History repeats itself

So the love of my life doesn’t want to be the love of my life.  I knew this was coming before we even got started.

He’s an alcoholic.  He’s depressed. He’s suicidal. He hates this life, his life. He loves me but doesn’t want me to love him. He doesn’t want to be important to me. I guess that way he can slope off to die quietly, and without my knowledge.

He pursued me knowing all the while he shouldn’t. He isn’t capable right now (maybe he never will be) of functioning well enough to support himself, let alone in relationships.  I let him in, again, and hoped for a better outcome this time even whilst having this nagging feeling that we’d just end up disappointed.

Doubt thou the stars are fire,

Doubt that the sun doth move,

Doubt truth to be a liar,

But never doubt I love.

So said him to me a year ago when I expressed doubts – and he was stone cold sober.

I want to shake him…

Shake him out of his depression, free him from his prison and drag his sorry arse into the light.

I have suffered from depression and sometimes it returns – everybody has been there and goes back again in their lifetime, to highly varied degrees.  It is not the same experience for everyone.  You can’t be talked out of it amongst friends, you can’t be drugged out of it. I talked to my GP and that was the extent of the professional help I got; the rest of the heavy lifting I did alone for the most part.  I have sought solace in a few drinks to numb the pain over the years and I still do, but not to the extremes that he does.  I have felt suicidal several times and in fact just a few months ago.  I survived a life threatening operation to return to a life that continues to hit me.  But that is life.  It isn’t pretty most of the time, it can be bloody boring too much of the time but there are bright spots and I seek them out.

He sought me out: “…the only and one bright thing in (his) life…”.

He said: “…I need you in my life…”.

But here I am, covered up again, filed away under what exactly…?

Am I an idiot?  Don’t think so.  I didn’t fall for a line/s, my eyes were wide open, he wanted to marry me and I knew within a few short weeks that it would never happen.  He lacks the courage and will and force to make a change that will benefit him and those around him. It is easier to hide behind your pain than to get out in front of it.  To do that takes effort, it is a monumental shift in the brain that sadly, some never rise to.  I want him to rise, and he simply cannot.  I’ve been there and fought through.  It took me such a long time… But all my experience comes to naught here. The arrows miss their target, the seeds lack fertile ground…

I hope he reads this, I hope against hope that it breaks through.  I want my friend to be well but I can’t tell him that in a text or email and he is avoiding a face to face. I get it.  The last thing you want when you feel like this is to be told there’s a better way. And yet he has said he didn’t want me to stop trying.  The man is a walking, talking contradiction in terms:  “Don’t wait for me, move on, I’d hate that you did but you should, I love you, I need you, I have no right to want you for myself or feel jealousy, I love hearing from you and then I don’t, I want to hear from you, be with you but I can’t handle how you or I feel.”.

I don’t want to be your all and all…

What a mind fuck, you say – except it isn’t because I was prepared.  The defences were much better this time around.

Dark soul that he is, messed up as he is, he is and always will be one of my bright spots. We shall, I hope, maintain a friendship but that is up to him.  He has hidden behind texts and has not seen me in months, yet a year ago we were in one another’s pockets.  I do not apportion any blame.  He is a sick man who needs professional help and isn’t seeking it beyond drugs that utterly fail to control the extreme low cycles he experiences.  He is barely clinging to life and it is a crying shame as he has much to give.  The state of his mind does not allow him to see this or believe it. He is locked in a prison largely of his own making and the depression makes that worse, a condition he simply cannot control without help and support.

So what do I do?

What I’ve always done with anyone I love and care for:  be a friend, watch, wait.  I’d like to see him but he probably can’t handle it.  As his friend, I am involved and care for him like really true friends do.  The fact that I do love him more than a friend is secondary.  All along I made it clear that if he couldn’t handle “us”, our friendship mattered more to me and I was not willing to lose it again.  He agreed but I do wonder if my greatest kindness to him would be to disappear for a while with little or no contact.  Hard to know what to do for the best really…  I must just keep working on loving him less but enough to keep us both sane and stay friends.  We don’t do so well apart and the friendship is important to us both.

I sent him this poem today.  I came across it earlier in the week and it’s by Adam Lindsay Gordon:

Life is mostly froth and bubble,

Two things stand like stone:

Kindness in another’s trouble;

Courage in your own.

He didn’t respond and I didn’t expect he would.  We all have troubles and heaven knows I have mine.  I was struggling with something yesterday. I wanted to put the past few weeks behind me for so many reasons and meet up, shoot the breeze, not talk about problems. He couldn’t meet up but when he texted me later and at the end of it, said that he didn’t want to be important to me (after I had said how much he mattered not just to me but because he is so intelligent, etc), he knew I was not in a great place. Timing is everything. It’s never going to be a good time to be negative but it didn’t exactly brighten my mood. That’s not his problem though and it’s not as if I wasn’t expecting it.  Still, it wasn’t fair was it.  I only said it (again) because he told me 2 weeks ago quite out of the blue that he came close to ending his life.  I have no idea what stopped him and he typically didn’t elaborate.  All I can say is that I knew it was coming because I know him and his family didn’t and still don’t have a clue.  He won’t tell them.

He has so much to say and is so intelligent which only makes his illness all the more frustrating because it blocks him.  I almost always get a lift when I hear from him and there is a word that I came across a few months ago:  Sapiosexual.  I am a sapiosexual person – the mind is more attractive to me, than the physical.  A much younger man has shown an interest but I find myself having to explain the simplest of words/phrases and I feel like an English teacher!  I want conversations to flow, not to stop every 10 minutes to explain the vernacular.  He isn’t available and although he might be in future I just can’t see myself as anything but a good friend. We have a giggle, there’s great chemistry and he’s lovely but that’s it. I have a best friend just like him. If I could feel more that would be great as he ticks most of the boxes, but I just don’t – and it is not because my heart is elsewhere.  Head and heart need to be engaged: the physical tale is told in the first kiss, which seals or breaks the union.

Ah life…  I shall plod on with my projects, fun and not so fun, keep up with my growing circle of friends and not expect anything to happen in the realm of the heart.

Perhaps I shall be taken by surprise.

We live in hope…

 

 

Do you gotta have faith?

I’m not so sure these past few years if faith is a crutch or a control for me.  Neither is good.

As a crutch, you rely upon a set of beliefs to prop you up and don’t necessarily dig around inside yourself as much for the answers – you believe that your God will light the way and accept that what comes is the will of your God.

As a means of control, faith can be devastating; I have lived through the effect my belief system has had upon me and those closest to me.  In short, adhering to the tenets of my faith cost me decades of my life throughout which I learnt a great deal about myself and others, but by turns I lost so much and caused pain to others through bitterness at feeling betrayed (by people and my God) and trapped (by the same).

Not good is it?

We all know about the wars started in the name of a God we cannot see but believe in:  The Crusades to name one very bloody and shameful part of Christian history.  We lament the so called death of Christianity and the rise of the secular age but it comes and goes in cycles and sometimes the Christians are on the wrong side or hold an ugly viewpoint.  How dare one belief system set itself up as THE belief system and systematically set about crushing and destroying any who dare question it by eradicating one belief and culture for another.  The Spanish Conquistadors decimated the people of the Americas, promoting a Christian God on one hand, whilst plundering gold and precious resources with the other.

The God I believe in would not advocate anything like this.  Too many men down the centuries have hijacked religion for their own ends, starting wars, wiping out cultures and peoples, masquerading as men of God when they were anything but.  Tony Blair anyone?  He claims God whispered in his ear to go to war against Iraq.

Oh really?

What bull!  I’m a cradle Catholic so I had no choice in my religion but as an adult I can choose to follow it blindly, pick and choose the bits I like or abandon it altogether.  What I am choosing to do is believe that God does exist but not accept everything that is spouted from the pulpit, however sincere.  The four main Gospels were chosen to fit a particular time – the rest simply did not fit the narrative that those in control sought to enforce upon the majority.  Men decided what stayed in and what got cut if you like.  Learned men (and women) from those times and up to the present day, make up the rules as they go along based upon their interpretations of The Bible.  This is why year on year, from one priest or vicar to another, the same reading, the same Gospel passage will be read and understood in myriad ways depending upon what the individual reads into it and then expounds to the masses.  It can further be said that the interpretation changes with the mood of the times – and this is when faith takes a back seat and control steps forward.

You see, too many people really do blindly follow what they are told about passages from The Bible.  If the priest or vicar tells you black is white, such people accept it because he’s a man of the cloth and his guidance comes direct from the big man upstairs.  But I know a priest who agrees with me that one size doesn’t fit all and therefore, The Bible passages, with their wisdom, foreboding, poetry and control simply cannot apply to everyone because we are all so different.  The life we live is not cut and dried and our world is full of complications caused by emotion – the two strongest human impulses are anger and love. Both can be used to devastating effect.  Fear plays it part and fear of the next life is not something a Christian sniffs at and blithely ignores if his faith is strong.  Being afraid to live a certain way or make certain choices for fear they may compromise our path to heaven is incredibly delimiting.  It is a cause of much sorrow.  It kept me “in my place” for too long.

If God created us all, then he created homosexuals too.  It is not right to say that love between same sex couples is abherrant and that they simply need coaxing onto a “straight” path.  They can no more be straight than a heterosexual can be made homosexual.  It is what it is – not cut and dried.  We do not choose to be one way or the other or a bit of both – it chooses us.

Rules are constructive, yes, but in this context and in the context of divorced remarried Catholics, the rules are brutal and leave no room for negotiation.  The Synod on the Family has all but shut down any hope of remarried divorced Catholics from being able to receive communion.  To be barred from the sacraments is not, I believe, something God would intend for someone like me were I to marry again.  To bar me from the sacraments would be wholly unfair:  I did not have an affair, my husband did; I got divorced (after holding on for decades because of my beliefs) because the situation was increasingly toxic for my son and I.  To fall in love and want to marry again or simply live with the one you love is surely not a bad thing?

Should anyone be damned for love when it is good, strong and true?

Surely God would be happy if this happened?  If God is directing our lives, how could it be wrong?  But then that same God was behind the scenes when my life fell apart.  He was behind the scenes of all of our worst moments.

Do we gotta have faith?  I think what we need is a good heart, beliefs that don’t hurt or control anyone and a willingness to question everything without giving rise to rancour.  Beliefs should be questioned and not accepted without self examination or examination of the one who is doling it out to us.  Priests, vicars, nuns and all pillars of all faiths are people first and they are not above corruption, as history and modern times have shown us.

Keep the faith?  Yes, maybe for me, but my mind is more open.  The personal experiences of recent years and so much that I’ve seen and read have taught me much.  I still have a great deal more to learn.

 

Juicy

Under the light of a darkening sky, you approach.

Between the shade and purple mist, covetor and coveted lie entangled, lost, found,

too soon.

Reality beats chemistry, beats against the heart,

not for it.

But head and heart, hand in hand, one on one…

Tongue

Taste

Touch…

Peel the rind, score the mind, sear the eyes, sweet surprise…

the flow of juice,

limbs now loose

and wanting.

Still wanting.

By Veritas

 

 

Writing in the wind to and about the object of my affection…

“There are two basic motivating forces: fear and love. When we are afraid, we pull back from life. When we are in love, we open to all that life has to offer with passion, excitement, and acceptance. We need to learn to love ourselves first, in all our glory and our imperfections. If we cannot love ourselves, we cannot fully open to our ability to love others or our potential to create. Evolution and all hopes for a better world rest in the fearlessness and open-hearted vision of people who embrace life.”
― John Lennon

“I’m selfish, impatient and a little insecure. I make mistakes, I am out of control and at times hard to handle. But if you can’t handle me at my worst, then you sure as hell don’t deserve me at my best.”
― Marilyn Monroe

“Only once in your life, I truly believe, you find someone who can completely turn your world around. You tell them things that you’ve never shared with another soul and they absorb everything you say and actually want to hear more. You share hopes for the future, dreams that will never come true, goals that were never achieved and the many disappointments life has thrown at you. When something wonderful happens, you can’t wait to tell them about it, knowing they will share in your excitement. They are not embarrassed to cry with you when you are hurting or laugh with you when you make a fool of yourself. Never do they hurt your feelings or make you feel like you are not good enough, but rather they build you up and show you the things about yourself that make you special and even beautiful. There is never any pressure, jealousy or competition but only a quiet calmness when they are around. You can be yourself and not worry about what they will think of you because they love you for who you are. The things that seem insignificant to most people such as a note, song or walk become invaluable treasures kept safe in your heart to cherish forever. Memories of your childhood come back and are so clear and vivid it’s like being young again. Colours seem brighter and more brilliant. Laughter seems part of daily life where before it was infrequent or didn’t exist at all. A phone call or two during the day helps to get you through a long day’s work and always brings a smile to your face. In their presence, there’s no need for continuous conversation, but you find you’re quite content in just having them nearby. Things that never interested you before become fascinating because you know they are important to this person who is so special to you. You think of this person on every occasion and in everything you do. Simple things bring them to mind like a pale blue sky, gentle wind or even a storm cloud on the horizon. You open your heart knowing that there’s a chance it may be broken one day and in opening your heart, you experience a love and joy that you never dreamed possible. You find that being vulnerable is the only way to allow your heart to feel true pleasure that’s so real it scares you. You find strength in knowing you have a true friend and possibly a soul mate who will remain loyal to the end. Life seems completely different, exciting and worthwhile. Your only hope and security is in knowing that they are a part of your life.”
― Bob Marley

Have you ever been in love? Horrible isn’t it? It makes you so vulnerable. It opens your chest and it opens up your heart and it means that someone can get inside you and mess you up.”
― Neil Gaiman, The Sandman, Vol. 9: The Kindly Ones

“You may not be her first, her last, or her only. She loved before, she may love again. But if she loves you now, what else matters? She’s not perfect – you aren’t either –  and the two of you may never be perfect together but if she can make you laugh, cause you to think twice, and admit to being human and making mistakes, hold onto her and give her the most you can. She may not be thinking about you every second of the day, but she will give you a part of her that she knows you can break—her heart. So don’t hurt her, don’t change her, don’t analyze and don’t expect more than she can give. Smile when she makes you happy, let her know when she makes you mad, and miss her when she’s not there.”
― Bob Marley

“You don’t love someone because they’re perfect, you love them in spite of the fact that they’re not.”
― Jodi Picoult

“Life will break you. Nobody can protect you from that, and living alone won’t either, for solitude will also break you with its yearning. You have to love. You have to feel. It is the reason you are here on earth. You are here to risk your heart. You are here to be swallowed up. And when it happens that you are broken, or betrayed, or left, or hurt, or death brushes near, let yourself sit by an apple tree and listen to the apples falling all around you in heaps, wasting their sweetness. Tell yourself you tasted as many as you could.”
― Louise Erdrich, The Painted Drum LP

“The only thing worse than a (man) who hates you: a (man) that loves you.”
― Markus Zusak, The Book Thief

“Every heart sings a song, incomplete, until another heart whispers back. Those who wish to sing always find a song. At the touch of a lover, everyone becomes a poet.”
― Plato

“Doubt thou the stars are fire;
Doubt that the sun doth move;
Doubt truth to be a liar;
But never doubt I love.”
―William Shakespeare, Hamlet

Insanity bites

When you love someone and they love you, but the idea of it makes them feel sick.

And still, you love them…  With your whole heart, but not without question – and no small amount of sorrow…

Pandora’s Box.

The barn door and the horse.

Too much, too soon (again).

Too little, too late?

Nothing ventured.

The leap of faith.

Do what scares you.

Jump…

The state of play

From “Don’t Stay” – Linkin Park

“…Don’t stay
Forget our memories
Forget our possibilities
What you were changing me into
Just give me myself back and
Don’t stay
Forget our memories
Forget our possibilities
Take all your faithlessness with you
Just give me myself back and
Don’t stay

Sometimes I feel like I trusted you too well
Sometimes I just feel like screaming at myself
Sometimes I’m in disbelief I didn’t know
Somehow I need to be alone

Don’t stay
Forget our memories
Forget our possibilities
What you were changing me into
Just give me myself back and
Don’t stay
Forget our memories
Forget our possibilities
Take all your faithlessness with you
Just give me myself back and
Don’t stay

I don’t need you anymore, I don’t want to be ignored
I don’t need one more day of you wasting me away
I don’t need you anymore, I don’t want to be ignored
I don’t need one more day of you wasting me away

With no apologies.”

Now this is not the exact depiction of my current state of mind but I’m skirting the area.  Some lines ring true.  And I’ve been here before…

You see some days it’s kinda like this, the flip and much softer, ultimately vulnerable side of the above feeling:

“One More Try” – George Michael

“I’ve had enough of danger
And people on the streets
I’m looking out for angels
Just trying to find some peace
Now I think it’s time
That you let me know
So if you love me
Say you love me
But if you don’t
Just let me go…

‘Cause teacher
There are things that I don’t want to learn
And the last one I had
Made me cry
So I don’t want to learn to
Hold you, touch you
Think that you’re mine
Because it ain’t no joy
For an uptown boy
Whose teacher has told him goodbye, goodbye, goodbye

When you were just a stranger
And I was at your feet
I didn’t feel the danger
Now I feel the heat
That look in your eyes
Telling me “No”
So you think that you love me
Know that you need me
I wrote the song, I know it’s wrong
Just let me go…

And teacher
There are things that I don’t want to learn
Oh the last one I had
Made me cry
So I don’t want to learn to
Hold you, touch you
Think that you’re mine
Because it ain’t no joy
For an uptown boy
Whose teacher has told him goodbye, goodbye, goodbye

So when you say that you need me
That you’ll never leave me
I know you’re wrong, you’re not that strong
Let me go

And teacher
There are things that I still have to learn
But the one thing I have is my pride
Oh, so I don’t want to learn to
Hold you, touch you
Think that you’re mine
Because there ain’t no joy
For an uptown boy
Who just isn’t willing to try
I’m so cold inside
Maybe just one more try.”

And still other days it’s like this:

“Hysteria” – Def Leppard

“Out of touch, out of reach, yeah
You could try to get closer to me
I’m in love, I’m in deep, yeah
Hypnotized, I’m shaken to my knees

I gotta know tonight
If you’re alone tonight
Can’t stop this feelin’
Can’t stop this fire

Oh, I get hysterical, hysteria, oh, can you feel it, do you believe it?
It’s such a magical mysteria
When you get that feelin’ better start believin’
‘Cause it’s a miracle, oh, say you will, ooh babe
Hysteria when you’re near

Out of me, into you, yeah
You can hide, it’s just a one way street
Oh, I believe I’m in you, yeah
Open wide that’s right, dream me off my feet, oh, believe in me

I gotta know tonight
If you’re alone tonight
Can’t stop this feelin’
Can’t stop this fire

Oh, I get hysterical, hysteria, oh, can you feel it, do you believe it?
It’s such a magical mysteria
When you get that feelin’ better start believin’
‘Cause it’s a miracle, oh, say you will, ooh babe
Hysteria when you’re near

I gotta know tonight
If you’re alone tonight
Can’t stop this feelin’
Can’t stop this fire

Oh, I get hysterical, hysteria, oh, can you feel it, do you believe it?
It’s such a magical mysteria
When you get that feelin’ better start believin’
‘Cause it’s a miracle, oh, say you will, ooh babe, ooh babe, oh

I get hysterical, (hysterical), hysteria, (hysteria)
When you get that feelin’, you’d better believe it
(Better start believin’) ’cause it’s a miracle
Oh, say you will, oh babe,

Say you will

Get closer to me, get closer baby
Ohh baby, closer, closer, closer, still closer.

closer to me.”

And sometimes the train of thought goes here:

“Still of the Night” – Whitesnake

“In the still of the night
I hear the wolf howl, honey
Sniffing around your door
In the still of the night
I feel my heart beating heavy
Telling me I gotta have more

In the shadow of night
I see the full moon rise
Telling me what’s in store
My heart start aching
My body start a-shaking
And I can’t take no more, no, no

Now I just wanna get close to you
An’ taste your love so sweet
And I just wanna make love to you
Feel your body heat

In the still of the night
In the still of the night
Over here, baby

In the heat of the day
I hang my head down low
And hide my face from the sun
Through the light of the day
Until the evening time
I’m waiting for the night to come

Ooh, baby

In the still of the night
In the cool moonlight
I feel my heart is aching
In the still of the night

Ooh, baby
Ooh, baby
Can’t keep away
Need you closer
Can’t keep away, can’t keep away, can’t keep away
Oh, can’t keep away, no

You gotta give me love
You gotta give me some lovin’ everyday
Can’t keep away, no

Ooh, baby, ooh Lord, ahh
Get over here, baby

In the still of the night
I hear the wolf howl, honey
Sniffing around your door
In the still of the night
I feel my heart beating heavy
Telling me I gotta have more

Ooh, mama

Now I just wanna get close to you
An’ taste your love so sweet
And I just wanna make love to you
Feel your body heat

In the still of the night, ooh yeah
In the still of the night, I will be sneakin’ ’round your door
In the still of the night, ah, ah
In the still of the night

Still of the night, still of the night, still of the night
Still of the night, still of the night, still of the night
Still of the night, still of the night, still of the night
Still of the night, still of the night, still of the night
Still of the night, still of the night, still of the night”

Where am I today?

“Never give up on something you can’t go a full day without thinking about” Sir Winston Churchill

“It’s a complicated world.  People have a hard time finding each other and even when they do, they’re scared to take the risk.” Rina Smiley

“Stories can conquer fear, you know. They can make the heart bigger.”  Ben Okri

“There are no simple love stories.  If it’s simple, it’s not love.  If it’s love, it’s going to get complicated…” (unknown)

But my favourite is this:

Being a person is getting too complicated. Time to be a unicorn.

Friends, Romans…..Anyone?

I shouldn’t let any of it hold sway, but astrology piques my interest.  As a teen and into my 20’s I bought into it completely – Western and Chinese.

By Western standards, I’m a Cancerian a few days short of Leo and depending on what you read I have Taurus or Aries rising and the moon affects me as well as some of that Leo fire.  Being a water sign and with tides being controlled by the pull of the moon (and with our bodies being mostly made up of water) this can apparently make one’s moods fluctuate constantly.  Being on the cusp of Leo apparently means that I have a very sociable side tempered by a need to be away from people – I want to be in the thick of it but at the same time, side-step it!  People see a different side to me at social gatherings, bright, carefree, outgoing and yet I find such events uncomfortable and can become disengaged.  That part is true enough. Cancer is the adolescent of the zodiac – moody, changeable teen…?

By Chinese standards I am a Metal Boar born in a “Golden year” during the hours of the Rat (which makes me shrewd, apparently), with great mental and physical strength.  The Boar resides in the twelfth House and whilst it was the last to complete the race, it is the most mature and accomplished.

Being this particular type of boar apparently means however that I:

“…underestimate my enemies and overestimate my friends.”.

Now that is spot on.

I read that line many years ago and I still haven’t learnt from the latter part of that declaration. Others who are apparently “in my house” are: Sir Alan Sugar, Bryan Adams, Hillary Clinton, Alice Cooper, Simon Cowell, Amy Winehouse, Carlos Santana, Henry Ford, Iggy Pop, Stephen King, Meat Loaf, Oliver Cromwell, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Elton John, The Dalai Lama, Wolfgang Mozart, Luciano Pavarotti.

I see many among them whom I find it hard to believe could be taken for granted – and I also see some very damaged, highly creative and flat out brilliant individuals…  I do not count myself as such, but will accede to having been very badly damaged. And having got back up again. And again. And again….

And then there are famous Cancerians whom I admire or whose work I enjoy (some a great deal) but am I anything like them?  Until today I had no idea (bar George Michael, Henry VIII, Caesar and Tom Cruise) that they shared my sign:  John Cusack, Meryl Streep, Sofia Vergara, Emmeline Pankhurst, Oliver Sacks, Edmund Hillary, Malala Yousafzai, Erin Brokovich, Nikola Tesla, Robin Williams, Kathy Bates, Frances McDormand, Gustav Klimt, Pablo Neruda, Harrison Ford, Bob Marley, Gustav Mahler, Alan Turing, Josh Hartnett, Nelson Mandela, Peter Paul Rubens, Jake La Motta, Edgar Degas, Steve McQueen, Alexander the Great….

Again there are some incredible individuals in that list.  Could I ever aspire to or attain the brilliance of Oliver Sacks, the depth of creativity of Rubens or Neruda, the immense talents of John Cusack or Meryl Streep, the emotional and rebellious musicality of Bob Marley, the fortitude of Mandela or La Motta, the wonderful comic timing and genius of Sofia Vergara or Robin Williams?  All of these people have moved me and continue to affect me; I get them.  They speak my language whether in print, with a brush or on film.

But I’m pretty sure I could find two dozen or ten dozen others with whom I also vibrate sympathetically and who are neither Cancerian or metal boars (bores…!).

I expect so much because I give so much – my “sign ” has naught to do with it.  Naively I still believe that what I so readily give will be reciprocated yet time and again it is not.  I think I will always be a “giving more than I receive” person because it is hard wired into me. Stings a bit though, especially if I’m not available when someone pulls the string and suddenly I am “persona non grata”!

Do I get taken for granted?  Yes.

Do I resent that?  Yes, sometimes I bloody well do!

Do I forgive it?  No, not always and a hardening begins (that crabby shell?).

But if you’re always there, what makes you necessary…..?  I hit upon this earlier today and it is an incredibly complex idea.

I’ve been told that I’m tenancious and formidable.  Could be that shell, but shells can be broken and claws lopped off…  Then again I’m apparently a metal boar (bore?) and a boar can be pretty damn ferocious if provoked, never mind one made of metal!  But I’m not a crab and I’m no boar (bore).

I’m just me.

The truth is I can (and have been) all of the above.  I’ve been stomped on and gone to pieces.  I’ve pulled in, disappeared and taken decades to re-emerge after being let down by people.  I’ve been a chattering ray of sunshine and harsh, cold showers.

Ask me who I am and I’ll say I’m an inquisitive, feeling, strong person who is loyal, shy, sunny, tough, sappy, melancholy, deeply loving, giving, self-sacrificing, sociable, sensitive, intuitive, insular, trusting, cynical, stubborn, cautious and impulsive, with a creative streak, sometimes a lazy bone, a fierce temper when provoked and a soppy centre.  I am independent and also long to let go and give over control but that takes trust. Who I am depends which mood or even decade you happen to catch hold of me in.  I can be warm or incredibly cold, but not quite unfeeling and I can feel too much one way or the other to my detriment. I’m a tricky combo, often misunderstood. Life gave me lemons early on and I didn’t learn how to make lemonade until I hit 40.  It’s also said when life gives you lemons, grab tequila and salt  – or just throw them at someone!!  Two songs that come very close to encapsulating me, who I am and where I’m at or have been at almost any given time in my life:  Four Seasons in One Day and Distant Sun – both by Crowded House.

Where am I going with this…?  Basically, where are my wonderful friends and family when I am in need? When I spent 2 hours on the phone while you railed at the world, when I dropped everything to see you or that time when you called and sucked up my evening when I was half way through dinner and my son ate alone while I listened and sympathised about how blue you were feeling?  Where are you?

I don’t necessarily need your advice but time off from being “me” would be nice once in a while!  And being me isn’t some terrible dark world it’s actually mostly light and happy but when those clouds gather, I’d like one of you to be present with a big umbrella!  I’m not bitter but it’s a bit rich when I push back and you decide to drop me like a hot potato!  And don’t I allow that to happen because I’m understanding, forgiving and soft, yes all true, but I can also be a hard-faced bitch.  I’ve cut people off over the years. There are some I’ve regretted and I learnt all the while, however I think time and recent life experiences are making me hard (tougher?).

It’s not a bad thing so long as it doesn’t run out of control and I end up a Julius Caesar or Henry VIII type  – or even a Robin Williams, God rest his soul…

I’m the only person I can depend upon, even when I let my stupid self down by being everything for those I care about the most.  Heck, I’m even 150% there for my boss all the while knowing he isn’t always going to match my input/effort.  So I get let down a great deal.  But I absorb it, let it out and move on.  Mostly…

Perhaps I need to learn faster and better what most people already practice: “Me, Myself and I”.

It’s not really me though – and there’s the rub!  I need to love, be loved and love myself more. I should continue to let people in but temper their subconscious or even conscious need to dominate my time and subjugate me.  Love – sexual, emotional, familial or intellectual – has to be breathed in and out, taken in and out, expressed, felt and wholly, unconditionally reciprocated and not flow only in one direction.

Love is about growth not the diminution of another.

I’ll end with this from The Bard:

“Self-love, my liege, is not so vile a sin, as self-neglecting.”

Oh tell me the truth about love…

Love is a dark stain upon the human consciousness.

It can start a war.

It can bind.

It can kill…

Love can maim and mutilate the mind, the body, the spirit.  It can twist you into something you no longer recognise.

Love is pressure and release…

Love is an atom bomb; unrequited – a damp squib.

Love is faith and hope.

Love is a mirror…we behold that which we need reflected back into our soul.

To love is to be neglectful of yourself.  It is not selfish.

It is undemanding.

It does not control.

It does not contort nor contain prohibitively.

Love can stop a war.

Love can change us for good or ill.  The right words or the wrong look are the difference between a heart that takes flight and one that is shot down.

Real love is a complex feeling.  It waxes and wanes, is never static, never staid and is ever constant, refreshed and renewed.  Real love sustains the lover and beloved and remains “real” whatever is thrown at it.

“True love” is the domain of the lusty teenage fantasist  – or 40 year old virgin.  And you can be a virgin when you have already lost your virginity….  There are men and women all around us who have not been loved in the right way, who haven’t matured emotionally and as a result, confuse the ideas of “true” love with real love.

When real love comes along, it’s like you’ve been hit by a freight train.  Now that doesn’t happen every day – nor does real love – and it takes a while to stand up straight, get your bearings and check you’re actually still “you” because it’s utterly devastating.  But if you do get back up, you’ll have a journey to end all journeys when you grab on with both hands.

Love is fear and self-loathing. This is particularly so when the object of your affection is on a pedestal at a height you feel you could never attain.  Why do we do that…?

Love is life-affirming and confidence boosting.

Love can build as well as destroy, make you light and heavy.  The good kind builds us up, slays the darkness, makes us happy with a heart that’s full.  The bad kind kind lifts us briefly then swiftly brings us down, empties the head of reason and dashes the soul to pieces even as it keeps it bound.

Good love and good reason co-exist in a good heart.

Love can pull you together and tear you apart at the same time – heat.  Hate can pull you together and tear you apart at the same time – cold.  The distance between love and hate is not so far at all.  Great deeds have been done under the guise of both, sometimes the one masquerading as the other and ultimately leading to tragedy.

Love conquers all… I don’t know about that.  Reason has to get in there somewhere as a life lived in pure emotion is both irrational and unsustainable, perhaps even maddening.  Reason helps steer the right path and makes love not exactly heel – love should be free, unfettered – but lends it the lines within which it can move, change and grow safely.  This calls to mind what Bruce Lee had to say about love:

“Young love is a flame: very pretty, often very hot and fierce, but still only light and flickering.  The love of the older and disciplined heart is as coals, deep-burning and unquenchable.”

and:

“I’m not one of those who do not believe in love at first sight – but I believe in taking a second look.”

and:

“Absence in love is like water upon fire; a little quickens but much extinguishes it.”

I agree with his statements but am I any clearer on the truth about love, from his viewpoint or mine?

No. And that’s the point.

Love is a moving, feeling, ever-changing animal, presenting itself in many hued colours like beautiful, soft radiant silks in a crowded bazaar, surrounded by men and women who call out persistently, inviting you to touch, to experience, to fall for their rich, sensual offerings.  We helplessly buy into the whole experience but sometimes the sight and sound is overwhelming and we need to duck into a cool, quiet alley before we dive back in and decide from amongst that bewildering array of delights what it is we truly want and, how much there is to pay for it…

When love ends because you and/or your lover did not completely buy in to it, learn from it.  Grow into a better person and be all the better a lover for the experience.  Don’t carry it with you into the next relationship and certainly don’t let it set you adrift and alone.  Loving someone or something is what defines us, sets us up or knocks us down – and that includes loving ourselves.  When we don’t love ourselves we become sorry, sad, dangerous, (self) destructive creatures.  The road back from there is a long and dark one.  So many cannot avoid it but the upside is that once travelled, a great deal is learnt about the self and about others.  During the journey two qualities are born, qualities that many strive to possess and never attain: wisdom and immense inner strength.  I read on my dark journey that “Depression is the illness of the strong” and I add to it that wisdom is the domain of the brave.

When love comes knocking invite it in but above all, simply enjoy it and let it breathe because the truth about love is this:

Unhealthy analysis kills it stone dead.

 

 

 

 

On Reason and Passion

On Reason and Passion
 Kahlil Gibran

Your soul is oftentimes a battlefield, upon which your reason and your judgment wage war against your passion and your appetite.
Would that I could be the peacemaker in your soul, that I might turn the discord and the rivalry of your elements into oneness and melody.
But how shall I, unless you yourselves be also the peacemakers, nay, the lovers of all your elements?

Your reason and your passion are the rudder and the sails of your seafaring soul. If either your sails or your rudder be broken, you can but toss and drift, or else be held at a standstill in mid-seas.
For reason, ruling alone, is a force confining; and passion, unattended, is a flame that burns to its own destruction.
Therefore let your soul exalt your reason to the height of passion, that it may sing;
And let it direct your passion with reason, that your passion may live through its own daily resurrection, and like the phoenix rise above its own ashes.

I would have you consider your judgment and your appetite even as you would two loved guests in your house.
Surely you would not honour one guest above the other; for he who is more mindful of one loses the love and the faith of both.

Among the hills, when you sit in the cool shade of the white poplars, sharing the peace and serenity of distant fields and meadows — then let your heart say in silence, “God rests in reason.”
And when the storm comes, and the mighty wind shakes the forest, and thunder and lightning proclaim the majesty of the sky — then let your heart say in awe, “God moves in passion.”
And since you are a breath in God’s sphere, and a leaf in God’s forest, you too should rest in reason and move in passion.