purpose. There are no mistakes. There are only life markers...and what you choose to make of them.
He called again this morning, but I knew he would. You know by now that that's the way we've always worked. When I opened my eyes hours earlier, my heart whispered to him a quiet, "I miss you, Big Cat." I didn't kick my own ass over it, I just acknowledged the sensation. No fear. No shame. But with a great awareness that none of that, of this...changes what is. And the feelings, none of them, will kill me. I answered the phone, with no anxiety, I just said hello. As I sipped my morning coffee, we shared a morning laugh and few minutes of conversation. I wished him a good day, and hung up. And I missed him when it was over. But no feeling, bad or good was designed to last forever.
It is, what it is. I smiled. I'm not trapped by my feelings anymore. I can love him, always. And I will. But there is still a journey that I must take. And the same goes for him. I can't blindly rest my hopes on those paths crossing. My heart is open. And so are my eyes.
I push away fear. And I trust that there is no reason to look down. I'm exceedingly grateful for that.
