Just got an email from motorcycle boy, or someone who *claims* to be motorcycle boy. At this point my bullshit meter is totally pegged in the red zone, and I won't trust ANYTHING this guy says until I've actually confirmed it with my own two eyes.
The thing is, I don't usually think of myself as gullible, or a sucker. Overly trusting, yes; that seems to be my nature. I've *tried* being more suspicious, and it just feels like wearing a badly-fitting, very silly-looking, overcoat, like something one of those goofball detectives in a B movie might wear. Or maybe Peter Falk in that old TV show Columbo.
So I spent yet another hour with google, trying to find an address for the name in the 'from' line of the email. Which of course is NOT the same as the name motorcycle boy gave me.
Sigh. Why on EARTH would anybody contort themselves so much, convolute everything? It's like some kind of - maze, trying to figure out what's real and what's not. Maybe it's yet another kind of smoke screen, squid ink? Self-protection, keeping the other person out until you feel safe. But by the time you've actually gotten to KNOW this other person, you've already woven such a tangled web of lies that there's no HOPE of ever sorting it out or the other person trusting you again. I just don't get it.
***
I know it's ridiculous for me to still be putting energy and time into this, but it's just BUGGING me. I was trying to think of an explanation for why it mattered, and the best I could come up with is that it's like a picture on your wall that's hanging crooked - it just DRIVES YOU NUTS. You want to FIX it, to make it right.
And I'm sure if I had more going on right now it wouldn't occupy so much time - what's that saying about tasks expanding to fill the time available? I had actually forgotten about it, and now it's all stirred up again.
Sigh. I guess this demon needs a little more feeding. I wrote down an address that looks the closest to fitting all the 'clues' he gave me when we were talking. I guess I'll go take a look. Maybe :-)
***
One moment sticks in my mind from our walk, maybe I described it already.
We were walking across a long, concrete suspension bridge over the river, and about halfway, I stopped to look out, because it was so beautiful. I also wanted to see if he could hang with me in such a moment, without getting impatient or trying to touch me before I was ready.
I knew he wanted to touch me – he kept kind of leaning toward me, then veering away when I didn’t immediately respond (and THAT is attractive – that level of awareness and responsiveness). He had that kind of – LOOK that some guys get when they want to touch you but haven’t quite worked up the nerve. And he wasn’t sure whether it was ok. Thank GOD for someone, FINALLY, who actually can read my frickin’ BODY LANGUAGE, for fuck’s sake.
As we were standing there, I said something about wondering if we would get a moment of absolute silence (the planes from the flight path were pretty much constant) if we stood there for a moment. After a few seconds I started to worry that he was getting impatient, and said, “Looks like maybe not.”
And he said, leaning forward onto the railing in a way that I swear was CALCULATED to make me want to touch him, “Let’s just wait for a bit.” Swoon :-)
These are a few of my favorite things (channeling Sound of Music): Responsiveness. Sensitivity. Awareness. Maybe they’re all part and parcel of the same thing, a certain kind of ability to read another person’s signals.
The thing was, I never really wanted to kiss him. I enjoyed the snuggling; and I felt immediate liking, fondness and affection for him; but I never really found myself getting stirred up. The only times I found myself really moved were when he SAID something that got all my bells ringing :-), which he did several times. And also when something about his body movement reminded me of a broken bird.
Come to think of it, there was an odd contrast between the way he moved and the way he talked. His voice was quite deep and warm and confident, very furry and soothing. At one point I had my head on his chest and it was all I could do to pay attention to the actual words because the sound of his voice was lulling me into such deep relaxation.
But his movements seemed, somehow – protective? Not sure. As if he’d been hurt or something. And I did ask him at one point if he was limping (while we were still on the walk), and he said he was missing a toe. I took a wild guess and asked if it was his left foot, and he said it was.
So I felt protective of him at times, and comforted by him at others. Maybe that’s why I keep thinking of him: He has something I need, and I have something *he* seemed to need. Beyond sex, that is. Which I still contend is a WANT, not a need. And is quite often a displacement technique, a way of escaping uncomfortable feelings.
Random thought bubbling out of the welter of images and ideas:
My body is not a medium of exchange.
Saturday, September 25, 2010
the root of it?
Feeling like I'm down to the root of things, that feeling of exhaustion, almost paralysis, from having no one to notice that you're struggling and frickin' HELP you, for fuck's sake.
It's not POSSIBLE to 're-parent' yourself. Yet another bullshit concept brought to us by the prime purveyors of Brave-New-World doublespeak: The shrinkological patrol. All they are is another police force to enforce our conformity.
I can't BE my own mother and father, though Flying Spaghetti Monster *knows* I've tried.
If someone ever brings up the notion of 're-parenting yourself' again, I'll ask them if they've ever tried to HUG themselves, and just exactly how satisfying THAT little exercise in futility was. In the same category as 'pulling yourself up by your bootstraps,' I'd say.
It's not POSSIBLE to 're-parent' yourself. Yet another bullshit concept brought to us by the prime purveyors of Brave-New-World doublespeak: The shrinkological patrol. All they are is another police force to enforce our conformity.
I can't BE my own mother and father, though Flying Spaghetti Monster *knows* I've tried.
If someone ever brings up the notion of 're-parenting yourself' again, I'll ask them if they've ever tried to HUG themselves, and just exactly how satisfying THAT little exercise in futility was. In the same category as 'pulling yourself up by your bootstraps,' I'd say.
expectations
Just listened to a story on NPR by a couple of journalists who taped conversations with some Wall Street guys shortly after the most recent financial bailout.
They asked the guys if they were grateful for the bailout, if they appreciated being helped by American taxpayers.
The men, who sounded pretty young, to a man insisted that their current 'success' and the fact that they still had jobs was because "I'm smart. Survival of the fittest."
The journalists kept trying to get these guys to admit that the bailout had saved their bacon - that, without it, their banks would have gone under and they would have lost their jobs.
"No way, man," they said. "That had nothing to do with it."
Just how delusional ARE these people???
The journalists went on to talk about being in Haiti, and speaking to both some of the very rich and very poor who'd been affected by economic difficulties.
They pointed out that the rich folks seemed to be FAR more vocal in complaining about their woes - they went on and on about how unfair it was. The poor folks, on the other hand (and one of the journalists pointed out that poor Haitians are among the poorest people in the world), seemed less vociferous, more accepting of their lot.
The journalists speculated as to why there was such a disparity in response between the poor and the rich. One suggested that it might be simply a difference in expectation: The rich EXPECTED far more than the poor did, so they felt more let down. I guess if you don't expect much, you don't feel so disappointed when things don't go your way.
***
The thing that's speaking to ME here about all this is this idea that you have some CONTROL over your own expectations.
Which, to me, is BULLSHIT.
You have no more control over your expectations than you do over your emotions.
Expectations, like emotions, just HAPPEN. They're like the weather - they come and go, and they're based on environmental CONDITIONS. They are NOT something under your control. You can control, to some degree, how you REACT to said emotions (or expectations), in that you can steer your behavior. But you can't change how it makes you FEEL. The feelings just HAPPEN, and then you react, either with an action or a thought.
Expectations come from experience. Like the whole celebrity phenomenon. If you grow up being a nobody, and then, through some freak series of events - chance, luck, being in the right place at the right time (which are pretty much all different ways of saying the same thing) - you are flung up into the spotlight, into the bright glare of fame and fortune, and then you FALL again, from that lofty post - Well. You're going to be hurt. You're going to feel let down, disappointed, betrayed. And people in such a situation ALWAYS become angry, or at least resentful. The way they EXPRESS said anger may vary - some may turn it inward and become depressed, and drink their way through it to numb the pain; others may become destructive, and turn their anger outward onto others, into angry rantings or even physical violence. And all the shades in between.
They asked the guys if they were grateful for the bailout, if they appreciated being helped by American taxpayers.
The men, who sounded pretty young, to a man insisted that their current 'success' and the fact that they still had jobs was because "I'm smart. Survival of the fittest."
The journalists kept trying to get these guys to admit that the bailout had saved their bacon - that, without it, their banks would have gone under and they would have lost their jobs.
"No way, man," they said. "That had nothing to do with it."
Just how delusional ARE these people???
The journalists went on to talk about being in Haiti, and speaking to both some of the very rich and very poor who'd been affected by economic difficulties.
They pointed out that the rich folks seemed to be FAR more vocal in complaining about their woes - they went on and on about how unfair it was. The poor folks, on the other hand (and one of the journalists pointed out that poor Haitians are among the poorest people in the world), seemed less vociferous, more accepting of their lot.
The journalists speculated as to why there was such a disparity in response between the poor and the rich. One suggested that it might be simply a difference in expectation: The rich EXPECTED far more than the poor did, so they felt more let down. I guess if you don't expect much, you don't feel so disappointed when things don't go your way.
***
The thing that's speaking to ME here about all this is this idea that you have some CONTROL over your own expectations.
Which, to me, is BULLSHIT.
You have no more control over your expectations than you do over your emotions.
Expectations, like emotions, just HAPPEN. They're like the weather - they come and go, and they're based on environmental CONDITIONS. They are NOT something under your control. You can control, to some degree, how you REACT to said emotions (or expectations), in that you can steer your behavior. But you can't change how it makes you FEEL. The feelings just HAPPEN, and then you react, either with an action or a thought.
Expectations come from experience. Like the whole celebrity phenomenon. If you grow up being a nobody, and then, through some freak series of events - chance, luck, being in the right place at the right time (which are pretty much all different ways of saying the same thing) - you are flung up into the spotlight, into the bright glare of fame and fortune, and then you FALL again, from that lofty post - Well. You're going to be hurt. You're going to feel let down, disappointed, betrayed. And people in such a situation ALWAYS become angry, or at least resentful. The way they EXPRESS said anger may vary - some may turn it inward and become depressed, and drink their way through it to numb the pain; others may become destructive, and turn their anger outward onto others, into angry rantings or even physical violence. And all the shades in between.
I must shed my family
The way a snake sheds its skin
Like a rocket ship, its first stage dropping away behind it
I had some fabulous image earlier today of - something crumbling? Falling to dust? that was perfect. Can't recall it now.
Maybe all the bad patterns can drop away too, now?
***
Keep thinking of little brother and betrayal, the Lucy/Charlie Brown/football thing. What do I feed THAT demon to satiate it?
First, define the demon.
I must not ask for help.
Why?
Because if I ask for help, they'll promise to help me, and the - NOT help me.
So I'll feel let down, sad, lonely.
AND, most of all, worst of all: Eventually (and it doesn't actually take long to get to this point) I begin to feel that I don't DESERVE help.
That I am intrinsically, inherently, BAD, WRONG, NO GOOD.
It's amazing how many flavors, how many variants of this particular poison there are. Like a giant candy shop, only every sugary treat is designed to KILL you.
An image comes to mind of a giant Halloween party, I'm in a new town, no friends yet, sitting alone in my costume. The eternal feeling of yawning, gaping, open-a-hole-in-the-floor-to-swallow-me-up-so-I-don't-feel-so-EXPOSED, achingly PAINFUL loneliness. I imagine every face that comes floating near me as TAUNTING me, aware of my loneliness and pain and MOCKING me for it.
This is my mother.
My father.
My middle brother.
My youngest brother didn't do it only because I was eight years older than he was.
Why did *I* get to be the scapegoat, the punching bag, the NOBODY, the UNIMPORTANT one?
This comes back to the previous post, where what I was leading up to was the idea of sibling rivalry, and my middle brother needs to CONQUER me, to DEFEAT me.
He saw me, at some point, as his ENEMY, who must be VANQUISHED.
He didn't win, but he did succeed in driving me into hiding.
Flash: Just like my mother! This is EXACTLY what mom would do when confronted with bad behavior: She'd CHECK OUT! Leave the scene, disappear, mentally and emotionally at least, and physically as well, if possible. No WONDER she's in hardly any of my early childhood memories: She WASN'T THERE.
***
I am cold; I am tired. I am hungry. I am physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually DRAINED and EXHAUSTED.
It seems to never stop, to go on and on and on, this race against time and the giant sucking sound of my precious resources - money, time, life - draining away.
I cannot seem to rest, my EYEBALLS hurt from looking at this computer screen. My throat burns from the words I cannot speak for lack of anyone to LISTEN to or HEAR them.
I am trying to PURGE all this shit out of my system before it KILLS me, before it SUCKS ME DRY. Like some cross between a giant spiritual BOIL and a PARASITE.
Like a rocket ship, its first stage dropping away behind it
I had some fabulous image earlier today of - something crumbling? Falling to dust? that was perfect. Can't recall it now.
Maybe all the bad patterns can drop away too, now?
***
Keep thinking of little brother and betrayal, the Lucy/Charlie Brown/football thing. What do I feed THAT demon to satiate it?
First, define the demon.
I must not ask for help.
Why?
Because if I ask for help, they'll promise to help me, and the - NOT help me.
So I'll feel let down, sad, lonely.
AND, most of all, worst of all: Eventually (and it doesn't actually take long to get to this point) I begin to feel that I don't DESERVE help.
That I am intrinsically, inherently, BAD, WRONG, NO GOOD.
It's amazing how many flavors, how many variants of this particular poison there are. Like a giant candy shop, only every sugary treat is designed to KILL you.
An image comes to mind of a giant Halloween party, I'm in a new town, no friends yet, sitting alone in my costume. The eternal feeling of yawning, gaping, open-a-hole-in-the-floor-to-swallow-me-up-so-I-don't-feel-so-EXPOSED, achingly PAINFUL loneliness. I imagine every face that comes floating near me as TAUNTING me, aware of my loneliness and pain and MOCKING me for it.
This is my mother.
My father.
My middle brother.
My youngest brother didn't do it only because I was eight years older than he was.
Why did *I* get to be the scapegoat, the punching bag, the NOBODY, the UNIMPORTANT one?
This comes back to the previous post, where what I was leading up to was the idea of sibling rivalry, and my middle brother needs to CONQUER me, to DEFEAT me.
He saw me, at some point, as his ENEMY, who must be VANQUISHED.
He didn't win, but he did succeed in driving me into hiding.
Flash: Just like my mother! This is EXACTLY what mom would do when confronted with bad behavior: She'd CHECK OUT! Leave the scene, disappear, mentally and emotionally at least, and physically as well, if possible. No WONDER she's in hardly any of my early childhood memories: She WASN'T THERE.
***
I am cold; I am tired. I am hungry. I am physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually DRAINED and EXHAUSTED.
It seems to never stop, to go on and on and on, this race against time and the giant sucking sound of my precious resources - money, time, life - draining away.
I cannot seem to rest, my EYEBALLS hurt from looking at this computer screen. My throat burns from the words I cannot speak for lack of anyone to LISTEN to or HEAR them.
I am trying to PURGE all this shit out of my system before it KILLS me, before it SUCKS ME DRY. Like some cross between a giant spiritual BOIL and a PARASITE.
Friday, September 24, 2010
oldest child usurped by middle child?
Still trying to unlock the self-hatred puzzle - where does the demon come from? Maybe if I can understand how it got there, I can eventually get rid of it.
Today I fed the demon by yanking on that eyebrow hair until I think the whole middle of my left eyebrow must be bald.
Each time it grows back, but, man, some days it's WEIRD looking. Some days it looks perfectly smooth, healthy, happy, more or less the same as the right eyebrow. Then other days it looks just GNARLY - half the hair sticking straight OUT, and some pointing straight DOWN. Just bizarre, like old man eyebrows. It seems to just KNOW what I'm feeling, like some kind of antennae, or a radar. Or maybe 'indicator' is what I mean. A pointer, that shows me when my energies are run the 'wrong' way, as in, not congruent with where I need them to go. Or something. Analogies and metaphors SNAP from the stress of being STRETCHED so hard.
***
It occurred to me that the 'self-picking-on' behaviors come from being picked on. I mean, kids don't NATURALLY pick on themselves, right? They learned it from somewhere. They sure as hell weren't BORN that way.
So, working backwards: What causes the eyebrow picking, or any of the other 'picking on' behaviors?
Well, bad thoughts. Specifically, thoughts that *I* am bad.
When there's something I need to do, such as getting more money to pay bills, and I have no money, and I have insufficient work to procure MORE money, then I get in this vicious, self-hating cycle that's hard to get out of.
What's wrong with me
Why won't I look for a job
I've DESPISED every job I've ever had, except music
(hm, I think maybe I've never stated, or understood, that so baldly before. Interesting. Keep going.)
Jobs are STUPID. They're BORING and people make you FEEL BAD ABOUT YOURSELF for not wanting to do their STUPID BORING THINGS that you COULDN'T CARE LESS ABOUT and THEY DON'T PAY YOU ENOUGH TO MAKE IT WORTH IT ANYWAY.
I think that last bit needs to be A BIT LOUDER:
THEY DON'T PAY YOU ENOUGH TO MAKE IT WORTH IT ANYWAY.
When people ask me why I quit architecture? That there, the line just above this? THAT's the reason. The real reason, the true reason, the honest reason.
I know people, mostly men, who cry big crocodile tears about how sorely used they feel, nose to the grindstone, wah - but when all's said and done? They fucking got PAID for it, and paid well. THEIR deal with the devil? Actually paid off. They got some actual, physical, measurable, TANGIBLE return for that soul they sold.
Me? Not so much. I suffered, and struggled, and toiled, and beat my head against the wall, and pushed that damn boulder up the hill (and got flattened when it rolled back down again) over and over again. And for what? So that, at the age of 47, I could live in a tiny rented house where the utilities and other miscellaneous things necessary to survive 'modern' life (an internet connection, in this case, I count as a NECESSITY rather than a luxury, given how much it's been both lifeline and umbilical cord, not to mention my own person university-at-my-fingertips, lo these 10 or so years of my personal self-reconstruction-from-scratch.)
Am I looking for help? Yes. Constantly.
Do I get it?
Tiny scraps, crumbs, just enough to remind me, continually, how STARVING I am to have even my most basic human needs met.
Maslow? He got NOTHIN'. I mean, picture that pyramid being like a triangular spaceship hovering over my head, just out of reach. I ain't even reached THE BOTTOM LEVEL yet. (Just had a horrible thought: What if, like in a video game, I RUN OUT OF TIME before the screen flashes 'GAME OVER'? That's my biggest fear. Or one of them - if my adrenals aren't fried to little crispy bits from the generalized anxiety around here, it ain't fer lack of TRYin'.)
***
Just glanced at the title of this entry and realized I haven't got anywhere near that part of the story yet. Have to pin this much up on the 'wall' and have a look at it, see what else needs to be said.
Today I fed the demon by yanking on that eyebrow hair until I think the whole middle of my left eyebrow must be bald.
Each time it grows back, but, man, some days it's WEIRD looking. Some days it looks perfectly smooth, healthy, happy, more or less the same as the right eyebrow. Then other days it looks just GNARLY - half the hair sticking straight OUT, and some pointing straight DOWN. Just bizarre, like old man eyebrows. It seems to just KNOW what I'm feeling, like some kind of antennae, or a radar. Or maybe 'indicator' is what I mean. A pointer, that shows me when my energies are run the 'wrong' way, as in, not congruent with where I need them to go. Or something. Analogies and metaphors SNAP from the stress of being STRETCHED so hard.
***
It occurred to me that the 'self-picking-on' behaviors come from being picked on. I mean, kids don't NATURALLY pick on themselves, right? They learned it from somewhere. They sure as hell weren't BORN that way.
So, working backwards: What causes the eyebrow picking, or any of the other 'picking on' behaviors?
Well, bad thoughts. Specifically, thoughts that *I* am bad.
When there's something I need to do, such as getting more money to pay bills, and I have no money, and I have insufficient work to procure MORE money, then I get in this vicious, self-hating cycle that's hard to get out of.
What's wrong with me
Why won't I look for a job
I've DESPISED every job I've ever had, except music
(hm, I think maybe I've never stated, or understood, that so baldly before. Interesting. Keep going.)
Jobs are STUPID. They're BORING and people make you FEEL BAD ABOUT YOURSELF for not wanting to do their STUPID BORING THINGS that you COULDN'T CARE LESS ABOUT and THEY DON'T PAY YOU ENOUGH TO MAKE IT WORTH IT ANYWAY.
I think that last bit needs to be A BIT LOUDER:
THEY DON'T PAY YOU ENOUGH TO MAKE IT WORTH IT ANYWAY.
When people ask me why I quit architecture? That there, the line just above this? THAT's the reason. The real reason, the true reason, the honest reason.
I know people, mostly men, who cry big crocodile tears about how sorely used they feel, nose to the grindstone, wah - but when all's said and done? They fucking got PAID for it, and paid well. THEIR deal with the devil? Actually paid off. They got some actual, physical, measurable, TANGIBLE return for that soul they sold.
Me? Not so much. I suffered, and struggled, and toiled, and beat my head against the wall, and pushed that damn boulder up the hill (and got flattened when it rolled back down again) over and over again. And for what? So that, at the age of 47, I could live in a tiny rented house where the utilities and other miscellaneous things necessary to survive 'modern' life (an internet connection, in this case, I count as a NECESSITY rather than a luxury, given how much it's been both lifeline and umbilical cord, not to mention my own person university-at-my-fingertips, lo these 10 or so years of my personal self-reconstruction-from-scratch.)
Am I looking for help? Yes. Constantly.
Do I get it?
Tiny scraps, crumbs, just enough to remind me, continually, how STARVING I am to have even my most basic human needs met.
Maslow? He got NOTHIN'. I mean, picture that pyramid being like a triangular spaceship hovering over my head, just out of reach. I ain't even reached THE BOTTOM LEVEL yet. (Just had a horrible thought: What if, like in a video game, I RUN OUT OF TIME before the screen flashes 'GAME OVER'? That's my biggest fear. Or one of them - if my adrenals aren't fried to little crispy bits from the generalized anxiety around here, it ain't fer lack of TRYin'.)
***
Just glanced at the title of this entry and realized I haven't got anywhere near that part of the story yet. Have to pin this much up on the 'wall' and have a look at it, see what else needs to be said.
Thursday, September 23, 2010
cog(nitive) function?
('modern' American?) Men are taught from an early age to split off from their emotions in such a way that makes them extremely efficient cogs in the Machine Age.
It also makes having relationships with them nearly impossible.
Posit: A woman who can learn to (step outside herself?) and turn this particular function on and off at will will have doubled her arsenal (male term - have I joined the 'other' side! Agghh!)
But wait. I *haven't* joined the other side. Not yet. It seems to me, maybe, to be possible to learn to use the language(s?) and behavior(s) of power without being caught up in the drama?
Hm. Skeptical.
And: Is so-called 'ethics' yet another power-play by the Haves to keep the Have-nots down? A form of mind control?
It also makes having relationships with them nearly impossible.
Posit: A woman who can learn to (step outside herself?) and turn this particular function on and off at will will have doubled her arsenal (male term - have I joined the 'other' side! Agghh!)
But wait. I *haven't* joined the other side. Not yet. It seems to me, maybe, to be possible to learn to use the language(s?) and behavior(s) of power without being caught up in the drama?
Hm. Skeptical.
And: Is so-called 'ethics' yet another power-play by the Haves to keep the Have-nots down? A form of mind control?
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
zombie feminism
From commenter Kathy Miriam on Feral Scholar's blog, entry titled "In the case of Clueless vs. Clueless … (Sex & Aggression)":
http://www.feralscholar.org/blog/index.php/2007/11/09/in-the-case-of-clueless-vs-clueless-sex-aggression/
***
Word of the day: Redoubtable
re·doubt·a·ble/riˈdoutəbəl/
Adjective: (of a person) Formidable, esp. as an opponent: "a redoubtable debater".
"I love the idea of MacDonaldized feminism. I myself have been tinkering with the notion of botox-feminism involving a paralysis of the moral/intellectual muscle particularly with respect to one’s capacity to show outrage. [Bold mine.]"
http://www.feralscholar.org/blog/index.php/2007/11/09/in-the-case-of-clueless-vs-clueless-sex-aggression/
***
Word of the day: Redoubtable
re·doubt·a·ble/riˈdoutəbəl/
Adjective: (of a person) Formidable, esp. as an opponent: "a redoubtable debater".
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
more nothingness
http://zenhabits.net/the-art-of-doing-nothing/:
Doing nothing, in the true sense of the word, can be overwhelming if you attempt to do too much nothing at once. Do small nothings at first.
do nothing
Wu-wei. New term to me, though I think I actually already live by it to some degree - the 'moderation in all things, including moderation' idea.
We wei is also called 'the middle path'.
From A Love Guide - Learn the Wu-Wei of Improving Communication in Your Relationships
http://ezinearticles.com/?A-Love-Guide---Learn-the-Wu-Wei-of-Improving-Communication-in-Your-Relationships&id=2313796:
We wei is also called 'the middle path'.
From A Love Guide - Learn the Wu-Wei of Improving Communication in Your Relationships
http://ezinearticles.com/?A-Love-Guide---Learn-the-Wu-Wei-of-Improving-Communication-in-Your-Relationships&id=2313796:
"If you feel any resistance or negativity during a conversation, instead of becoming negative or defensive you can choose to go with the flow. You can yield to the other person and change the direction of the conversation by allowing the negative energy of the other to pass you by without disturbing or even touching you. Think of it as verbal Tai Chi or Karate."
Your conditioned response to negativity may be that of either fight or flight. You might get defensive or aggressive. You might shut down and become passive, including giving in or doing what you don't want to do in order to avoid conflict conversations.
Both aggressive and passive responses are ineffective ways to communicate. They often leave you feeling alienated and at odds with the person who either fought with or fled.
Why is Wu-Wei a better choice?
The goal of Wu-Wei is to be assertive by telling others what you are feeling, what you want, need, or what you are requesting. Let it be known what is not acceptable; and do so in a way that is forceful enough but does not step over any of their boundaries.
You are respecting yourself and others when you assert yourself by dealing with the small stuff before it becomes large. You use Wu-Wei to avoid arguments and set firm boundaries against an onslaught of negativity. Then you have plenty of positive energy to live your life on your terms. And you will become a powerful listener, which is an act of love and a way to create healthy relationships."
Sunday, September 19, 2010
dying of emotional hunger
This is insane. I'm a 47-year-old, intelligent, attractive, talented, 'interesting' person, sitting here alone at a computer feeling as if I'm about to literally starve to death because I CANNOT get my most basic human needs met.
I've reached out in all the ways I know how; I've schooled myself to not take 'rejections' personally. All I feel, right now, really, is HUNGER.
Yes, I could go get some food. I could, like last night, skip any pretense at physical appearance maintenance and simply throw clothes on, jump in the car and run down to the 'convenience' store, and get some semblance of 'food' to get me through the night and on to another day.
There are so many things lurking on the edges of vision that I must not look at. Physical hunger; emotional hunger. Money running out. Winter coming. Holidays coming. I can put them all off for a while longer; they aren't quite all 'up in my grill' yet.
It's not that I'm afraid of *asking* for help; it's the inevitable ANGER I'm faced with, the RESENTMENT at my temerity to ASK.
Clearly I'm asking the wrong people.
A while back, someone left a local news flier (small newspaper) on my windshield, folded open to a page on a community service ad for a weekly, free dinner ('open to all') at a church. I was mildly affronted, wondering if someone thought I was homeless? Then realized, maybe the universe *does* look out for us, in small ways.
So maybe I'll go there this week - the dinner happens on Tuesday nights.
I've reached out in all the ways I know how; I've schooled myself to not take 'rejections' personally. All I feel, right now, really, is HUNGER.
Yes, I could go get some food. I could, like last night, skip any pretense at physical appearance maintenance and simply throw clothes on, jump in the car and run down to the 'convenience' store, and get some semblance of 'food' to get me through the night and on to another day.
There are so many things lurking on the edges of vision that I must not look at. Physical hunger; emotional hunger. Money running out. Winter coming. Holidays coming. I can put them all off for a while longer; they aren't quite all 'up in my grill' yet.
It's not that I'm afraid of *asking* for help; it's the inevitable ANGER I'm faced with, the RESENTMENT at my temerity to ASK.
Clearly I'm asking the wrong people.
A while back, someone left a local news flier (small newspaper) on my windshield, folded open to a page on a community service ad for a weekly, free dinner ('open to all') at a church. I was mildly affronted, wondering if someone thought I was homeless? Then realized, maybe the universe *does* look out for us, in small ways.
So maybe I'll go there this week - the dinner happens on Tuesday nights.
when 'comfort food' no longer provides comfort
When you've gotten to the point where you know that practically EVERYTHING you're doing is a substitute for what you really need -
Then what?
I slept a long time today, knowing that I'd have to spend most of today's waking hours avoiding thinking. And so far I've managed it - I've kept the demons at bay by reading and writing, curled up here in front of my electronic umbilical cord.
There's this sort of constant, low-level physical hunger - I feel a bit like the prisoner or the terminal cancer patient who KNOWS she's going to die, and who chronicles her last moments with excruciating clarity. Like Emma Thompson's character in Wit.
***
A useful (?) concept occurs to me: In one of Terry Pratchett's stories, one of the witches, Granny Weatherwax, teaches one of her dying, elderly patients how to 'put the pain outside himself'. I think that's what I'm doing. It must be a survival technique. I feel a kinship with those guys who crashed their plane in the Andes, though here I am, supposedly in the middle of 'civilization', other 'humans' living less than 50 to a hundred feet away from me on all sides, the closest one less than ten feet away right this minute, through the floor in the duplex unit below. Might as well be on Jupiter.
Then what?
I slept a long time today, knowing that I'd have to spend most of today's waking hours avoiding thinking. And so far I've managed it - I've kept the demons at bay by reading and writing, curled up here in front of my electronic umbilical cord.
There's this sort of constant, low-level physical hunger - I feel a bit like the prisoner or the terminal cancer patient who KNOWS she's going to die, and who chronicles her last moments with excruciating clarity. Like Emma Thompson's character in Wit.
***
A useful (?) concept occurs to me: In one of Terry Pratchett's stories, one of the witches, Granny Weatherwax, teaches one of her dying, elderly patients how to 'put the pain outside himself'. I think that's what I'm doing. It must be a survival technique. I feel a kinship with those guys who crashed their plane in the Andes, though here I am, supposedly in the middle of 'civilization', other 'humans' living less than 50 to a hundred feet away from me on all sides, the closest one less than ten feet away right this minute, through the floor in the duplex unit below. Might as well be on Jupiter.
exchange
What I feel like is, I'm up to me scuppers and can barely see over the bowsprit to even SEE if I'm about to run aground or be capsized, and the spray is blinding me and I have no idea where I'm going. Each day when I open my eyes, I spend the first few hours being amazed that I'm STILL HERE AT ALL.
And people seem to think I'm joking. I feel like one of those cartoon characters who've run off the edge of the cliff but haven't yet quite realized they're standing on thin air.
It's as if nobody but me can see the cliff, and even if they can, it's as unreal to them as a cartoon. The jagged rocks below, the likely outcome, are somehow invisible to them.
That's why people commit suicide: Because they KNOW, in their soul, their heart, their gut, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that they've become INVISIBLE. And that NO ONE will catch them when they fall.
***
An ex-lover committed suicide about six months ago.
I had some pangs of regret, missed him for a while, had flashbacks of fond (and some not-so-fond, but mostly remembered the fond ones) memories.
I talked with the woman he'd been most recently involved with, who felt horribly guilty that her 'dumping' him had contributed to him giving up.
But I'd known him for a long time, and found him to be one of the most insanely selfish people I'd ever known.
This didn't keep me from *liking* him; he was quite likable, in spite of his self-centeredness. He just wasn't somebody I wanted to spend any time with.
The few times I ran into him, he'd go on about how he "still felt the same way", and I was always completely unmoved - the 'same way' as *what*??? When we were together (about a year), he'd made no effort whatsoever to cement our relationship. It was an endless series of lies, excuses and evasions, and I eventually dumped him because I saw the writing on the wall. Actually I saw the writing on the wall about six months in, but it took me another few months after that, stretching out to nearly a year total, for me to 'pull the plug'.
***
So, my question is: How much am I like this guy? I try REALLY HARD to give back to people who've helped me. The hard part is: What if they don't NEED any of the things I have to offer?
Like with my brother. I needed (and continue to need) all kinds of help, from borrowing the truck to help me move things, to shoveling dirt for the garden, to helping me with my car, etc. Projects that are just too big (physically) for me, or that I don't have the tools or knowledge or experience to deal with alone. Or, sometimes? I just need the moral support of having someone to work with! For god's sake, is this *really* so difficult to understand?
"Many hands make light work." There have to be a million sayings out there about such things.
And granted, from a physical standpoint, I can't offer in return what he's given me - his financial and physical resources far exceed mine. But I *can* offer to hang out with the girls, which is something that's good for *all* of us. And it's a not inconsiderable investment of time and energy for me to do it - I have to drive there, and handle, single-handedly, three young children for whom I have none of the physical, financial or emotional infrastructure that two full-time parents have. I'd say I do pretty damn well, when I do it. The fact that I'm limited to an hour or two or three at a time with them is not surprising, given that I have no money to spend to take them to fancy meals or outings - all our 'adventures' have centered on long walks, exploring and making up our own 'Tom Sawyer' type amusements. Which, at least from *my* point of view, have always been fun and rewarding, if sometimes exhausting. And the girls seemed to think so too.
This whole 'medium-of-exchange' approach - isn't there some saying about, "From each according to her abilities/gifts, to each according to her needs"? Or, "Those who can, must?" Maybe that's a 'democratic' ideal that has long since been mowed under by the stampeding feet pursuing individual 'happiness' and/or success.
I'm just thinking out loud, here, as usual, hoping that whatever's churning away in my gut - guilt, shame, fear, anger - will be relieved by attempting to lure it out in the open where I can SEE it, and, hopefully, DEAL with it, somehow.
And people seem to think I'm joking. I feel like one of those cartoon characters who've run off the edge of the cliff but haven't yet quite realized they're standing on thin air.
It's as if nobody but me can see the cliff, and even if they can, it's as unreal to them as a cartoon. The jagged rocks below, the likely outcome, are somehow invisible to them.
That's why people commit suicide: Because they KNOW, in their soul, their heart, their gut, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that they've become INVISIBLE. And that NO ONE will catch them when they fall.
***
An ex-lover committed suicide about six months ago.
I had some pangs of regret, missed him for a while, had flashbacks of fond (and some not-so-fond, but mostly remembered the fond ones) memories.
I talked with the woman he'd been most recently involved with, who felt horribly guilty that her 'dumping' him had contributed to him giving up.
But I'd known him for a long time, and found him to be one of the most insanely selfish people I'd ever known.
This didn't keep me from *liking* him; he was quite likable, in spite of his self-centeredness. He just wasn't somebody I wanted to spend any time with.
The few times I ran into him, he'd go on about how he "still felt the same way", and I was always completely unmoved - the 'same way' as *what*??? When we were together (about a year), he'd made no effort whatsoever to cement our relationship. It was an endless series of lies, excuses and evasions, and I eventually dumped him because I saw the writing on the wall. Actually I saw the writing on the wall about six months in, but it took me another few months after that, stretching out to nearly a year total, for me to 'pull the plug'.
***
So, my question is: How much am I like this guy? I try REALLY HARD to give back to people who've helped me. The hard part is: What if they don't NEED any of the things I have to offer?
Like with my brother. I needed (and continue to need) all kinds of help, from borrowing the truck to help me move things, to shoveling dirt for the garden, to helping me with my car, etc. Projects that are just too big (physically) for me, or that I don't have the tools or knowledge or experience to deal with alone. Or, sometimes? I just need the moral support of having someone to work with! For god's sake, is this *really* so difficult to understand?
"Many hands make light work." There have to be a million sayings out there about such things.
And granted, from a physical standpoint, I can't offer in return what he's given me - his financial and physical resources far exceed mine. But I *can* offer to hang out with the girls, which is something that's good for *all* of us. And it's a not inconsiderable investment of time and energy for me to do it - I have to drive there, and handle, single-handedly, three young children for whom I have none of the physical, financial or emotional infrastructure that two full-time parents have. I'd say I do pretty damn well, when I do it. The fact that I'm limited to an hour or two or three at a time with them is not surprising, given that I have no money to spend to take them to fancy meals or outings - all our 'adventures' have centered on long walks, exploring and making up our own 'Tom Sawyer' type amusements. Which, at least from *my* point of view, have always been fun and rewarding, if sometimes exhausting. And the girls seemed to think so too.
This whole 'medium-of-exchange' approach - isn't there some saying about, "From each according to her abilities/gifts, to each according to her needs"? Or, "Those who can, must?" Maybe that's a 'democratic' ideal that has long since been mowed under by the stampeding feet pursuing individual 'happiness' and/or success.
I'm just thinking out loud, here, as usual, hoping that whatever's churning away in my gut - guilt, shame, fear, anger - will be relieved by attempting to lure it out in the open where I can SEE it, and, hopefully, DEAL with it, somehow.
what is a friend?
I recently asked a friend for help with some homemade 'storm windows' that I got last winter and never finished installing because I mis-measured the space they need to fit and they're just *that* much too big.
I left him a voicemail, hoping he might help - I need both a vehicle big enough to haul them to the hardware store to be re-cut (he's got a pickup truck and a station wagon), and an extra pair of hands, since the sheets are too big for me to physically handle alone.
I just got an email back that seemed calculated to make me feel guilty for asking, though he has a slightly flowery, archaic turn of phrase that makes it hard (for *me*) to tell whether he's joking or not.
I wrote a response back (that I sent to my*self*) that let me get out all the angry, frustrated, painful feelings I had when reading his email.
And now I'm trying to think of how to *really* respond.
First of all, I prefer the phone, because there can be some back-and-forth.
And also, I don't like being made responsible for someone else's guilt feelings!
I mean, why does he feel guilty in the first place? I don't know. I mean, *I* think he has far more resources than I do, from his family, to being male, etc. Privileges I'm quite sure he's blissfully unaware of.
I *do* know that he seems to have a certain kind of - puritanical? guilt, which he's exhibited repeatedly over the years.
I've never been sure how much our 'friendship' was based on that; how much was based on latent, unexpressed sexual attraction or other feeling; and how much he simply *likes* me and wanted to help.
Very confusing.
I've tried to talk about this before with him, when we were on a couple of long car journeys (just the two of us) to try to relieve the tension I'd always felt impeded us from being the kind of friends *I* thought we could be: Close, but not spending a lot of time together. Of like mind, on certain things. Kindred spirits, or something like that.
Exchanges like this make me question things - it's a bit of that Charlie-Brown-and-the-football, house of cards, quicksand feeling that I've had so often with my own family.
I wish I could TALK with him about it, openly and freely, and FIND OUT.
But he's married, and I'm not sure he even has conversations that candid with his own wife. I can't fathom how people do this - sleep, night after night, in close physical proximity to someone who might as well be living on Neptune for all the shared understanding they have of the other person's universe.
I left him a voicemail, hoping he might help - I need both a vehicle big enough to haul them to the hardware store to be re-cut (he's got a pickup truck and a station wagon), and an extra pair of hands, since the sheets are too big for me to physically handle alone.
I just got an email back that seemed calculated to make me feel guilty for asking, though he has a slightly flowery, archaic turn of phrase that makes it hard (for *me*) to tell whether he's joking or not.
I wrote a response back (that I sent to my*self*) that let me get out all the angry, frustrated, painful feelings I had when reading his email.
And now I'm trying to think of how to *really* respond.
First of all, I prefer the phone, because there can be some back-and-forth.
And also, I don't like being made responsible for someone else's guilt feelings!
I mean, why does he feel guilty in the first place? I don't know. I mean, *I* think he has far more resources than I do, from his family, to being male, etc. Privileges I'm quite sure he's blissfully unaware of.
I *do* know that he seems to have a certain kind of - puritanical? guilt, which he's exhibited repeatedly over the years.
I've never been sure how much our 'friendship' was based on that; how much was based on latent, unexpressed sexual attraction or other feeling; and how much he simply *likes* me and wanted to help.
Very confusing.
I've tried to talk about this before with him, when we were on a couple of long car journeys (just the two of us) to try to relieve the tension I'd always felt impeded us from being the kind of friends *I* thought we could be: Close, but not spending a lot of time together. Of like mind, on certain things. Kindred spirits, or something like that.
Exchanges like this make me question things - it's a bit of that Charlie-Brown-and-the-football, house of cards, quicksand feeling that I've had so often with my own family.
I wish I could TALK with him about it, openly and freely, and FIND OUT.
But he's married, and I'm not sure he even has conversations that candid with his own wife. I can't fathom how people do this - sleep, night after night, in close physical proximity to someone who might as well be living on Neptune for all the shared understanding they have of the other person's universe.
hunger
My hunger for love, touch, physical affection and companionship is so strong today that I can't EAT. Because my body knows that everything I put in my mouth will feel like a totally inadequate substitute for what I really need.
So I've worked my way through every barely edible thing in the house so that I don't have to face the endless shower/self-maintenance/psychological armoring process necessary to go out and face a bunch of strangers who'll press me with the obligatory, "How's it going."
To which I will feel compelled to answer, "Fine." Or, in spite of my best intentions of civility, my barely-contained stress/hunger/anger/rage/fury will leak out, as in, "Starving. How about you?" I usually manage, if I'm actually buying food, to simply say, "Hungry." To which I'll usually get an appreciative laugh, they'll assume I'm joking, and they'll say something hearty, like, "Well, you've come to the right place!" Socially-enforced jollity all round ensues.
Knowing what I need, but not being able to get it. Not even SEEING it around me, in the relationships of others. Seeing the same emptiness I feel in the faces of others who are in all kinds of different situations, and realizing that the hunger is EPIDEMIC. And I can't solve it all.
All I need is ONE other intelligent, thoughtful person who's UNDERSTOOD this problem for her/himself, and is willing to ENGAGE with me in solving it, at least for the two of us.
So I've worked my way through every barely edible thing in the house so that I don't have to face the endless shower/self-maintenance/psychological armoring process necessary to go out and face a bunch of strangers who'll press me with the obligatory, "How's it going."
To which I will feel compelled to answer, "Fine." Or, in spite of my best intentions of civility, my barely-contained stress/hunger/anger/rage/fury will leak out, as in, "Starving. How about you?" I usually manage, if I'm actually buying food, to simply say, "Hungry." To which I'll usually get an appreciative laugh, they'll assume I'm joking, and they'll say something hearty, like, "Well, you've come to the right place!" Socially-enforced jollity all round ensues.
Knowing what I need, but not being able to get it. Not even SEEING it around me, in the relationships of others. Seeing the same emptiness I feel in the faces of others who are in all kinds of different situations, and realizing that the hunger is EPIDEMIC. And I can't solve it all.
All I need is ONE other intelligent, thoughtful person who's UNDERSTOOD this problem for her/himself, and is willing to ENGAGE with me in solving it, at least for the two of us.
language, framing, stories, and tellings thereof
Cadging a line from a blog I'm reading, re: rejection by powerful parent/other figures:
" If you don’t want to be what she wants you to be, she has no use for you."
I'm not sure whether that sentiment applies more to the female half of the people who housed me as a child, or the male half.
It's incredibly powerful to play with language until you find WORDS that reflect what you FEEL.
Because then you can tell the story your OWN way, and not be limited by the words 'they' *let* you use.
Hm. That sentence says a lot.
***
Another contributor gave me another useful term: 'zygote donor' :-)
Let me practice.
"I'm not sure to whether that sentiment applies more to my egg donor or my sperm donor."
Doesn't quite have the ring I'm looking for. But it's a step in - some? direction.
" If you don’t want to be what she wants you to be, she has no use for you."
I'm not sure whether that sentiment applies more to the female half of the people who housed me as a child, or the male half.
It's incredibly powerful to play with language until you find WORDS that reflect what you FEEL.
Because then you can tell the story your OWN way, and not be limited by the words 'they' *let* you use.
Hm. That sentence says a lot.
***
Another contributor gave me another useful term: 'zygote donor' :-)
Let me practice.
"I'm not sure to whether that sentiment applies more to my egg donor or my sperm donor."
Doesn't quite have the ring I'm looking for. But it's a step in - some? direction.
good excerpt - thoughts on emotional abuse and neglect
From How not to raise a rapist
http://thehathorlegacy.com/how-not-to-raise-a-rapist/#comment-92062
DON'T STRATEGICALLY WITHHOLD AFFECTION.
'Strategically withholding affection' is abuse, a power play. At best it is passive-aggressive, and destructive to the relationship; at worst it is INSANELY damaging to the mental health and well-being of the person on the receiving end. Because it is a MIND fuck, gaslighting, fucking with the person's sense of right and wrong, of basic reality.
***
This all comes down to TRUST, I'm thinking - how to build it, how to destroy it. How to undermine it, both subtly and overtly.
I think I'm still 'chewing' through my encounter with Motorcycle boy at some level, though far less 'consciously' than I was for all those days I wrote about it.
Now it seems like it's more at a 'macro' level, as in, "What lessons can I learn from this?"
And I'm not trying to get all self-schooly on my ass and bust myself for 'falling in love'. I just think that it's an ongoing lesson in how to avoid the 'hole in the sidewalk'. Which I sure's HECK am tired of falling into.
I think, at this point, I need a different metaphor.
What I feel like happened with Motorcycle boy was that I remained in charge (of my*self*, that is) throughout the situation. I'm proud that I both opened up to someone new, while still looking out for my limits and boundaries, and that I didn't let him *cross* my (physical) boundaries. As far as the emotional ones? I feel like I - let him in as close as I want someone to be, but the fact that I now can't see him again when *I* want to makes it - unfair. Or something. Unequal? I keep wondering whether he'd actually LIKE to see me again, but is afraid? Ashamed? Uncertain because he'd had too much to drink? Or embarrassed because he gave me a fake phone number and did some other, weasly stuff that he now feels slimy about? Who knows. That's the thing: I don't like this UNCERTAINTY. I just want to KNOW.*
***
And then, *after* the fact, I found myself wishing I could see him again.
Pretty normal stuff, right? And how can you *ever* anticipate all the ways in which a thing won't turn out to be what you expected, for bad OR for good?
I went into that whole thing with no pre-meditation whatsoever -
You know, I think that's it. That's the boundary that got crossed, for me.
It was the URGENCY of needing to get together NOW that bothered/continues to bug me.
Not because I thought he had some ulterior motive, such as sex; but more the CONTROL aspect of it.
Now I have to stop and think a bit, because I feel like I HAVE it, the tail of the tiger, but I'm not sure what to DO with it.
Because it's so VANISHINGLY RARE for me to find someone who I'm interested in AT ALL, to encounter a complete random stranger -
Wait. It's Fundamental Attribution Error again.
Shit happens. Things happen. CHANCE is a large operator in the game of Life.
He showed up; I showed up. We had ONE dance.
After that one dance? It turns out that I'd like another.
But we met on a - dance floor? (argh, holy mutating metaphors, Batgirl!) that - well, it's kind of like the Twilight Zone: Once it's over, you're not really sure it ever happened.
Can I prevent that kind of thing from happening again?
SHOULD I?
Do I even WANT to?
Some of the most interesting, fun, exciting adventures I've ever had in my life have been essentially the equivalent of 'just get ON that sucker and HANG ON FOR DEAR LIFE', and enjoying the HELL out of the ride :-)
Some of the BIGGEST smiles EVER on my face have been when I just JUMPED, not without looking, but while seeing that, hey, I might not ever have this chance again! So, GO! Just DO it!
I have to say that I've never regretted any of those choices. I've only regretted things that I *haven't* done. My sense is that, as experiential beings, we pretty much have to find out for ourselves. Secondhand is never the same, or even close, really, to really experiencing something directly.
I'm not trying to say that anything I did was 'right' or 'wrong', just, again, trying to suss out any lurking, unfinished emotional business. It often seems that a 'new' adventure sort of gloms on to old, unfinished stuff, and kind of pulls the old thing, forcibly, out of the closet, or the woodwork, or whatever. The old stuff and the new stuff kind of *stick* to each other, because they're similar in some way.
So maybe it's that *similarity* that I'm trying to figure out? To know, exactly, what 'label' my mind filed this particular experience under, and WHY it's having such an impact on me for such a seemingly small event.
I think it's the control thing. That he knows where I live, but I've been unable to reach him or get any response from him. I know I mentioned this earlier, but I think it's the abandonment thing.
I think the hardest thing about the abandonment thing is that people expect you to magically 'just get over it, already.'
Which just compounds the issue and makes you feel even MORE neglected, lonely, frightened. Becuase the whole ABANDONMENT issue is about NOBODY CARING about you, in the first place.
So telling you to 'get over it' is yet ANOTHER abandonment, saying, again, "I don't CARE how this makes YOU feel; I want you to STOP BOTHERING ME WITH YOUR STUPID PROBLEMS/FEELINGS/NEEDS/THINGS THAT MAKE *ME* UNCOMFORTABLE."
Because, in EVERY CASE, the most important person in the exchange (?) and/or 'interaction' was THEM, and not ME.
So I'm trying to learn to shift the equation so that
There. I think I finally put my finger on it, put it into words. Step back and look at it and see if that's it.
***
Really, what it's all about is: YUM, that was GOOD, I WANT MORE.
And feeling frustrated that, given how easily he popped IN to my life, why is it so INSANELY difficult to GET MORE?
Answer: Motorcycle boy is not candy. And I can't just go to the Motorcycle boy store and get more of him - "Please, sir, I'd like three bags full of cinnamon-flavored motorcycle boy."
I think, at some level, I never learned how to navigate these interactions as a child. Plus never being properly 'socialized' as a 'girl'; plus the contradictory rules and double-standards for women vs. men. What a TANGLE.
But I still feel GOOD about it :-). I just want MORE! Yes, be careful what you wish for. But if you're *too* careful, you'll go hungry. Moderation in all things, including moderation.
***
*This is something I've READ comes up a lot in 'dysfunctional' relationships, especially ones involving alcoholics or children of alcoholics (though I'm pretty solidly against the term 'alcoholic' at this point, I'm using the term because I haven't thought of something that makes more sense to me.)
Alcoholics lack EMPATHY, or, the ability to put themselves in the other person's shoes. And so there's always the OTHER person who's doing all that 'connective' or relational 'work', while the alcoholic basically remains a child, the one who's being 'taken care of'.
But I felt like Motorcycle boy was at least *attempting* to become aware of his own patterns about this. He still had a long way to go; and he didn't seem to EXPECT me to 'take care of' him. He seemed to soak up what I offered, and to acknowledge and appreciate it, OPENLY.
What it felt like, in short, was that he was more like ME.
http://thehathorlegacy.com/how-not-to-raise-a-rapist/#comment-92062
Keep in mind that “psychological abuse” entails neglect and head games, a type of abuse that many people still aren’t schooled in recognizing. So when I say “don’t abuse your kids” I’m also sayingThe bold is mine, and is a concept I think should be BEATEN (yeah, crossed-eyes emoticon here, meaning, I'm kidding) into the head of every parent or person-in-charge of the well-being of another, dependent-upon-them being:
“don’t strategically withhold affection to make your child unnaturally dependent on your approval, which you dangle like a carrot,
so that he or she gets the idea all people of your gender are evil and should be punished.”
DON'T STRATEGICALLY WITHHOLD AFFECTION.
'Strategically withholding affection' is abuse, a power play. At best it is passive-aggressive, and destructive to the relationship; at worst it is INSANELY damaging to the mental health and well-being of the person on the receiving end. Because it is a MIND fuck, gaslighting, fucking with the person's sense of right and wrong, of basic reality.
***
This all comes down to TRUST, I'm thinking - how to build it, how to destroy it. How to undermine it, both subtly and overtly.
I think I'm still 'chewing' through my encounter with Motorcycle boy at some level, though far less 'consciously' than I was for all those days I wrote about it.
Now it seems like it's more at a 'macro' level, as in, "What lessons can I learn from this?"
And I'm not trying to get all self-schooly on my ass and bust myself for 'falling in love'. I just think that it's an ongoing lesson in how to avoid the 'hole in the sidewalk'. Which I sure's HECK am tired of falling into.
I think, at this point, I need a different metaphor.
What I feel like happened with Motorcycle boy was that I remained in charge (of my*self*, that is) throughout the situation. I'm proud that I both opened up to someone new, while still looking out for my limits and boundaries, and that I didn't let him *cross* my (physical) boundaries. As far as the emotional ones? I feel like I - let him in as close as I want someone to be, but the fact that I now can't see him again when *I* want to makes it - unfair. Or something. Unequal? I keep wondering whether he'd actually LIKE to see me again, but is afraid? Ashamed? Uncertain because he'd had too much to drink? Or embarrassed because he gave me a fake phone number and did some other, weasly stuff that he now feels slimy about? Who knows. That's the thing: I don't like this UNCERTAINTY. I just want to KNOW.*
***
And then, *after* the fact, I found myself wishing I could see him again.
Pretty normal stuff, right? And how can you *ever* anticipate all the ways in which a thing won't turn out to be what you expected, for bad OR for good?
I went into that whole thing with no pre-meditation whatsoever -
You know, I think that's it. That's the boundary that got crossed, for me.
It was the URGENCY of needing to get together NOW that bothered/continues to bug me.
Not because I thought he had some ulterior motive, such as sex; but more the CONTROL aspect of it.
Now I have to stop and think a bit, because I feel like I HAVE it, the tail of the tiger, but I'm not sure what to DO with it.
Because it's so VANISHINGLY RARE for me to find someone who I'm interested in AT ALL, to encounter a complete random stranger -
Wait. It's Fundamental Attribution Error again.
Shit happens. Things happen. CHANCE is a large operator in the game of Life.
He showed up; I showed up. We had ONE dance.
After that one dance? It turns out that I'd like another.
But we met on a - dance floor? (argh, holy mutating metaphors, Batgirl!) that - well, it's kind of like the Twilight Zone: Once it's over, you're not really sure it ever happened.
Can I prevent that kind of thing from happening again?
SHOULD I?
Do I even WANT to?
Some of the most interesting, fun, exciting adventures I've ever had in my life have been essentially the equivalent of 'just get ON that sucker and HANG ON FOR DEAR LIFE', and enjoying the HELL out of the ride :-)
Some of the BIGGEST smiles EVER on my face have been when I just JUMPED, not without looking, but while seeing that, hey, I might not ever have this chance again! So, GO! Just DO it!
I have to say that I've never regretted any of those choices. I've only regretted things that I *haven't* done. My sense is that, as experiential beings, we pretty much have to find out for ourselves. Secondhand is never the same, or even close, really, to really experiencing something directly.
I'm not trying to say that anything I did was 'right' or 'wrong', just, again, trying to suss out any lurking, unfinished emotional business. It often seems that a 'new' adventure sort of gloms on to old, unfinished stuff, and kind of pulls the old thing, forcibly, out of the closet, or the woodwork, or whatever. The old stuff and the new stuff kind of *stick* to each other, because they're similar in some way.
So maybe it's that *similarity* that I'm trying to figure out? To know, exactly, what 'label' my mind filed this particular experience under, and WHY it's having such an impact on me for such a seemingly small event.
I think it's the control thing. That he knows where I live, but I've been unable to reach him or get any response from him. I know I mentioned this earlier, but I think it's the abandonment thing.
I think the hardest thing about the abandonment thing is that people expect you to magically 'just get over it, already.'
Which just compounds the issue and makes you feel even MORE neglected, lonely, frightened. Becuase the whole ABANDONMENT issue is about NOBODY CARING about you, in the first place.
So telling you to 'get over it' is yet ANOTHER abandonment, saying, again, "I don't CARE how this makes YOU feel; I want you to STOP BOTHERING ME WITH YOUR STUPID PROBLEMS/FEELINGS/NEEDS/THINGS THAT MAKE *ME* UNCOMFORTABLE."
Because, in EVERY CASE, the most important person in the exchange (?) and/or 'interaction' was THEM, and not ME.
So I'm trying to learn to shift the equation so that
I
AM ALWAYS
AS IMPORTANT
AS THE OTHER PERSON.
AM ALWAYS
AS IMPORTANT
AS THE OTHER PERSON.
There. I think I finally put my finger on it, put it into words. Step back and look at it and see if that's it.
***
Really, what it's all about is: YUM, that was GOOD, I WANT MORE.
And feeling frustrated that, given how easily he popped IN to my life, why is it so INSANELY difficult to GET MORE?
Answer: Motorcycle boy is not candy. And I can't just go to the Motorcycle boy store and get more of him - "Please, sir, I'd like three bags full of cinnamon-flavored motorcycle boy."
I think, at some level, I never learned how to navigate these interactions as a child. Plus never being properly 'socialized' as a 'girl'; plus the contradictory rules and double-standards for women vs. men. What a TANGLE.
But I still feel GOOD about it :-). I just want MORE! Yes, be careful what you wish for. But if you're *too* careful, you'll go hungry. Moderation in all things, including moderation.
***
*This is something I've READ comes up a lot in 'dysfunctional' relationships, especially ones involving alcoholics or children of alcoholics (though I'm pretty solidly against the term 'alcoholic' at this point, I'm using the term because I haven't thought of something that makes more sense to me.)
Alcoholics lack EMPATHY, or, the ability to put themselves in the other person's shoes. And so there's always the OTHER person who's doing all that 'connective' or relational 'work', while the alcoholic basically remains a child, the one who's being 'taken care of'.
But I felt like Motorcycle boy was at least *attempting* to become aware of his own patterns about this. He still had a long way to go; and he didn't seem to EXPECT me to 'take care of' him. He seemed to soak up what I offered, and to acknowledge and appreciate it, OPENLY.
What it felt like, in short, was that he was more like ME.
Friday, September 17, 2010
language link + large excerpt
Evolution of Symbolic Language
Some propose that language appeared recently, and suddenly, due to some marvelous mutations that transformed "dumb brutes" into articulate speakers. If language is a recent feature of human social interaction — arising, say, 100,000 years ago as an evolutionary afterthought — then it would have had little opportunity to impose selection pressures; hence language abilities would be expected to have been inserted unsystematically into an otherwise typical (if enlarged) ape brain. If so, they should be poorly integrated with other cognitive functions, relatively fragile if faced with impoverished learning contexts, and susceptible to catastrophic breakdown as a result of genetic defects.
None of this seems to be the case.
If, instead, language has been around for a good deal of our evolutionary past, say a million years or so, the demands of language would have had time to affect brain evolution more broadly. A large network of subtle gene changes and neurological adjustments would be involved, resulting in a well-integrated and robust neurological function. Indeed, there is ample evidence to suggest that language is remarkably well-integrated into almost every aspect of our cognitive and social lives, that it utilizes a significant fraction of the forebrain, and is acquired robustly under even quite difficult social circumstances and neurological impairment. It is far from fragile.
If language-like communication has been a long-time feature of hominid evolution, then languages themselves must also have a long history. Since the language one learns must be passed from generation to generation, the more learnable its structures, and the better its fit to human limitations, the more effective its reproduction in each generation. Hence languages and brains are expected to have evolved in tandem. That said, brain evolution is a ponderously slow and unyielding process compared with the more facile evolution of languages, so we should expect that languages are more modified for brains than are brains for languages.
[...]
Language is in effect an emergent function, not some prior function that just required fine-tuning. Our inherited ("instinctive") vocalizations, such as laughter, shrieks of fright, and cries of anguish, are under localized, mostly subcortical, neurological control, as are analogous instinctive vocalizations in other animals. By contrast, language depends on a widely dispersed constellation of cortical systems. Each system is also found in other primate brains, where they engage in other functions; their collective recruitment for language was apparently driven by the fact that their previously evolved functions overlapped with particular processing demands necessitated by language. Old structures came to perform unprecedented new tricks.
[...]
This story is relevant to the human because a number of features of human language adaptation also appear to involve a relaxation of innate constraints. Probably the clearest evidence for this is infant babbling, an unprecedented tendency to freely play with vocal sound production, with minimal innate constraint on what sound can follow what (save physical constraints on vocal sound generation). Babbling occurs in contexts of low arousal, whereas laughter, sobbing, and shrieking are each produced in high-arousal states with specific contextual associations. This reduction of emotional and contextual constraint on sound production opens the door for numerous other influences to play a role, allowing many more brain systems to participate in vocal behavior, including socially acquired auditory experience. In fact, such freedom from constraint is an essential precondition for being able to correlate learned vocal behaviors with the wide diversity of objects, events, properties, and relationships that language is capable of referring to. Hence an evolutionary de-differentiation process, while clearly not the whole story, may be a part of the story for symbolic language evolution.
human brain function poorly integrated?
Is the rise in so-called ‘mental disorders’ really a reflection that our ‘modern’ brains are pretty shoddily cobbled-together pieces of makework, and aren’t really suited to life in the fast-paced, technology-saturated, emotionally isolated world we now live in?
people don’t think. And: Gut brain
This is bugging me.
The ‘Age of Reason’ is bullshit.
There’s no ‘reason’ involved.
It’s just a bunch of tall tales, yarn-spinning, whatnot.
It’s making up an explanation after the fact, to suit the needs of the moment. Expedience.
And people do it ALL THE TIME, and they NEVER SEEM TO HAVE ANY CLUE WHATSOEVER THAT THEY’RE DOING IT.
***
Something happens.
They make up a story to explain it.
The explanation may or may not have anything whatsoever to do with what really happened.
And PEOPLE BUY IT!
WHY? This is absolutely mystifying, baffling, to me.
It’s almost as if people care more about the STORY than the ‘TRUTH’.
So, what good IS the ‘truth’, anyway, if nobody ever pays it any attention, or USES it, in any way, shape or form?
"History is a pack of lies about events that never happened told by people who weren't there."~George Santayana
***
See, there's the cortex (or neo-cortex, or frontal cortex, or whatever the heck it's called); then there's the limbic (connective) brain; and the 'brain stem' or primitive, lizard brain.
That's my quick, layperson's, thumbnail sketch, pinning my assumptions up there so I can look at them while I try to figure this out.
As I understand it, people react FIRST from their 'gut'. Literally, the hind brain triggers a flood of chemicals which charges the body via the gut's interpretation of these chemical 'signals' (dopamine, serotonin, norepinephrine (?), adrenalin, etc.) based on audio/visual/tactile/whatever input, which is (nearly) instantaneously compared with stored 'data' in the amygdala (your basic 'trauma' filing cabinet, imagine flipping through an entire lifetime's stored experience in a nanosecond).
So the body sort of 'jerks' into this literal, visceral reaction where the 'gut brain' responds BEFORE the so-called 'thinking brain' has a chance to kick in. (And apparently this 'gut' brain is pretty amazing - the 'gut reaction' is a very real, literal thing, that is FAR more powerful than the relatively weak, much newer [evolutionarily speaking] 'rational' brain.)
Gut/brain links:
The Enteric Nervous System: The Brain in the Gut
A brain in the head, and one in the gut,
The Brain-Gut Connection
[After a very superficial scan of these links, it's clear that *my* 'thinking' and/or 'understanding' on this subject is fuzzy as best. Ach. Well, it's a place to start. I'll leave the following speculative stuff as is, maybe write/think more on it later. After all, it *does* say, 'thinking out loud' right up there in the blog's sub-title. :-) ]
***
The limbic brain, which is second-in-command, as I understand it, or possibly operates in parallel? but developed later in the history of humanity, reads relational cues, which are *connected* to the most basic, raw 'fight or flight' signals, but are slightly behind them in importance. That is, if you have to choose between running from the tiger or saving your partner, you'll most likely choose running, first. But if you're old enough and/or experienced enough to recognize your partner's value in your *continued* survival, the limbic brain will fire off some kind of signal *a split second behind* that received from the hind brain, and you'll be faced with the classic dilemma.
That's where, I'm speculating, the neo-cortex comes in: To sort out, and explain, the complicated thought processes associated with 'deciding' what matters most.
I'm guessing the cortex is where we store things like 'precepts', beliefs, etc. 'Moral codes,' basic 'emergency instructions' to live (literally) by so that we don't have to reinvent the wheel everytime we're faced with one of these rock-and-a-hard-place choices.
***
The problem is, what with the Age of Reason and all, people THINK they think more than they ACTUALLY do. What people BELIEVE is 'thinking' is actually a sort of - spin doctor. An after-the-fact manipulator that puts a 'good face' on the hind brain's 'decisions' so that the limbic brain can calm down and not worry about the damage our selfish, raw survival instincts have done to our relationships.
(Remember, I'm making this up as I go, cobbling it together out of a million random thoughts based on things I've read, heard and conjectured. A stew, a patchwork quilt. Hopefully *not* a Frankenstein's monster.)
The ‘Age of Reason’ is bullshit.
There’s no ‘reason’ involved.
It’s just a bunch of tall tales, yarn-spinning, whatnot.
It’s making up an explanation after the fact, to suit the needs of the moment. Expedience.
And people do it ALL THE TIME, and they NEVER SEEM TO HAVE ANY CLUE WHATSOEVER THAT THEY’RE DOING IT.
***
Something happens.
They make up a story to explain it.
The explanation may or may not have anything whatsoever to do with what really happened.
And PEOPLE BUY IT!
WHY? This is absolutely mystifying, baffling, to me.
It’s almost as if people care more about the STORY than the ‘TRUTH’.
So, what good IS the ‘truth’, anyway, if nobody ever pays it any attention, or USES it, in any way, shape or form?
"History is a pack of lies about events that never happened told by people who weren't there."~George Santayana
***
See, there's the cortex (or neo-cortex, or frontal cortex, or whatever the heck it's called); then there's the limbic (connective) brain; and the 'brain stem' or primitive, lizard brain.
That's my quick, layperson's, thumbnail sketch, pinning my assumptions up there so I can look at them while I try to figure this out.
As I understand it, people react FIRST from their 'gut'. Literally, the hind brain triggers a flood of chemicals which charges the body via the gut's interpretation of these chemical 'signals' (dopamine, serotonin, norepinephrine (?), adrenalin, etc.) based on audio/visual/tactile/whatever input, which is (nearly) instantaneously compared with stored 'data' in the amygdala (your basic 'trauma' filing cabinet, imagine flipping through an entire lifetime's stored experience in a nanosecond).
So the body sort of 'jerks' into this literal, visceral reaction where the 'gut brain' responds BEFORE the so-called 'thinking brain' has a chance to kick in. (And apparently this 'gut' brain is pretty amazing - the 'gut reaction' is a very real, literal thing, that is FAR more powerful than the relatively weak, much newer [evolutionarily speaking] 'rational' brain.)
Gut/brain links:
The Enteric Nervous System: The Brain in the Gut
A brain in the head, and one in the gut,
The Brain-Gut Connection
[After a very superficial scan of these links, it's clear that *my* 'thinking' and/or 'understanding' on this subject is fuzzy as best. Ach. Well, it's a place to start. I'll leave the following speculative stuff as is, maybe write/think more on it later. After all, it *does* say, 'thinking out loud' right up there in the blog's sub-title. :-) ]
***
The limbic brain, which is second-in-command, as I understand it, or possibly operates in parallel? but developed later in the history of humanity, reads relational cues, which are *connected* to the most basic, raw 'fight or flight' signals, but are slightly behind them in importance. That is, if you have to choose between running from the tiger or saving your partner, you'll most likely choose running, first. But if you're old enough and/or experienced enough to recognize your partner's value in your *continued* survival, the limbic brain will fire off some kind of signal *a split second behind* that received from the hind brain, and you'll be faced with the classic dilemma.
That's where, I'm speculating, the neo-cortex comes in: To sort out, and explain, the complicated thought processes associated with 'deciding' what matters most.
I'm guessing the cortex is where we store things like 'precepts', beliefs, etc. 'Moral codes,' basic 'emergency instructions' to live (literally) by so that we don't have to reinvent the wheel everytime we're faced with one of these rock-and-a-hard-place choices.
***
The problem is, what with the Age of Reason and all, people THINK they think more than they ACTUALLY do. What people BELIEVE is 'thinking' is actually a sort of - spin doctor. An after-the-fact manipulator that puts a 'good face' on the hind brain's 'decisions' so that the limbic brain can calm down and not worry about the damage our selfish, raw survival instincts have done to our relationships.
(Remember, I'm making this up as I go, cobbling it together out of a million random thoughts based on things I've read, heard and conjectured. A stew, a patchwork quilt. Hopefully *not* a Frankenstein's monster.)
power, again
TO THE EXTENT THAT WE ARE ABLE TO INFLUENCE THE PEOPLE AROUND US*,
via beauty, wit, charm, persuasion, physical force, financial incentive, or what have you (aka, ‘resources’),
we shape our own universe.
***
Here it seems appropriate to quote Yoda, for some reason:
"There is no 'try'. There is only do, or do not."
*this is the ‘missing link’ absent from such tripe as ‘The Secret’ and whatnot (as in, ‘without this piece, the machine doesn’t fucking WORK’).
via beauty, wit, charm, persuasion, physical force, financial incentive, or what have you (aka, ‘resources’),
we shape our own universe.
***
Here it seems appropriate to quote Yoda, for some reason:
"There is no 'try'. There is only do, or do not."
*this is the ‘missing link’ absent from such tripe as ‘The Secret’ and whatnot (as in, ‘without this piece, the machine doesn’t fucking WORK’).
who the fuck CARES if I don't live up to what's in my head?
Me. That's who.
The cognitive dissonance is what keeps me awake at night: The clash between reality and what we're TOLD is possible, the expectations we're held to.
Shoulds.
Feet to the fire.
But who's holding THEIR fucking feet to the fire, hm? That's what *I* want to know.
I'LL hold their feet to the fire for them, so they fucking KNOW WHAT IT FEELS LIKE. Fuckers, talking out of both sides of their goddamn mouths, holding ME to one standard, and THEMSELVES to another, entirely different, and MUCH< MUCH LOWER standard. If they hold themselves to ANY standard, at all, whatsoever.
Power plays, AGAIN.
I've said this a million times and will probably say it a million times more:
It's all about power. Who has it, and who doesn't.
And until you see this, you have absolutely NO chance. Not even the snowball's.
Hammer.
Have it.
Whether you choose to USE it or not is something YOU have to deal with, live with.
But HAVE one.
That's my best advice right now.
The cognitive dissonance is what keeps me awake at night: The clash between reality and what we're TOLD is possible, the expectations we're held to.
Shoulds.
Feet to the fire.
But who's holding THEIR fucking feet to the fire, hm? That's what *I* want to know.
I'LL hold their feet to the fire for them, so they fucking KNOW WHAT IT FEELS LIKE. Fuckers, talking out of both sides of their goddamn mouths, holding ME to one standard, and THEMSELVES to another, entirely different, and MUCH< MUCH LOWER standard. If they hold themselves to ANY standard, at all, whatsoever.
Power plays, AGAIN.
I've said this a million times and will probably say it a million times more:
It's all about power. Who has it, and who doesn't.
And until you see this, you have absolutely NO chance. Not even the snowball's.
Hammer.
Have it.
Whether you choose to USE it or not is something YOU have to deal with, live with.
But HAVE one.
That's my best advice right now.
power and dominance? or, something else?
Trying to find middle ground.
If there IS such a thing.
I am still so ANGRY with my brothers, my father, my uncles, and my MOTHER, for her COMPLICITY. her SILENCE. Her FAILURE TO ACT ON MY BEHALF IN ANY WAY SHAPE OR FORM. To fricking STAND UP for her OWN FLESH AND BLOOD. For fuck’s sake.
Love? or power?
CHOOSE.
They are MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVE. One cannot EXIST in the presence of the other. It’s like saying that a TENDER FLOWER can flourish under the ministrations of a FLAME-THROWER.
FUCKED UP, is what that is.
If there IS such a thing.
I am still so ANGRY with my brothers, my father, my uncles, and my MOTHER, for her COMPLICITY. her SILENCE. Her FAILURE TO ACT ON MY BEHALF IN ANY WAY SHAPE OR FORM. To fricking STAND UP for her OWN FLESH AND BLOOD. For fuck’s sake.
Love? or power?
CHOOSE.
They are MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVE. One cannot EXIST in the presence of the other. It’s like saying that a TENDER FLOWER can flourish under the ministrations of a FLAME-THROWER.
FUCKED UP, is what that is.
abandonment; strength; children 'testing' parents
Children need someone to protect them, to look to for security - somebody bigger and stronger.
One of the ways they 'test' the strength of so-called 'parents' is by PUSHING on the parents - either physically, psychologically, emotionally, or whatever - to SEE WHAT HAPPENS.
I believe it is actually TERRIFYING for a child to believe that she is stronger than her parent, either emotionally or physically. Because this means she has NO ONE TO COUNT ON, NO ONE to DEPEND on. She is alone. She has been, as the shrinks put it, emotionally abandoned.
I, here and now, raise my hand to count myself among the numerous children who have been 'left behind' by their parents in such ways.
One of the ways they 'test' the strength of so-called 'parents' is by PUSHING on the parents - either physically, psychologically, emotionally, or whatever - to SEE WHAT HAPPENS.
I believe it is actually TERRIFYING for a child to believe that she is stronger than her parent, either emotionally or physically. Because this means she has NO ONE TO COUNT ON, NO ONE to DEPEND on. She is alone. She has been, as the shrinks put it, emotionally abandoned.
I, here and now, raise my hand to count myself among the numerous children who have been 'left behind' by their parents in such ways.
more fragments: reach for what YOU want
let other people protect *themselves*. Not your job.
And: Your needs are NOT something from which other people need to be ‘protected’.
Your needs? are your needs. Period. End of story. No discussion, argument or judgment.
People ask for what they need; you say, “Yes,” or “No.” End of story. Period. :-)
***
You ask for what YOU want or need; people say, “Yes,” or “No.” End of story.
Feed the DEEPEST need FIRST. All others will follow, as night, day.
Though feeding your STOMACH the best food you can find is always a good place to start :-)
***
Regarding: Feeling obligated to take care of other people:
THAT felt good :-)
***
people who ‘ask without asking’ piss me off.
Basically, they’re taking advantage of your GOOD NATURE, while being TOTALLY oblivious to the fact that they JUST ASKED YOU FOR A FAVOR.
Their complete lack of self-awareness is a MIND fuck.
They tell you one thing; they *think* one thing; and then they DO another, the COMPLETE OPPOSITE of what they’re PRESENTING themselves as doing.
They don’t even know they’re doing it. They’re so ‘split off’ from their essential SELVES that they have NO IDEA WHO THEY ARE or what they want. From you, from life, from ANYthing or anyone.
Motorcycle guy seemed to be breaking through this barrier, which is why it’s so exciting to me, and why I want to see him again – someone to SHARE this breakthrough with, this venture into new psychological and emotional territory. Motorcycle guy, WHERE ARE YOU?????
***
messages from my sub-conscious? some other phrase trying to get out. “My subconscious leaves me notes while I’m sleeping.”
Maybe ‘split’ personalities are the same as dreams, only dreams are less ‘conscious’ ways for the split-off parts to communicate with the ‘conscious’ parts?
***
I, on the other hand, am TOO painfully aware of ever asking for ANYthing, and am thus made insecure by that quicksand-y ground of BEING MADE TO FEEL GUILTY for HAVING BASIC HUMAN NEEDS.
FUCK that shit.
And: Your needs are NOT something from which other people need to be ‘protected’.
Your needs? are your needs. Period. End of story. No discussion, argument or judgment.
People ask for what they need; you say, “Yes,” or “No.” End of story. Period. :-)
***
You ask for what YOU want or need; people say, “Yes,” or “No.” End of story.
Feed the DEEPEST need FIRST. All others will follow, as night, day.
Though feeding your STOMACH the best food you can find is always a good place to start :-)
***
Regarding: Feeling obligated to take care of other people:
NO.
THAT felt good :-)
***
people who ‘ask without asking’ piss me off.
Basically, they’re taking advantage of your GOOD NATURE, while being TOTALLY oblivious to the fact that they JUST ASKED YOU FOR A FAVOR.
Their complete lack of self-awareness is a MIND fuck.
They tell you one thing; they *think* one thing; and then they DO another, the COMPLETE OPPOSITE of what they’re PRESENTING themselves as doing.
They don’t even know they’re doing it. They’re so ‘split off’ from their essential SELVES that they have NO IDEA WHO THEY ARE or what they want. From you, from life, from ANYthing or anyone.
Motorcycle guy seemed to be breaking through this barrier, which is why it’s so exciting to me, and why I want to see him again – someone to SHARE this breakthrough with, this venture into new psychological and emotional territory. Motorcycle guy, WHERE ARE YOU?????
***
messages from my sub-conscious? some other phrase trying to get out. “My subconscious leaves me notes while I’m sleeping.”
Maybe ‘split’ personalities are the same as dreams, only dreams are less ‘conscious’ ways for the split-off parts to communicate with the ‘conscious’ parts?
***
I, on the other hand, am TOO painfully aware of ever asking for ANYthing, and am thus made insecure by that quicksand-y ground of BEING MADE TO FEEL GUILTY for HAVING BASIC HUMAN NEEDS.
FUCK that shit.
fragments
this is another instance of someone trying to take.
Men TAKE
Women GIVE
At least that’s how men WANT it to be.
It takes constant vigilance on the part of a woman to
or does it?
minimal effort. See HOW LITTLE EFFORT you can expend to keep them off you.
***
twitching eye as guide to what i’m seeing/not seeing :-)
***
CAN vs. SHOULD = COGNITIVE DISSONANCE
Narrow your focus to what you CAN do at any given moment – it’s all about RESOURCES
Shoulds meet cans and clash
Play both sides against the middle, fearlessly and shamelessly
the SHOULDS are a POWER PLAY by those who HAVE MORE RESOURCES THAN YOU to KEEP YOU DOWN and
so that they can CONTINUE TO SIPHON OFF YOUR EARNINGS.
Make it NOT WORTH THEIR WHILE TO HASSLE YOU.
Make it VERY COSTLY for them to hassle you – time , money, energy, whatever. peace of mind.
***
men whose bodies know the whole story, reality the truth; while their minds operate as if from a jar on a shelf 7 miles away, completely separate, disconnected.
belt cinch, valve. Keeps unwanted emotions from consciousness.
sexual release as substitute for emotional understanding can be a HABIT, hard to break even once an alternative becomes available. The unknown, even the GOOD unknown, is frightening?
Men TAKE
Women GIVE
At least that’s how men WANT it to be.
It takes constant vigilance on the part of a woman to
or does it?
minimal effort. See HOW LITTLE EFFORT you can expend to keep them off you.
***
twitching eye as guide to what i’m seeing/not seeing :-)
***
CAN vs. SHOULD = COGNITIVE DISSONANCE
Narrow your focus to what you CAN do at any given moment – it’s all about RESOURCES
Shoulds meet cans and clash
Play both sides against the middle, fearlessly and shamelessly
the SHOULDS are a POWER PLAY by those who HAVE MORE RESOURCES THAN YOU to KEEP YOU DOWN and
so that they can CONTINUE TO SIPHON OFF YOUR EARNINGS.
Make it NOT WORTH THEIR WHILE TO HASSLE YOU.
Make it VERY COSTLY for them to hassle you – time , money, energy, whatever. peace of mind.
***
men whose bodies know the whole story, reality the truth; while their minds operate as if from a jar on a shelf 7 miles away, completely separate, disconnected.
belt cinch, valve. Keeps unwanted emotions from consciousness.
sexual release as substitute for emotional understanding can be a HABIT, hard to break even once an alternative becomes available. The unknown, even the GOOD unknown, is frightening?
Wednesday, September 15, 2010
catching up
Feel like I alternate between the pell-mell, mad-dash feeling of trying to 'catch up' (emotionally) from all the years of disconnected cluelessness that I learned from my mother.
I just had an image of me leaping madly from one rock to another, ditching one as it began to wobble in favor of more solid ground. Excellent metaphor for this particular feeling :-)
Alternating with this frantic, frenetic behavior are periods of near-comatose collapse, recuperation. I feel like the swings are narrowing, coming closer and closer to some kind of sustainable (?) equilibrium. But it's still a little frightening how dependent I am on unreliable 'food' sources, emotionally. I've been lucky (or brilliant? knock on wood) that, each time one source begins to dry up, another one presents itself. Serendipity? Or the zen, "When you are ready, a teacher will appear"? Who knows.
I just had an image of me leaping madly from one rock to another, ditching one as it began to wobble in favor of more solid ground. Excellent metaphor for this particular feeling :-)
Alternating with this frantic, frenetic behavior are periods of near-comatose collapse, recuperation. I feel like the swings are narrowing, coming closer and closer to some kind of sustainable (?) equilibrium. But it's still a little frightening how dependent I am on unreliable 'food' sources, emotionally. I've been lucky (or brilliant? knock on wood) that, each time one source begins to dry up, another one presents itself. Serendipity? Or the zen, "When you are ready, a teacher will appear"? Who knows.
willful stupidity
From Dictionary.com:
will·ful/ˈwilfəl/Adjective
1. (of an immoral or illegal act or omission) Intentional; deliberate.
2. Having or showing a stubborn and determined intention to do as one wants, regardless of the consequences or effects.
Is it a reaction to being beaten down in childhood? To being told, over and over again, that you are stupid, or worthless?
The pendulum effect is interesting, too - I'm pretty sure that my 'intelligence' is, to a large degree, a reaction to my mother's 'stupidity'. In other words, I HAD to be smart in order to survive her. Or, becoming 'smart' was the path that made sense to my sensitive temperament? Dunno. And I'm not implying conscious choice here, at the age of two or three. I'm talking more about Drama of the Gifted Child kind of intelligence, a la Alice Miller.
Googling turned up this link on the subject:
http://brucebyfield.wordpress.com/2009/05/29/willful-stupidity/
will·ful/ˈwilfəl/Adjective
1. (of an immoral or illegal act or omission) Intentional; deliberate.
2. Having or showing a stubborn and determined intention to do as one wants, regardless of the consequences or effects.
Is it a reaction to being beaten down in childhood? To being told, over and over again, that you are stupid, or worthless?
The pendulum effect is interesting, too - I'm pretty sure that my 'intelligence' is, to a large degree, a reaction to my mother's 'stupidity'. In other words, I HAD to be smart in order to survive her. Or, becoming 'smart' was the path that made sense to my sensitive temperament? Dunno. And I'm not implying conscious choice here, at the age of two or three. I'm talking more about Drama of the Gifted Child kind of intelligence, a la Alice Miller.
Googling turned up this link on the subject:
http://brucebyfield.wordpress.com/2009/05/29/willful-stupidity/
No, what bothers me is the willfully stupid’s absolute conviction that they are correct. They know almost nothing about what they are talking about – in this case, not even what stock their store carries. Nor, despite the fact that they are focusing on a topic for much of their working life, have they made any effort to push back the limits of their ignorance, a failure that I find baffling. When I’ve been in similar situations, I’ve learned, partly despite myself and partly so the work would be more interesting. But when people choose to become willfully stupid, not learning seems the whole point of their behavior. In a perverse way, they seem to have scored some victory over the conditions of their lives by refusing to see a point or learn.
But the worst thing about such behavior is that it seems to be self-inflicted. In this sense, it is the mental equivalent of cutting yourself or some other self-destructive behavior. It seems to me that, if you play stupid long enough, you risk becoming stupid permanently. Eventually, you might reach a point where you can’t see evidence or listen to a counter-argument no matter what. And I can only imagine this state as one of diminished enjoyment and intellectual impoverishment.
That, in the end, is why such encounters disturb me. They send my scuttling to my mental mirror for a close scrutiny, wondering if my behavior is ever anything like what I’ve just seen, and wondering if I would know if it were.
being born unwanted
At least by the time my brothers were born, my parents had made some kind of 'agreement' - they'd settled their terms of negotiation.
In other words, they'd gotten married, bought a house, and got on with the 2.5 kids/three cats in the yard/white picket fence business.
But when *I* came along, no such negotiations had been made. There was no structure in place to accommodate my appearance on the scene, no safety net, nothing to catch me when I fell (from my mother's womb onto this here blue and green ball of mud.)
Even my youngest brother, unexpectedly conceived in spite of an IUD, who was told, at some point, that he was an 'accident', was never out-and-out rejected at such a root, basic, elemental level as I was.
And I'm not 'competing for last place' here. It's a fucking miserable position to be in, that of the unwanted child; many children, I'd guess at least a third, if not half or more, are born into similar situations. That's the whole design plan: Children happen. The idea that they can, or should be, planned, is a lot of modern, Western, wishful thinking.
And I'm not saying that planning children is a *bad* idea; I'm just saying that, in most cases, people simply don't manage to do that thing. It doesn't HAPPEN, and it's not realistic to expect it.
In other words, they'd gotten married, bought a house, and got on with the 2.5 kids/three cats in the yard/white picket fence business.
But when *I* came along, no such negotiations had been made. There was no structure in place to accommodate my appearance on the scene, no safety net, nothing to catch me when I fell (from my mother's womb onto this here blue and green ball of mud.)
Even my youngest brother, unexpectedly conceived in spite of an IUD, who was told, at some point, that he was an 'accident', was never out-and-out rejected at such a root, basic, elemental level as I was.
And I'm not 'competing for last place' here. It's a fucking miserable position to be in, that of the unwanted child; many children, I'd guess at least a third, if not half or more, are born into similar situations. That's the whole design plan: Children happen. The idea that they can, or should be, planned, is a lot of modern, Western, wishful thinking.
And I'm not saying that planning children is a *bad* idea; I'm just saying that, in most cases, people simply don't manage to do that thing. It doesn't HAPPEN, and it's not realistic to expect it.
I'll give you a pair o' dimes
to step outside
your paradigm
(yes, I just made that up my very own self. If someone else has said it, then bully for them! Otherwise, I hereby claim it as MINE.)
your paradigm
(yes, I just made that up my very own self. If someone else has said it, then bully for them! Otherwise, I hereby claim it as MINE.)
philosophizing
We are creatures of rhythm, cycle, pattern, habit; we need ritual, repetition, the anchor point of the over-and-over, (crimson and clover - don't ask me where *that* came from - the eternally deviating [not as in 'deviant', but as in 'not staying on the path'], free-associating mind :-)
Synthesist, broad rather than deep (though *sometimes* deep, too, depending on interest level and subject matter. Can I call myself a philosopher? Or is that a name that can only be appended to one by someone *else*, someone external, an observer? Hm. It's not that I ASPIRE [or perhaps PERspire?] to be a philosopher so much as that I spend much time philosophizing. If it's true that we "are what we do," then, dang it, I'm a frickin' philosopher. (I think, here, that I am feeling constrained by the cultural mandate that women must NEVER, EVER, call attention to ourselves or crave credit or desire the spotlight, to be center of attention. We must ALWAYS be in the background - a mirror, at most, for the desires of others [read: MEN]. Stopping, because I no longer support this bullshit, and am becoming ever more outspoken about that.)
Philosopher me collects thoughts and ideas as a squirrel gathers nuts, storing them away against a future time when they may come in handy.
***
"Life is not a spectacle or a feast; it is a predicament." ~George Santayana
Synthesist, broad rather than deep (though *sometimes* deep, too, depending on interest level and subject matter. Can I call myself a philosopher? Or is that a name that can only be appended to one by someone *else*, someone external, an observer? Hm. It's not that I ASPIRE [or perhaps PERspire?] to be a philosopher so much as that I spend much time philosophizing. If it's true that we "are what we do," then, dang it, I'm a frickin' philosopher. (I think, here, that I am feeling constrained by the cultural mandate that women must NEVER, EVER, call attention to ourselves or crave credit or desire the spotlight, to be center of attention. We must ALWAYS be in the background - a mirror, at most, for the desires of others [read: MEN]. Stopping, because I no longer support this bullshit, and am becoming ever more outspoken about that.)
Philosopher me collects thoughts and ideas as a squirrel gathers nuts, storing them away against a future time when they may come in handy.
***
"Life is not a spectacle or a feast; it is a predicament." ~George Santayana
Fear of 'losing data' during repeated over-writes
Like Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, I fear that if I 'lose' some of my 'programming', I'll lose some of ME in the process. I don't actually want to lose my MEMORIES, just the pain, and the painful habits, associated with those memories.
But in Spotless, the original versions of the main characters leaked through the 'de-programming', and they eventually reverted to their old selves. The 'wiped slate' was not thorough enough - perhaps *too* clean a wipe would remove essential functions, and not just 'surface' personality traits.
Query: *Are* such 'charactistics' only on the surface? or are they deeply integrated throughout the person's being? never thought about it before, but maybe that's the whole point/central question of the movie. If we erase our memories, do *we* disappear, as well?
But in Spotless, the original versions of the main characters leaked through the 'de-programming', and they eventually reverted to their old selves. The 'wiped slate' was not thorough enough - perhaps *too* clean a wipe would remove essential functions, and not just 'surface' personality traits.
Query: *Are* such 'charactistics' only on the surface? or are they deeply integrated throughout the person's being? never thought about it before, but maybe that's the whole point/central question of the movie. If we erase our memories, do *we* disappear, as well?
accentuate the positive
I could never get down with 'positive thinking'. It always struck me as smarmy, kiss-ass, people-pleasing, 'don't rain on my parade' bullshit, which is really about not bothering other people and not really at all about helping yourself.
Fuck THAT noise.
But - on the other hand, maybe it's all the same thing. I mean, maybe, this 'accentuate the positive' thing that I'm about to attempt to explore, is really just getting to the same place via a different road.
Maybe I'm like the person in that zen parable about a family who was asked how hard it is to achieve enlightenment. I'm paraphrasing freely, here, so if anyone happens to read this who knows how the story *really* goes, I hope I don't offend by wielding the sword/scalpel of poetic license too heavily, leaving too many bits scattered on the cutting room floor. (Many a mangled/mixed metaphor twixt lips and script.)
My version: Some people walk straight to their 'goal' (or *appear* to) with nary a missed step or deviation along the way. Their road, to the wanderer, appears as a well-paved, smooth, wide throughway that leads directly to their destination.
Whereas I, on the other hand, repeatedly find myself stuck in some thicket, beset by thorns, hacking futilely at some impenetrable wall of brambles, only to realize, knuckles bruised and bloodied from repeated assaults on the prickly impediment to my forward progress, that I could just go AROUND it. Ach. (Or is that, "Ouch?" Like Shrek, when the princess finally manages to pull the arrow out of his butt when he's distracted and forgets to resist her efforts.)
So, the parable:
Some seeker asks this family how they achieved enlightenment.
The mother says, "Oh, is fair amount of work, but, you know, not too bad."
The father says, "Oh, very difficult, many obstacles. I've spent my whole life trying to get there, and I'm still working on it."
The little girl shrugs and says, "Nothing to it. Easy. Like falling off a log."
All that said: I've been noticing, lately, small ways in which I could choose different words (at each juncture, notice the alternative branches, paths, available to you, if possible :P ). On yesterday's fabulous walk, I was balancing on one of those logs bordering the road to the park, and a guy on a bicycle went by with a big grin and said, "Cartwheel!" I was so tired, and feeling so frazzled, and really trying to focus on ME and not get sucked off onto other people's 'stuff', that I got a little irritated and said, "One thing at a time! One thing at a time! Let me take baby steps!" And trailed off with, "It's all I can do to just walk on here at *all*, let alone doing fancy tricks." I don't think he heard that last part, I kind of muttered it under my breath, because I was realizing how ungracious it sounded.
And at the same time as I was saying what I *actually* said, I was *also* thinking, "Wow, that'd be really COOL! To be able to do CARTWHEELS while balancing on this thing! Dude!"
So I *could* have taken his cheerleading as it was meant, as an appreciation and an encouragement, and said, "Oh MAN, I'd LOVE to be able to do that!" And look at is something to aspire to and wish for, whether I ever actually *try* to do it or not. But instead I heard it as yet another 'goad' to try to prod me into doing something I didn't want to do and wasn't ready for (a la my father).
So the old demons haunt us, much as we want to be rid of them. But: I FED that one by saying what I did; and by not resisting it (the demon), I think maybe I FREED myself to have that OTHER thought, which, though I didn't express it at the time, is now able to come forth and be heard, and become an 'option' along the way, a branch, a fork in the road, a possible path.
Sounds like a queueing (sp?) problem to *me*, a 'sorting' problem, where the 'wrong' (i.e., unwanted, not desired) thing is taking precedence at the wrong time.
Sort of as if a synaptic switch needs to be recalibrated (kind of like giving it a good WHACK - /kidding :-) so as to shunt the proper response into the proper channel and hence into its rightful place in the queue, at the necessary moment.
Reverse Pavlov? Replace old message with new, overwrite.
Fuck THAT noise.
But - on the other hand, maybe it's all the same thing. I mean, maybe, this 'accentuate the positive' thing that I'm about to attempt to explore, is really just getting to the same place via a different road.
Maybe I'm like the person in that zen parable about a family who was asked how hard it is to achieve enlightenment. I'm paraphrasing freely, here, so if anyone happens to read this who knows how the story *really* goes, I hope I don't offend by wielding the sword/scalpel of poetic license too heavily, leaving too many bits scattered on the cutting room floor. (Many a mangled/mixed metaphor twixt lips and script.)
My version: Some people walk straight to their 'goal' (or *appear* to) with nary a missed step or deviation along the way. Their road, to the wanderer, appears as a well-paved, smooth, wide throughway that leads directly to their destination.
Whereas I, on the other hand, repeatedly find myself stuck in some thicket, beset by thorns, hacking futilely at some impenetrable wall of brambles, only to realize, knuckles bruised and bloodied from repeated assaults on the prickly impediment to my forward progress, that I could just go AROUND it. Ach. (Or is that, "Ouch?" Like Shrek, when the princess finally manages to pull the arrow out of his butt when he's distracted and forgets to resist her efforts.)
So, the parable:
Some seeker asks this family how they achieved enlightenment.
The mother says, "Oh, is fair amount of work, but, you know, not too bad."
The father says, "Oh, very difficult, many obstacles. I've spent my whole life trying to get there, and I'm still working on it."
The little girl shrugs and says, "Nothing to it. Easy. Like falling off a log."
***
So it's all down to luck, temperament and your approach. Just like everything else in life. Just do what *you* do, one foot in front of the other, and eventually you'll get 'there'. Or not. Because: There is no THERE, there. It's the path itself that is the enlightenment: Just walking your own way. Martha Graham and George Santayana had some quotes I like that seem apropos here:"There is a vitality, a life-force, an energy, a quickening that is translated through you into action, and because there is only one of you in all of time this expression is unique and if you block it, it will never exist through any other medium and be lost. The world will not have it! It is not your business to determine how good it is nor how it compares with other expressions. It is your business to keep it yours clearly and directly, to keep the channel open."
~Martha Graham
"Everything in nature is lyrical in its ideal essence, tragic in its fate, and comic in its existence." ~George Santayana***
All that said: I've been noticing, lately, small ways in which I could choose different words (at each juncture, notice the alternative branches, paths, available to you, if possible :P ). On yesterday's fabulous walk, I was balancing on one of those logs bordering the road to the park, and a guy on a bicycle went by with a big grin and said, "Cartwheel!" I was so tired, and feeling so frazzled, and really trying to focus on ME and not get sucked off onto other people's 'stuff', that I got a little irritated and said, "One thing at a time! One thing at a time! Let me take baby steps!" And trailed off with, "It's all I can do to just walk on here at *all*, let alone doing fancy tricks." I don't think he heard that last part, I kind of muttered it under my breath, because I was realizing how ungracious it sounded.
And at the same time as I was saying what I *actually* said, I was *also* thinking, "Wow, that'd be really COOL! To be able to do CARTWHEELS while balancing on this thing! Dude!"
So I *could* have taken his cheerleading as it was meant, as an appreciation and an encouragement, and said, "Oh MAN, I'd LOVE to be able to do that!" And look at is something to aspire to and wish for, whether I ever actually *try* to do it or not. But instead I heard it as yet another 'goad' to try to prod me into doing something I didn't want to do and wasn't ready for (a la my father).
So the old demons haunt us, much as we want to be rid of them. But: I FED that one by saying what I did; and by not resisting it (the demon), I think maybe I FREED myself to have that OTHER thought, which, though I didn't express it at the time, is now able to come forth and be heard, and become an 'option' along the way, a branch, a fork in the road, a possible path.
Sounds like a queueing (sp?) problem to *me*, a 'sorting' problem, where the 'wrong' (i.e., unwanted, not desired) thing is taking precedence at the wrong time.
Sort of as if a synaptic switch needs to be recalibrated (kind of like giving it a good WHACK - /kidding :-) so as to shunt the proper response into the proper channel and hence into its rightful place in the queue, at the necessary moment.
Reverse Pavlov? Replace old message with new, overwrite.
I have to nurture my SELF
in order to have something to give back.
This mother principle: I think it's true, though I scarcely think it's limited to women. I think men have it, and can give it, too. As can women play the father role, sometimes, when necessary: The strong, commanding, leading figure who gives you the strength to do what you need to do. I sort of don't like dividing them so much - I think the division is arbitrary and is mainly about reinforcing power differentials.
This mother principle: I think it's true, though I scarcely think it's limited to women. I think men have it, and can give it, too. As can women play the father role, sometimes, when necessary: The strong, commanding, leading figure who gives you the strength to do what you need to do. I sort of don't like dividing them so much - I think the division is arbitrary and is mainly about reinforcing power differentials.
keys
I think I fell in love with this guy on the spot.
He went for a walk with me.
He was not in a hurry.
He seemed instantly comfortable to talk about anything and everything.
He used the word 'diversity' in a sentence, without seeming phony or pretentious, but just as casually as you'd say, "I like eggs." He said, "I love the diversity of the area." (as opposed to my brother, who, some time ago, said, to my eternal dismay, "Diversity is overrated." And I'm pretty sure he wasn't kidding, which broke my heart. How can we have come from the same nest???)
He snuggled. And snuggled. And wrapped his arms around me, and held me, and was warm, and had the strongest, warmest, most wonderful hands.
And his voice was rumbly and low and deep, and I could lay my head on his warm chest and just listen to the rumble, and even enjoy the WORDS he was saying, not just the sound of the sea, as it were.
I feel like I want to give back what he gave to me: Comfort, nurturance, a feeling of being loved and cared for. Because I CAN DO THESE THINGS. And with him? I wanted to.
And I *did*, as best I could in that late-night, unexpected moment with a complete stranger, in a room I'd only just cleaned out enough to have *room* for two. It's probably just as well I don't have the bed set up, yet - we would have ended up having sex, and I would have been miserable. As it is, I'm just hungry :-)
That's interesting (a la Jack Sparrow). I'll have to make note of when I feel ready to put that bed together; I *think* it'll be a sign that I'm ready to invite a man into my life. And I think it will be in response to a *particular* man entering my life.
In fact, that's absolutely fascinating: I'm now thinking that the whole reason I couldn't sleep in the bedroom for so long was that the ghost of K had such a huge impact on me that I literally couldn't be in the same room where we'd been together until all internal, visceral feeling about him had ceased to pull on me.
And I'm so hungry for physical affection that I don't trust myself to *not* sleep with the first guy who comes along. Hence the pallet on the floor that's only big enough for *me*. Bloody hell. I've unlocked my own bloody secret! Yay!
So what this means is: I need to find physical affection in WHATEVER forms I can get it, which means dancing, basically. I just need to go dance, dance, dance. My little legs off. This will hopefully take the pressure off.
He went for a walk with me.
He was not in a hurry.
He seemed instantly comfortable to talk about anything and everything.
He used the word 'diversity' in a sentence, without seeming phony or pretentious, but just as casually as you'd say, "I like eggs." He said, "I love the diversity of the area." (as opposed to my brother, who, some time ago, said, to my eternal dismay, "Diversity is overrated." And I'm pretty sure he wasn't kidding, which broke my heart. How can we have come from the same nest???)
He snuggled. And snuggled. And wrapped his arms around me, and held me, and was warm, and had the strongest, warmest, most wonderful hands.
And his voice was rumbly and low and deep, and I could lay my head on his warm chest and just listen to the rumble, and even enjoy the WORDS he was saying, not just the sound of the sea, as it were.
I feel like I want to give back what he gave to me: Comfort, nurturance, a feeling of being loved and cared for. Because I CAN DO THESE THINGS. And with him? I wanted to.
And I *did*, as best I could in that late-night, unexpected moment with a complete stranger, in a room I'd only just cleaned out enough to have *room* for two. It's probably just as well I don't have the bed set up, yet - we would have ended up having sex, and I would have been miserable. As it is, I'm just hungry :-)
That's interesting (a la Jack Sparrow). I'll have to make note of when I feel ready to put that bed together; I *think* it'll be a sign that I'm ready to invite a man into my life. And I think it will be in response to a *particular* man entering my life.
In fact, that's absolutely fascinating: I'm now thinking that the whole reason I couldn't sleep in the bedroom for so long was that the ghost of K had such a huge impact on me that I literally couldn't be in the same room where we'd been together until all internal, visceral feeling about him had ceased to pull on me.
And I'm so hungry for physical affection that I don't trust myself to *not* sleep with the first guy who comes along. Hence the pallet on the floor that's only big enough for *me*. Bloody hell. I've unlocked my own bloody secret! Yay!
So what this means is: I need to find physical affection in WHATEVER forms I can get it, which means dancing, basically. I just need to go dance, dance, dance. My little legs off. This will hopefully take the pressure off.
I'm drawn to something
in that area where I was walking yesterday.
It's partly the 'feel' of the place - the mix of urban, yuppie, too-much-money-so-everything's-really-high-end-and-slick kind of thing, with the blue collar, just-barely-making-it feel of the docks. When I was down on the very chi-chi (sp?) dock of the luxury yacht people, I felt like I'd found something - not the place itself, but some combination of the water, the boats, and people who make things.
I'm trying to free associate here, see if I can suss out what was grabbing me at such a visceral level.
I found myself saying, "I've found him," meaning, the man I've been looking for all my life. But I don't know if I mean motorcycle boy specifically? Or something else. Because I ran into to *so many* men yesterday who were attractive and who seemed to be responding to me as if they found *me* attractive and/or interesting, that I began to lose interest in motorcycle boy.
But I had a feeling - something about strength, and diversity, and common ground.
That's what struck me about him: How quickly and instantly we were at ease with each other, even in spite of his repeated comments about sex. I still never *really* felt pushed beyond my boundaries (or I would have asked him to leave), I just wished he'd stop asking, already, because it was boring and seemed irrelevant to what was actually going on between us.
But he made all kinds of comments that I found fascinating, and I thought we could have talked for days.
Why are men so stupid? They get caught up in the sex thing and seem to ignore entirely the thousands of other ways in which we might be incredibly compatible and really good for each other. It's like their 'brains' (?) get caught in this little, tiny, insanely narrow groove and they can't see ANY of the other things that are so essential to making an actual RELATIONSHIP as opposed to just an endless series of one-night stands.
I still feel like he was carrying massive emotional baggage that he was looking to dump somewhere (which is often how guys 'use' sex - the woman becomes their emotional 'dumping ground', for all that toxic, built-up, unwanted emotional stuff that male culture deems unmanly, unseemly and WEAK. I mean, how the HELL are guys ever supposed to have real relationships if they don't have any clue what their emotions are all about?)
Speaking of which, there was a weird part of the conversation with the Trader Joe's guy - we actually had a pretty good talk about some things, but then he was so insanely DENSE about a bunch of other stuff (shades of my mother!) that I found myself getting angry with him and starting to become verbally abusive, which I realized was out of line and inappropriate, so I just changed the subject to calmer waters and tried to gracefully end the evening on a less combative note. With some success - we were at least superficially friendly to each other in our parting, though it was pretty clear (at least to me, and I think to him, too) that we'd never be seeing each other again, at least, not intentionally. Too bad. He seemed like such a nice guy. And he has absolutely GORGEOUS green eyes, and was wearing a shirt that made them almost luminescent. His eyes have a captivating quality about them. Hm, *also* like my mother. Asiding here (in terminal tangent mode :-) I think people like that are NEEDY, and they try to FEED OFF YOU with their eyes.
I became aware of that trait/habit/behavior in my*self* long ago, and have since tried consciously to NOT be needy in that particular way, which basically means trying to be aware of my eye contact, and to break contact any time I sense someone becoming uncomfortable with the intensity of my gaze. And it also means that I'm more aggressive/assertive in standing up for mySELF when I find someone's being insensitive to MY body language, not respecting my need to not be stared at or looked at with an intrusive gaze. Interesting to try to put this into words.
But I also recognize my needs as real and valid, and use people's reactions a)as signposts as to how deep of waters we can venture into together (argh-y sentence structure, crossed-eyes emoticon here); and b)indicators as to whether I'm coming on 'too strong' for that particular person at that particular time, and so maybe need to back off a little if I want to continue to interact with them. A balancing act, as so often in life.
***
Oh yeah, never finished the thought about the 'weird conversational moment' with Trader Joes guy.
Our conversation was all over the map, so I don't remember how we got to this particular juncture. I was trying to illustrate the concept of making 'I' statements instead of 'you' statements, as a way to not piss people off and to 'take ownership' for situations (usually relational issues) we often find ourselves in.
He'd been talking about some situation he had with a friend, and was repeatedly calling the friend an 'asshole', and saying that everyone else he knew thought the guy was an asshole, too. But then there was this *other* friend of his, who everyone *else* thought was a jerk, but *he* (Trader Joes guy) thought the guy was ok, had some good qualities in spite of the assholeness.
So I was trying to use this to illustrate that it's all relative, that "nothing is either good nor bad, but thinking makes it so" (Hamlet).
We got all embroiled in the details, but he was being cool and trying really hard to understand what I was saying.
So he said, well, so how do I turn that around? I said, "Well, think about how it feels. What did that guy's behavior make you feel?"
He gave some descriptor, like, "He was a jerk."
And I said, no, that's not an emotion, that's a description.
Then he tried, "I didn't like how he treated me."
I said, "Better, but still not an emotion - that's a thought about an emotion."
It went on like this for a while, til finally he came up with an emotion word rather than something that described the other guy. Maybe he said, "frustrated," or "irritated," or "offended", something like that.
And then he said, "But that's not exactly it. What's *this* emotion?" And he made this kind of twisted, scrunched-up, off-to-the-side face that was a pretty good representation of the classic "What the fuck?" look.
So I fumbled for a word for it, being amazed that this (theoretically) grown man was so - illiterate? ('impoverished' feels more like what I want, or something like, communicationally challenged??? gah) - in the language of emotions, even relatively simple ones.
(And his vocabulary! I don't know how many words the 'average' adult American's vocabulary includes, but his had gaps big enough to drive a double-wide through. It was embarassing, and, ultimately, infuriating. Communication is impossible with someone like this, or so tedious as to be absolutely madness-inducing, as in hair-pulling, punch-you-in-the-face-because-you're-driving-me-NUTS crazy-making.
And his general ignorance level? He'd never heard of 'nuclear family'. Now maybe my middle-class, college-educated privilege is showing [and to give him his due, he never went to college, and may not even have graduated from high school? Can't remember what he said about it. But he definitely wasn't stupid, I'd even say he was quite bright - he just {maybe, for the millionth time, like my mother - are they *all* going to be repeats of unfinished business with my mother???? Gawd, I HOPE not}] But I have to tell you, my JAW was SORE from hitting the table so many times. And it riled me enough that I said, more than once before we parted ways, something to the effect of, "What, have you been living under a ROCK??!?" Which did not win me any friends, though he seemed more hurt than angry, and was quite gracious in the end, despite my mistreatment of him. Perhaps WILLFUL STUPIDITY is a defense mechanism? I've often wondered if this is what's going on with my mother.)
So that was the moment. I was astonished to be sitting across a table, yet again, from yet another -- person whose company was so displeasing to me. (Attempting to practice what I preach. :-)
I think this is where *I* still have some 'growing up' to do: To learn how to accept *other people's* flaws gracefully. If the 'solution' to this one is the same as previous 'life lessons', I think I won't be able to accept the flaws in others until I'm able to accept my own. Which is coming along nicely, but still needs some more time in the oven.
It's partly the 'feel' of the place - the mix of urban, yuppie, too-much-money-so-everything's-really-high-end-and-slick kind of thing, with the blue collar, just-barely-making-it feel of the docks. When I was down on the very chi-chi (sp?) dock of the luxury yacht people, I felt like I'd found something - not the place itself, but some combination of the water, the boats, and people who make things.
I'm trying to free associate here, see if I can suss out what was grabbing me at such a visceral level.
I found myself saying, "I've found him," meaning, the man I've been looking for all my life. But I don't know if I mean motorcycle boy specifically? Or something else. Because I ran into to *so many* men yesterday who were attractive and who seemed to be responding to me as if they found *me* attractive and/or interesting, that I began to lose interest in motorcycle boy.
But I had a feeling - something about strength, and diversity, and common ground.
That's what struck me about him: How quickly and instantly we were at ease with each other, even in spite of his repeated comments about sex. I still never *really* felt pushed beyond my boundaries (or I would have asked him to leave), I just wished he'd stop asking, already, because it was boring and seemed irrelevant to what was actually going on between us.
But he made all kinds of comments that I found fascinating, and I thought we could have talked for days.
Why are men so stupid? They get caught up in the sex thing and seem to ignore entirely the thousands of other ways in which we might be incredibly compatible and really good for each other. It's like their 'brains' (?) get caught in this little, tiny, insanely narrow groove and they can't see ANY of the other things that are so essential to making an actual RELATIONSHIP as opposed to just an endless series of one-night stands.
I still feel like he was carrying massive emotional baggage that he was looking to dump somewhere (which is often how guys 'use' sex - the woman becomes their emotional 'dumping ground', for all that toxic, built-up, unwanted emotional stuff that male culture deems unmanly, unseemly and WEAK. I mean, how the HELL are guys ever supposed to have real relationships if they don't have any clue what their emotions are all about?)
Speaking of which, there was a weird part of the conversation with the Trader Joe's guy - we actually had a pretty good talk about some things, but then he was so insanely DENSE about a bunch of other stuff (shades of my mother!) that I found myself getting angry with him and starting to become verbally abusive, which I realized was out of line and inappropriate, so I just changed the subject to calmer waters and tried to gracefully end the evening on a less combative note. With some success - we were at least superficially friendly to each other in our parting, though it was pretty clear (at least to me, and I think to him, too) that we'd never be seeing each other again, at least, not intentionally. Too bad. He seemed like such a nice guy. And he has absolutely GORGEOUS green eyes, and was wearing a shirt that made them almost luminescent. His eyes have a captivating quality about them. Hm, *also* like my mother. Asiding here (in terminal tangent mode :-) I think people like that are NEEDY, and they try to FEED OFF YOU with their eyes.
I became aware of that trait/habit/behavior in my*self* long ago, and have since tried consciously to NOT be needy in that particular way, which basically means trying to be aware of my eye contact, and to break contact any time I sense someone becoming uncomfortable with the intensity of my gaze. And it also means that I'm more aggressive/assertive in standing up for mySELF when I find someone's being insensitive to MY body language, not respecting my need to not be stared at or looked at with an intrusive gaze. Interesting to try to put this into words.
But I also recognize my needs as real and valid, and use people's reactions a)as signposts as to how deep of waters we can venture into together (argh-y sentence structure, crossed-eyes emoticon here); and b)indicators as to whether I'm coming on 'too strong' for that particular person at that particular time, and so maybe need to back off a little if I want to continue to interact with them. A balancing act, as so often in life.
***
Oh yeah, never finished the thought about the 'weird conversational moment' with Trader Joes guy.
Our conversation was all over the map, so I don't remember how we got to this particular juncture. I was trying to illustrate the concept of making 'I' statements instead of 'you' statements, as a way to not piss people off and to 'take ownership' for situations (usually relational issues) we often find ourselves in.
He'd been talking about some situation he had with a friend, and was repeatedly calling the friend an 'asshole', and saying that everyone else he knew thought the guy was an asshole, too. But then there was this *other* friend of his, who everyone *else* thought was a jerk, but *he* (Trader Joes guy) thought the guy was ok, had some good qualities in spite of the assholeness.
So I was trying to use this to illustrate that it's all relative, that "nothing is either good nor bad, but thinking makes it so" (Hamlet).
We got all embroiled in the details, but he was being cool and trying really hard to understand what I was saying.
So he said, well, so how do I turn that around? I said, "Well, think about how it feels. What did that guy's behavior make you feel?"
He gave some descriptor, like, "He was a jerk."
And I said, no, that's not an emotion, that's a description.
Then he tried, "I didn't like how he treated me."
I said, "Better, but still not an emotion - that's a thought about an emotion."
It went on like this for a while, til finally he came up with an emotion word rather than something that described the other guy. Maybe he said, "frustrated," or "irritated," or "offended", something like that.
And then he said, "But that's not exactly it. What's *this* emotion?" And he made this kind of twisted, scrunched-up, off-to-the-side face that was a pretty good representation of the classic "What the fuck?" look.
So I fumbled for a word for it, being amazed that this (theoretically) grown man was so - illiterate? ('impoverished' feels more like what I want, or something like, communicationally challenged??? gah) - in the language of emotions, even relatively simple ones.
(And his vocabulary! I don't know how many words the 'average' adult American's vocabulary includes, but his had gaps big enough to drive a double-wide through. It was embarassing, and, ultimately, infuriating. Communication is impossible with someone like this, or so tedious as to be absolutely madness-inducing, as in hair-pulling, punch-you-in-the-face-because-you're-driving-me-NUTS crazy-making.
And his general ignorance level? He'd never heard of 'nuclear family'. Now maybe my middle-class, college-educated privilege is showing [and to give him his due, he never went to college, and may not even have graduated from high school? Can't remember what he said about it. But he definitely wasn't stupid, I'd even say he was quite bright - he just {maybe, for the millionth time, like my mother - are they *all* going to be repeats of unfinished business with my mother???? Gawd, I HOPE not}] But I have to tell you, my JAW was SORE from hitting the table so many times. And it riled me enough that I said, more than once before we parted ways, something to the effect of, "What, have you been living under a ROCK??!?" Which did not win me any friends, though he seemed more hurt than angry, and was quite gracious in the end, despite my mistreatment of him. Perhaps WILLFUL STUPIDITY is a defense mechanism? I've often wondered if this is what's going on with my mother.)
So that was the moment. I was astonished to be sitting across a table, yet again, from yet another -- person whose company was so displeasing to me. (Attempting to practice what I preach. :-)
I think this is where *I* still have some 'growing up' to do: To learn how to accept *other people's* flaws gracefully. If the 'solution' to this one is the same as previous 'life lessons', I think I won't be able to accept the flaws in others until I'm able to accept my own. Which is coming along nicely, but still needs some more time in the oven.
one is the loneliest number
I found a homeless-looking guy staring at me yesterday - he was actually quite good-looking, in a scruffy, unkempt way. I wondered if he was staring at me because *I* looked like a homeless person? Dunno. I wish I could get some honest feedback from somewhere - for a while I'll feel like I'm fitting in because I'm around people I know and I don't feel like I'm any different from anybody else, but then I'll be around some *other* folks who seem to suddenly be treating me differently, and I don't know if it's because of how I look? Or how I'm acting? Or some random thing like the weather or the phase of the moon. Or maybe they're just exhibiting some kind of brainless, irritating herd behavior, and have chosen me as the 'outcast' of the moment, simply because I'm not with a group?
People are weird.
And a so-called 'friend' muttered an aside to me at a gig some months ago, a church service dedicated to the theme of homelessness. He referred to us (the musicians) as the "nearly homeless". I began to get incensed, thinking he was slamming me, but then wondered if he was including himself in that statement, or maybe all of us, since many musicians struggle to survive, especially free-lancers, which is what most of the musicians in that group were. I've never remembered to ask him, though it niggles at the back of my mind. Maybe I need to feed this minor little demon, then it'll go away :-)
People are weird.
And a so-called 'friend' muttered an aside to me at a gig some months ago, a church service dedicated to the theme of homelessness. He referred to us (the musicians) as the "nearly homeless". I began to get incensed, thinking he was slamming me, but then wondered if he was including himself in that statement, or maybe all of us, since many musicians struggle to survive, especially free-lancers, which is what most of the musicians in that group were. I've never remembered to ask him, though it niggles at the back of my mind. Maybe I need to feed this minor little demon, then it'll go away :-)
feed your demons
The title isn't mine, I got it from a story on NPR a while back*. It appears to be a buddhist precept, which basically says that the more you fight something, the more of your energy it consumes. But if you give in to it, let it take over, 'feed' it, it'll will become satiated and therefore stop being a problem. Theoretically :-) Kind of like feeding a hungry baby, to my mind - if you give her what she needs instead of getting angry or resisting her, then she'll calm down and go happily to sleep.
Along those lines, I'd been thinking all weekend of trying to track down motorcycle boy. I somehow felt that if I could just locate him in time and space, I would feel more at ease.
Today I'm feeling less - needy? about it, maybe because I gave in fully and completely to my urge to find him yesterday, and wandered wherever my gut suggested until I was tired and had to rest.
I was so exhausted from lack of sleep the night before (Monday night), and from having waited to eat til I got just the right thing :-) Which was great - the breakfast, I mean - and fed me in all kinds of ways - not only was the cook guy insanely attentive about the food, the cafe itself was so peaceful - beautiful view, and the whole place was fresh, clean, tastefully decorated and quiet (except for the music, which I asked to have turned down a bit).
The dining area was open on one side to the bike path, and I sat at a table right along that edge, blissfully roasting in the sun, nodding off a little as I waited for my food. Bicyclists, runners and other peds zipped, trotted and strolled by, and I felt myself being 'examined' more than once by several attractive male passersby :-) Ego, ego :-)
Finally the food came - he'd warned me that it'd take a while for poached eggs, but I was willing to wait, because poached is my favorite.
And it was worth the wait. Everything was perfect: The eggs were soft but not runny, firm enough to spoon up without losing any of the yolk (which is the only part I eat). He'd sprinkled some paprika on the eggs to make them pretty, and the bacon was perfectly crisp, not soggy. He'd added a little cup of sweet red grapes on the side, and a sprig of Italian parsley. Beautiful! Pride in his work. I had to wonder if he cooked that carefully for everyone? Or maybe it was just slow and he could really focus on that one meal. Whatever the case, it certainly made me feel pampered.
I slowly savored the meal, the restaurant gradually emptied til I had the place to myself, watching the people go by, eating slowly, as I like to, gazing mindlessly out at the sunny sky.
There was the little thrill of anticipation as I began to imagine looking for motorcycle boy's daytime hangout, wandering up and down the piers randomly, letting my feet find their way. I've always had a sort of romantic fascination with that part of town - the docks, the fishing boats - a parallel universe all its own, never touching my own (except at the fish market).
I finally finished my meal, and strolled out into the luxuriously decadent afternoon to begin my wander.
I went wherever my heart/gut/feet/soul led me - up one gangplank and down another, to a park bench; to a builder of luxury yachts where, off to one side, an ancient, rusting-out old float stood in a quiet patch of water, and, lo and behold, a heron stood there, basking in the sun, possibly searching the water for potential lunch.
I finally got tired enough (and exhausted the search possibilities enough) to want to lie down. I wandered over to the park, climbed the hill, and collapsed on a sunny slope in a patch of clover. Just dropped right where I stood when I got to a place that was empty and quiet, sheltered and with the right angle to the sun.
I lay there for a while, not quite able to nod off because of a woman nearby calling repeatedly to her dog. But she was far enough away for it to be a minor annoyance, and I dozed.
Finally I got too hot and had to move on, and I didn't want to get a ticket (I'd parked in a two-hour spot, and had been wandering so long that I had no idea what time it was, though I figured I was probably safe because the sun was still pretty high up.)
So I wandered back, finding some logs to balance on along the way, and getting comments from various people watching - one guy said, "Cartwheel!" Yeah :-) It was about all I could manage to focus on simply balancing, what with all the people going by. One woman, getting into her car applauded and said, "It's hard to walk on those!" Felt like I was surrounded by cheerleaders. I'm sure the perfection of the day had something to do with it - everyone I encountered seemed to be in that utterly relaxed state you get when you've had a good meal and you're sitting, warm and full and comfortable, not quite asleep but just enjoying the peaceful feeling of satiety. (Hm - everything comes back to feeling 'fed' properly :-)
I finally got back to my car, but still wasn't ready to give up any part of that beautiful day to being inside a smelly old laundromat, so stalled a little longer by walking a few blocks up the hill to another cafe I've gone to a few times for Wednesday evening jam sessions. I'd only ever been there at night, and the place was filled with instruments from wall to wall - guitars, mandolins, a few fiddles, the occasional banjo. I wanted to see what it looked like in the daylight.
I got there just as the girl was locking up for the day, her shift had ended - the cafe apparently closes in the late afternoon, then opens again for the evening a few hours later.
But she gave me a flyer for the Wednesday night jam - something she'd said made me think maybe the jam wasn't happening this week, and I'd been planning to go, since I've missed the last few weeks. I wanted a phone number to call the guy who runs it, to make sure I didn't make the drive up for no reason.
***
Finally it was cooling off and dropping into evening, and the laundromat required that the last loads be put in by 7 pm, so I'd stalled long enough.
As I did my laundry, I escaped periodically back out to the car to get away from the detergent smell, and found myself looking, again, at the cafe where I'd had breakfast. I didn't really think about it when I parked the car, but it occurred to me that the guy who'd fixed me breakfast could probably see my car out that window, and I wondered if he thought I was 'stalking' him, or something. Because I'd left my car on the OTHER side of the cafe for two hours when I was off on my wander, then parked it in the laundromat parking lot for several more hours. If the guy was observant at all (and it seemed like he was) and noticed my car, he might think he was being - what's that detective word for it - watched, observed, can't think of the right word.
Anyway, the funny thing was, I figured they'd gone home for the day at some point, because it was past 6, which was when they closed.
As I was getting in and out of my car, running back and forth with various items - coins, vinegar, soap, etc., repeatedly forgetting things and having to run back and get them because I didn't want to leave anything unattended in the laundromat - I noticed a guy pull up in a light blue station wagon about fifty feet up the street. I didn't pay any attention at first, but then the guy just sat there. I kind of noticed him, but didn't really think anything about it, until I went across the street to the Subway to get a chocolate chip cookie, and noticed that the guy looked a bit like the morning's cook. I couldn't really tell because he was too far away, but as I got back in my car to eat my cookie, he closed his door and went around to the driver's side and started to drive away (he'd been sitting on the passenger side with the door open), and as he passed me I tried to see if it was him, but still couldn't tell. Maybe if I go to that restaurant again I'll ask if he drives a light blue station wagon.
Life is weird - people never seem to be what you think they are. I don't know if I just don't get out enough, or my lack of trust has made me too much of a hermit, but I feel like I really have no idea of what's considered 'normal' these days in terms of - well, stalking. I mean, I don't even like the term, because I think it's overused, often used to describe completely harmless behaviors, which takes away from its TRUE meaning, which is something dark, sinister, and scary, at least to *my* mind.
Eventually the laundry saga ended, and I got in the car and headed home.
I stopped at the library to see if I had any books or videos, and one of the women who works there, who knows me well, had my books all ready for me when I went up to the counter after checking my email and printing a couple of things off the computer.
I started to ask her for my books, then realized she already had them sitting there in a pile at the terminal and was entering my info into the computer. She seemed a little flustered, and I teased her about being so fabulously efficient. She said, "Well, I got them when I saw you come in the door, but then you didn't come to the counter right away!" I teased her some more, "Do I have to do everything the same way every time?" "Yes!" she said, "And you're early, too! You're not supposed to be here until 8:50 or so!" (I have, in the past, often come in as close to closing time as humanly possible and shaved it in just under the wire, which amused me and which they (the staff) seemed to come to expect after a while. I would zoom in, grab my books while somebody would pull my videos off the shelf, check out, and be in and out in under two minutes flat. For a long time it was my preferred way to do it, though now I've become a bit more comfortable with the place, I'll tend to hang out there a bit longer. (Even though the staff is friendly, the patrons are often a bunch of noisy, rude kids after school, or there are a bunch of non-English-speaking folks, often Russian or Somali, and I would get a bit overwhelmed, feeling like *I* was the intruder in another country. Not that I'm saying they're 'intruding' it's just - well, it feels awkward. Because they tend to travel in packs, and I'm always by myself, so there's this feeling of potentially being ganged up on. Thought the staff would certainly come to my rescue if I needed help, but sometimes the atmosphere can be a bit stressful. At least for *me*)
*Link to a chapter from Feeding Your Demons: http://www.hachettebookgroup.com/books_9780316013130_ChapterExcerpt(1).htm
And an excerpt:
Along those lines, I'd been thinking all weekend of trying to track down motorcycle boy. I somehow felt that if I could just locate him in time and space, I would feel more at ease.
Today I'm feeling less - needy? about it, maybe because I gave in fully and completely to my urge to find him yesterday, and wandered wherever my gut suggested until I was tired and had to rest.
I was so exhausted from lack of sleep the night before (Monday night), and from having waited to eat til I got just the right thing :-) Which was great - the breakfast, I mean - and fed me in all kinds of ways - not only was the cook guy insanely attentive about the food, the cafe itself was so peaceful - beautiful view, and the whole place was fresh, clean, tastefully decorated and quiet (except for the music, which I asked to have turned down a bit).
The dining area was open on one side to the bike path, and I sat at a table right along that edge, blissfully roasting in the sun, nodding off a little as I waited for my food. Bicyclists, runners and other peds zipped, trotted and strolled by, and I felt myself being 'examined' more than once by several attractive male passersby :-) Ego, ego :-)
Finally the food came - he'd warned me that it'd take a while for poached eggs, but I was willing to wait, because poached is my favorite.
And it was worth the wait. Everything was perfect: The eggs were soft but not runny, firm enough to spoon up without losing any of the yolk (which is the only part I eat). He'd sprinkled some paprika on the eggs to make them pretty, and the bacon was perfectly crisp, not soggy. He'd added a little cup of sweet red grapes on the side, and a sprig of Italian parsley. Beautiful! Pride in his work. I had to wonder if he cooked that carefully for everyone? Or maybe it was just slow and he could really focus on that one meal. Whatever the case, it certainly made me feel pampered.
I slowly savored the meal, the restaurant gradually emptied til I had the place to myself, watching the people go by, eating slowly, as I like to, gazing mindlessly out at the sunny sky.
There was the little thrill of anticipation as I began to imagine looking for motorcycle boy's daytime hangout, wandering up and down the piers randomly, letting my feet find their way. I've always had a sort of romantic fascination with that part of town - the docks, the fishing boats - a parallel universe all its own, never touching my own (except at the fish market).
I finally finished my meal, and strolled out into the luxuriously decadent afternoon to begin my wander.
I went wherever my heart/gut/feet/soul led me - up one gangplank and down another, to a park bench; to a builder of luxury yachts where, off to one side, an ancient, rusting-out old float stood in a quiet patch of water, and, lo and behold, a heron stood there, basking in the sun, possibly searching the water for potential lunch.
I finally got tired enough (and exhausted the search possibilities enough) to want to lie down. I wandered over to the park, climbed the hill, and collapsed on a sunny slope in a patch of clover. Just dropped right where I stood when I got to a place that was empty and quiet, sheltered and with the right angle to the sun.
I lay there for a while, not quite able to nod off because of a woman nearby calling repeatedly to her dog. But she was far enough away for it to be a minor annoyance, and I dozed.
Finally I got too hot and had to move on, and I didn't want to get a ticket (I'd parked in a two-hour spot, and had been wandering so long that I had no idea what time it was, though I figured I was probably safe because the sun was still pretty high up.)
So I wandered back, finding some logs to balance on along the way, and getting comments from various people watching - one guy said, "Cartwheel!" Yeah :-) It was about all I could manage to focus on simply balancing, what with all the people going by. One woman, getting into her car applauded and said, "It's hard to walk on those!" Felt like I was surrounded by cheerleaders. I'm sure the perfection of the day had something to do with it - everyone I encountered seemed to be in that utterly relaxed state you get when you've had a good meal and you're sitting, warm and full and comfortable, not quite asleep but just enjoying the peaceful feeling of satiety. (Hm - everything comes back to feeling 'fed' properly :-)
I finally got back to my car, but still wasn't ready to give up any part of that beautiful day to being inside a smelly old laundromat, so stalled a little longer by walking a few blocks up the hill to another cafe I've gone to a few times for Wednesday evening jam sessions. I'd only ever been there at night, and the place was filled with instruments from wall to wall - guitars, mandolins, a few fiddles, the occasional banjo. I wanted to see what it looked like in the daylight.
I got there just as the girl was locking up for the day, her shift had ended - the cafe apparently closes in the late afternoon, then opens again for the evening a few hours later.
But she gave me a flyer for the Wednesday night jam - something she'd said made me think maybe the jam wasn't happening this week, and I'd been planning to go, since I've missed the last few weeks. I wanted a phone number to call the guy who runs it, to make sure I didn't make the drive up for no reason.
***
Finally it was cooling off and dropping into evening, and the laundromat required that the last loads be put in by 7 pm, so I'd stalled long enough.
As I did my laundry, I escaped periodically back out to the car to get away from the detergent smell, and found myself looking, again, at the cafe where I'd had breakfast. I didn't really think about it when I parked the car, but it occurred to me that the guy who'd fixed me breakfast could probably see my car out that window, and I wondered if he thought I was 'stalking' him, or something. Because I'd left my car on the OTHER side of the cafe for two hours when I was off on my wander, then parked it in the laundromat parking lot for several more hours. If the guy was observant at all (and it seemed like he was) and noticed my car, he might think he was being - what's that detective word for it - watched, observed, can't think of the right word.
Anyway, the funny thing was, I figured they'd gone home for the day at some point, because it was past 6, which was when they closed.
As I was getting in and out of my car, running back and forth with various items - coins, vinegar, soap, etc., repeatedly forgetting things and having to run back and get them because I didn't want to leave anything unattended in the laundromat - I noticed a guy pull up in a light blue station wagon about fifty feet up the street. I didn't pay any attention at first, but then the guy just sat there. I kind of noticed him, but didn't really think anything about it, until I went across the street to the Subway to get a chocolate chip cookie, and noticed that the guy looked a bit like the morning's cook. I couldn't really tell because he was too far away, but as I got back in my car to eat my cookie, he closed his door and went around to the driver's side and started to drive away (he'd been sitting on the passenger side with the door open), and as he passed me I tried to see if it was him, but still couldn't tell. Maybe if I go to that restaurant again I'll ask if he drives a light blue station wagon.
Life is weird - people never seem to be what you think they are. I don't know if I just don't get out enough, or my lack of trust has made me too much of a hermit, but I feel like I really have no idea of what's considered 'normal' these days in terms of - well, stalking. I mean, I don't even like the term, because I think it's overused, often used to describe completely harmless behaviors, which takes away from its TRUE meaning, which is something dark, sinister, and scary, at least to *my* mind.
Eventually the laundry saga ended, and I got in the car and headed home.
I stopped at the library to see if I had any books or videos, and one of the women who works there, who knows me well, had my books all ready for me when I went up to the counter after checking my email and printing a couple of things off the computer.
I started to ask her for my books, then realized she already had them sitting there in a pile at the terminal and was entering my info into the computer. She seemed a little flustered, and I teased her about being so fabulously efficient. She said, "Well, I got them when I saw you come in the door, but then you didn't come to the counter right away!" I teased her some more, "Do I have to do everything the same way every time?" "Yes!" she said, "And you're early, too! You're not supposed to be here until 8:50 or so!" (I have, in the past, often come in as close to closing time as humanly possible and shaved it in just under the wire, which amused me and which they (the staff) seemed to come to expect after a while. I would zoom in, grab my books while somebody would pull my videos off the shelf, check out, and be in and out in under two minutes flat. For a long time it was my preferred way to do it, though now I've become a bit more comfortable with the place, I'll tend to hang out there a bit longer. (Even though the staff is friendly, the patrons are often a bunch of noisy, rude kids after school, or there are a bunch of non-English-speaking folks, often Russian or Somali, and I would get a bit overwhelmed, feeling like *I* was the intruder in another country. Not that I'm saying they're 'intruding' it's just - well, it feels awkward. Because they tend to travel in packs, and I'm always by myself, so there's this feeling of potentially being ganged up on. Thought the staff would certainly come to my rescue if I needed help, but sometimes the atmosphere can be a bit stressful. At least for *me*)
*Link to a chapter from Feeding Your Demons: http://www.hachettebookgroup.com/books_9780316013130_ChapterExcerpt(1).htm
And an excerpt:
In mythology the dragon often guards a secret treasure. Through feeding our demons and transforming them into allies, we discover our own treasures that have been hidden by our preoccupation with doing battle. As it turns out, when liberated, the energy of the demon that has been locked in struggle is the treasure. Feeding our demons also makes us less of a threat in the world. When we become aware of our demons and offer them an elixir of conscious acceptance and compassion, we are much less likely to project them onto others.
Tuesday, September 14, 2010
a perfect day :-)
Today was gorgeous, one of those rare, late-summer jewels of a day where the sky was an absolutely perfect, clear blue all day long, and the air was fantastically warm. An I-think-I've-died-and-gone-to-heaven kind of day.
I'd gone up to the north end of town to run some errands and get breakfast, and got so caught up in the beauty of the day that I ended up spending two hours wnndering just to be out there as much as possible.
I started out with a short list: Breakfast; laundry; find motorcycle boy's work place; and stop at the co-op and Whole Foods for various things I couldn't get elsewhere.
***
Over the last few days I've thought about motorcycle boy a lot, wondering if I'd hear from him, if he got my email. After trying the phone number he gave me and getting that woman, I tore up the piece of paper he gave me in irritation, and deleted his email address and the email I sent him. I thought about calling the phone number again and seeing if the person on the other end knew anything - I had this idea that maybe she was an old girlfriend? And he'd given me her number to get even? Though I'm not sure exactly who he would have been getting even with. Very strange.
And the fact that he even thought to give me a wrong number - I mean, why not just say, hey, I'm not comfortable giving out my phone number, but I'll give you an email? But then that would have gone against his apparent urgency to go do something now rather than later. Still, very - what - hostile??? Why on earth would you be hostile to someone you just met and are trying to get to go somewhere and do something with you? (Scratching head in puzzlement.)
He'd given me enough clues about the boat shop where he works (which he said he's owner of, but I'm skeptical of *everything* he said, at this point) that I thought maybe I could hunt him down, and at least ask him about the phone number, and see how he acted/reacted in a non-spur-of-the-moment, late-night, slightly drunken situation.
I was thinking about it this morning, trying to explain why it matters. The explanation I came up with is that it's like an anchor point: I felt a strong connection with this guy, and I want to know where he IS. It's not that I want to *see* him, exactly, as in necessarily spending more time together; it's more like, if I know where he is, then - I'm not sure I can capture what I'm feeling in words.
It's kind of like a security blanket - if I know this guy's real, solid, actual, and that SOMEthing he said was true, such as that his place of work actually exists and I can find him if I want to - it has something to do with being abandoned, emotionally, over and over and over again in my life.
It's like, if I know where this person IS, then they can't abandon me, not really - because I know where to find them. It's not that I necessarily want to BE with them, I just want to - regain MY power in the relationship?
***
So I had that in mind, and it turned out that the laundromat I was thinking of going to is right near the area he described his shop being in. And the breakfast place I was planning on was pretty near by, as well as a couple of other errands I had on my list.
So I headed up there, but I got going too late to go to the breakfast place I"d originally planned on. I thought, well, there *must* be someplace up in that part of town. Then I remembered a place I"d tried before and not liked much, but which was very close to the laundromat. So I put everything in the car and headed up there, determined to just simply FIND a place that suited me for breakfast.
I got down there, and was suddenly intent on seeing if I could find motorcycle guy's place. Even though I was really hungry, I was even hungrier for a kind of - closure? that I think has haunted me through many, many relationships.
So I cruised around the area I thought was most likely, and in the process, came across a new restaurant I hadn't seen before, right on the corner of a very busy intersection, but with the dining area right adjacent to the busy bike trail rather than the street.
Not only was this place cute and clean, but the prices were cheap, and best of all, they serve breakfast all day! I'd been wary to even walk in to the place because it looked so high-end and urban yuppified. But I braved it, and was glad I did.
The cook took my order himself, so I was able to tell him exactly what I wanted. He fixed it PERFECTLY. Nirvana! Heaven! Sitting at an open-air table, in a gorgeous, sparklingly clean cafe, with
***
Days like this have to be saved up, savored, and stoppered away carefully against future chill, a talisman to ward off those bleak, dark, dreary days of winter.
***
Noticing (and I've noticed this before) that I have (or used to, getting better)
a tendency to 'forget' the good stuff that happens and focus on the bad.
So today I want to capture all the FABULOUS things that happened and not let the few relatively small annoyances get me down.
*don't think I've gotten into the whole chemical sensitivity thing much, here, but it's an ongoing battle. The washing machine here (that I share with the smoker neighbor in the downstairs part of the duplex) is a refurbished, replacement machine that my landlords got when our old machine died.
The old machine was great; the new one, not so much. I spent an insane amount of time when we first got it trying to get my clothes to come out not full of soap, but ended up, over and over again, with soap-filled, gray laundry that was getting shredded and stretched and basically ruined by this piece of crap. Plus, I was beginning to be able to smell cigarette smoke on my clothes, too - I think the old machine was good enough to keep that from happening, but the replacement machine was so lame and feeble that it just wasn't rinsing ANYthing properly, no matter how many times I put it through the rinse cycle. All it was doing was destroying my clothes, a little at a time, leaving them progressively more gray, dingy and damaged.
So I finally gave up, and eventually found someone who let me borrow his machine for about 6 months. When that stopped being an option, I tried *another* friend, who said I could come use their machine any time I liked, but they live 45 minutes away and are in the process of a massive remodel, and the first load I did there was fabulous, except - it all smelled of drywall dust. Sigh.
I'd been hunting around for a laundromat for a long time (since the old washing machine died), but every one I visited was so overwhelmingly toxic that I'd have a headached within seconds of walking into the place. Sneezing, eyes burning, etc. Just not worth it. Plus the idea of any of that touching my skin, or trying to sleep on sheets with that smell - I've been struggling with this for 30 years, ever since I first had a reaction to fabric softener in college.
It's never really let up, and was compounded during my architect years by 10 years of working in (what I'm pretty sure was) a 'sick building'.
I'd gone up to the north end of town to run some errands and get breakfast, and got so caught up in the beauty of the day that I ended up spending two hours wnndering just to be out there as much as possible.
I started out with a short list: Breakfast; laundry; find motorcycle boy's work place; and stop at the co-op and Whole Foods for various things I couldn't get elsewhere.
***
Over the last few days I've thought about motorcycle boy a lot, wondering if I'd hear from him, if he got my email. After trying the phone number he gave me and getting that woman, I tore up the piece of paper he gave me in irritation, and deleted his email address and the email I sent him. I thought about calling the phone number again and seeing if the person on the other end knew anything - I had this idea that maybe she was an old girlfriend? And he'd given me her number to get even? Though I'm not sure exactly who he would have been getting even with. Very strange.
And the fact that he even thought to give me a wrong number - I mean, why not just say, hey, I'm not comfortable giving out my phone number, but I'll give you an email? But then that would have gone against his apparent urgency to go do something now rather than later. Still, very - what - hostile??? Why on earth would you be hostile to someone you just met and are trying to get to go somewhere and do something with you? (Scratching head in puzzlement.)
He'd given me enough clues about the boat shop where he works (which he said he's owner of, but I'm skeptical of *everything* he said, at this point) that I thought maybe I could hunt him down, and at least ask him about the phone number, and see how he acted/reacted in a non-spur-of-the-moment, late-night, slightly drunken situation.
I was thinking about it this morning, trying to explain why it matters. The explanation I came up with is that it's like an anchor point: I felt a strong connection with this guy, and I want to know where he IS. It's not that I want to *see* him, exactly, as in necessarily spending more time together; it's more like, if I know where he is, then - I'm not sure I can capture what I'm feeling in words.
It's kind of like a security blanket - if I know this guy's real, solid, actual, and that SOMEthing he said was true, such as that his place of work actually exists and I can find him if I want to - it has something to do with being abandoned, emotionally, over and over and over again in my life.
It's like, if I know where this person IS, then they can't abandon me, not really - because I know where to find them. It's not that I necessarily want to BE with them, I just want to - regain MY power in the relationship?
***
So I had that in mind, and it turned out that the laundromat I was thinking of going to is right near the area he described his shop being in. And the breakfast place I was planning on was pretty near by, as well as a couple of other errands I had on my list.
So I headed up there, but I got going too late to go to the breakfast place I"d originally planned on. I thought, well, there *must* be someplace up in that part of town. Then I remembered a place I"d tried before and not liked much, but which was very close to the laundromat. So I put everything in the car and headed up there, determined to just simply FIND a place that suited me for breakfast.
I got down there, and was suddenly intent on seeing if I could find motorcycle guy's place. Even though I was really hungry, I was even hungrier for a kind of - closure? that I think has haunted me through many, many relationships.
So I cruised around the area I thought was most likely, and in the process, came across a new restaurant I hadn't seen before, right on the corner of a very busy intersection, but with the dining area right adjacent to the busy bike trail rather than the street.
Not only was this place cute and clean, but the prices were cheap, and best of all, they serve breakfast all day! I'd been wary to even walk in to the place because it looked so high-end and urban yuppified. But I braved it, and was glad I did.
The cook took my order himself, so I was able to tell him exactly what I wanted. He fixed it PERFECTLY. Nirvana! Heaven! Sitting at an open-air table, in a gorgeous, sparklingly clean cafe, with
***
Days like this have to be saved up, savored, and stoppered away carefully against future chill, a talisman to ward off those bleak, dark, dreary days of winter.
***
Noticing (and I've noticed this before) that I have (or used to, getting better)
a tendency to 'forget' the good stuff that happens and focus on the bad.
So today I want to capture all the FABULOUS things that happened and not let the few relatively small annoyances get me down.
*don't think I've gotten into the whole chemical sensitivity thing much, here, but it's an ongoing battle. The washing machine here (that I share with the smoker neighbor in the downstairs part of the duplex) is a refurbished, replacement machine that my landlords got when our old machine died.
The old machine was great; the new one, not so much. I spent an insane amount of time when we first got it trying to get my clothes to come out not full of soap, but ended up, over and over again, with soap-filled, gray laundry that was getting shredded and stretched and basically ruined by this piece of crap. Plus, I was beginning to be able to smell cigarette smoke on my clothes, too - I think the old machine was good enough to keep that from happening, but the replacement machine was so lame and feeble that it just wasn't rinsing ANYthing properly, no matter how many times I put it through the rinse cycle. All it was doing was destroying my clothes, a little at a time, leaving them progressively more gray, dingy and damaged.
So I finally gave up, and eventually found someone who let me borrow his machine for about 6 months. When that stopped being an option, I tried *another* friend, who said I could come use their machine any time I liked, but they live 45 minutes away and are in the process of a massive remodel, and the first load I did there was fabulous, except - it all smelled of drywall dust. Sigh.
I'd been hunting around for a laundromat for a long time (since the old washing machine died), but every one I visited was so overwhelmingly toxic that I'd have a headached within seconds of walking into the place. Sneezing, eyes burning, etc. Just not worth it. Plus the idea of any of that touching my skin, or trying to sleep on sheets with that smell - I've been struggling with this for 30 years, ever since I first had a reaction to fabric softener in college.
It's never really let up, and was compounded during my architect years by 10 years of working in (what I'm pretty sure was) a 'sick building'.
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