Here they are.....
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I Deserve Love?
"Live like you deserve to be loved."
It's like I am reading another language. I just don't get it. For a long time I didn't understand how one did that. Live like you deserve to be loved. Baffles the mind. Well, my mind anyway. Looking at many of my recent self discoveries, I think I know why it is so hard for me to understand. I don't feel like I deserve to be loved. Maybe that is a bit of tragic self loathing, but it is an honest feeling.
And here enters that tragic ass hole, again.
Damn this caricature, this tragic me. My biggest challenge as of late has been trying to pinpoint the source of my unfounded bullshit belief that I am no good, that I don't deserve to be loved. This same fucker that forces his way into my head and emotions and threw away my marriage. When the options were laid out, I could have worked at it, talked it out, perhaps even recognized that my life was good, really good. I had a beautiful wife, a house, a dog and a cat. My job is stable, more or less. I have a great family and some really close friends. So what the hell do I have to bitch about. I am loved. Why don't I feel I deserve it?
I am a real ass sometimes. Here I am with this semi-charmed kind of life and I seem to enjoy taking a sledge hammer to it and rocking the foundations whenever I get a chance. I have to add fuel to my fire of self deprecation so that I can never get too comfortable or actually experience happiness or contentment for too long.
So, here is a real clincher, a doozy of a fuck job on my life.
One of the sparks that ignited the gunpowder used to decimate my marriage was a woman (how cliche). Though our relationship did not enter the "inappropriate" during my time in that house with my wife, she awakened feelings in me that I had been squashing down for quite a while. She was a passionate woman and she awoke that passion in me. Suddenly, I needed something more than what I had. I felt like I was the unhappiest man alive - but I felt like I deserved to be happy, to have that passion that had been on simmer for too long, which is a good thing in some ways. Don't we all deserve to be happy?
After my marriage broke up, this woman and I found something pretty powerful together for a short while. I was legitimately happy. But the shadow of guilt has an amazing ability to block out any and all rays of sun. Guilt rained on me with gale force winds. I threw this new relationship away because I couldn't stand the guilt. I didn't deserve to be loved by this woman, or anyone. I was a liar, since I couldn't tell anyone about this woman for fear of disapproval. I had smashed a loved one's life to pieces. My family and friends didn't even know who I was anymore. I was piling shit upon the trash I was using as an excuse for being depressed.
I don't really know why I did what I did. I followed my heart without referring to my brain (which my father wisely warned me about). Thanks to my destructive nature in terms of my own happiness, I have a mountain to dig through to figure out what my damn problem is. I can be a real douche bag sometimes.
There is an epidemic in my life, a pattern that has messed with me for a long time.
I have spent a long time blaming anything else but myself for the things I do. My father, my astrological sign, my age, my upbringing, and the list goes on. I have had the epiphany, recently, and have discovered who is actually to blame for the storm inside my head.
Me.
All the bad feelings and pain and guilt and promiscuity and depression and sadness and happiness and laughter and crying are on me. It is so easy, and often encouraged in our society, to blame everyone else for the shit we go through. But the only one who controls what we do and feel is the person doing and feeling. I realize this now and life has a different shade to it. Things aren't so bad when we take control of our actions. Sure, we can't blame others for the fucked up things we do. That is motivation to stop doing stupid things. Being an Aries is no excuse for being an asshole.
Once I realized this I also realized why I had such a hard time with the quote. I have done some things that aren't so nice, some of them fairly recently. When we shove the blame onto any number of excuses, we don't actually get rid of anything. It still sits and brews within us and whispers unhappiness into our ears every day. I am tired of feeling crappy about myself, so I need to take responsibility for what I do. If I mess up, I will acknowledge it and fix it and move on.
The best thing I have ever read was in the book "The Joy of Living" by Yongay Mingyur Rinpoche. The most powerful line for me said that we are all already perfect, we just have to clear out the debris to see it.
Live like I deserve to be loved.
I'm working on it.
The Greener Grass
I may be more guilty of this than anyone. New is like a drug. The problem with new, is that "I" am always involved. The issue with fleeting moments of excitement is that when it is all over, this guy is waiting on the other side.
It is unfortunate that new thrills and travels and new stuff doesn't really bring happiness on any sort of long term level. That stuff is easy to do. Okay, I'm depressed so I am going to jump from an airplane - depression cured. Sorry. It doesn't work that way. Boredom does not cause unhappiness. That is caused by something much deeper. You.
I have a friend who believes that moving somewhere new and getting a new job and a new start will bring her happiness. She believes that a new relationship could be the key to whatever is missing. I used to think this way too. But again, the problem remains that no matter where you go or who you are with, you are there. Since you are the source of your unhappiness, moving or getting a new job will not cure anything on a long term basis. Until you find that happy person that you really are, it doesn't matter where you go.
I have always looked on the other side of the fence and stared longingly at the green grass I wasn't standing on. It has been a self inflicted curse for the majority of my prepubescent to adult life. When I was in grade school I believed that I was unpopular because of the people I hung out with. It was never my fault. Well, truth be told, I don't know that I was all that disliked at all. When my best friend moved away for a while, I thought that I would be skyrocketed to popularity. It didn't happen. I was still who I was, but minus a really good friend. This blame thing continued for many years.
My unhappiness was the fault of everyone else.
The eye opener for me was when I used to blame my misery on my wife. She was holding me back. She was making me mad. It was all her fault. The black pit inside of me was her doing. Of course, she knew none of this because, like I said before, I never talked. It wasn't until a month or so after I left her that I had "the breakdown" and realization that all of my depression was on me. If our marriage failed, it wasn't just her, it was me. If I was unhappy about work, it was because I wasn't pursuing my dreams. I am more miserable now then I ever was with her. Sure we had problems, but they didn't have anything to do with why I was not happy being me.
The depression lives inside of me. I have to deal with it in order for it to go away. Buddhist thought says that acknowledging the sorrow and letting it go will lead to happiness. This is a much simplified example, but the idea is there. The emotions that drag us down only have the power we give them. This goes for people too. The only people that can hurt us are the ones we give the power to. Through practice and meditation, we take the power away from the emotions and the outside world and begin to find some semblance of peace within ourselves. Believe me, this is easier said then done. For me, the outside world is easier to shrug off then the emotions. When you live inside your head like I do, emotions create the world. But, as I step outside of my head and begin to see things more clearly, I find myself a little bit happier.
Once I began to take responsibility for myself and for what I was doing, everything seemed a little easier to manage. Since I was the only one who was making myself miserable, and the only one capable of doing so, I can take control. When it was the fault of everything else in the universe, it was out of my hands. The only thing I can control is me. It is also true that in this realization comes a ton of responsibility. I used to blame being an Aries on my behavior. I can't do that anymore. It has created some new guilt, but as I deal with that I can see that by correcting my behavior I can stop doing the things that caused the guilt. I have control.
With all of that in mind I see that doing new things and experiencing the greener grass is not a source of happiness, but a source of new things and greener grass. It is what it is. The happiness is up to me.
Finding the Love
This creates quite the conundrum for a person like myself. I tend to draw my own happiness from making others happy, but since I am not happy I can't make others happy which in turn prevents me from being happy and on and on and on. This little cycle is especially prevalent in my life as it is right now. Thanks to my hasty and generally stupid decisions as of late, I am damn near miserable and have made quite a few others unhappy as well.
So, how to stop this cycle?
I have tried the Buddhist thought that we are all perfect but we can not see it. Generally speaking, this has worked for me on a temporary basis. I will be all well and good for a bit and then it all goes to shit. But I like the idea. In terms of spirituality, that kind of thought is very uplifting. It also puts the responsibility of your own happiness on you. If you don't think you are a good person, it's your fault. Change your thoughts. Clear the clouds to see the sun.
I also like the idea because it gives the hint of something good. It's within your reach, because it is already there.
I think the biggest realization that has come to me was that my pain is my own. "My pain is self chosen," or so the song goes. When I find myself getting down and beating myself up, it can help to think that all of the negative feelings I am experiencing are the product of my own mind. Of course, after 33 years it is hard to simply let them go, but I am working on it.
Every day I am trying to break my habit of living in my head. There is a whole world out there that I have been missing because I live in the world of my dark and depressing mind. I used to have whole conversations in my head instead of having them with the people I needed to have them with. This is obviously not healthy or productive in any way. I have lived a huge portion of my life in my head. Again, not healthy or productive. It might be different if my world was a happy place, but it tends to be pretty negative which then spills out into the real world. It is frustrating to say the least.
Clouded in Guilt
This may be the single worst emotion available in the human lexicon of emotion. It sits like a knot in my chest, choking out any chance of seeing things for what they are. My vision is clouded and distorted. My friends are strangers, my family ghosts. A diamond is coal. What do I have to give? Nothing. What do I have? Nothing.
Guilt.
My world is a wasteland.
I was recently in a relationship of sorts. It was ugly. Fighting and yelling and hurt feelings everyday. But there were spots of sunshine and something beautiful. Like really beautiful. The simple presence of each other was air, breath. Separation caused storms of anxiety. It was like being burned by the sun, wishing it away and when the clouds rolled in, all you want is to see the sun again. There is no respite. Burn or freeze. The thoughts of that sun in someone else's life may as well be a shovel for a grave.
This must be heartbreak. The thing I always passively aggressively pursued and I now have. Some days I want to die.
I am melodramatic.
I am finding it interesting that I want everything I don't have, throw away what I get, and want it all back again.
This little relationship of sorts came to a halt recently. Fighting and crying and pills. The rest of the world sees that it was unhealthy and I did too. Now I only see it as gone. I miss her touch and her warmth. I don't sleep in my bed because I smell her. It was destructive, that relationship. I drank and wallowed in my self pity and sickness from the things she said. When things were good for a few days she would tell me that I wanted to bang chicks. Back to zero. I felt horrible at the end. Suicidal at times, knife in hand, I would be certain it would be easier. In the beginning, it was sitting at sunset watching the colors of the sky turn to fire.
Both of her hands fit into one of mine.
It was guilt that started the knife moving into our chests. I couldn't escape it. I shoved her out of the line of fire, but she kept coming back.
How do you deny love?
I destroyed her.
I destroyed me.
I am lonely now. I think of others and see her in their shadow. Then I see the storm over head when I begin to approach. Maybe I need to leave, run away.
I am weak.
I wonder how much of my loss is her body. Her closeness. Her attention. I love her. No question. But we destroy each other. How do you get around that?
Lost in Stockholm
I cry, a lot. Like a little kid, blubbering and sobbing and being an all around emotional mess.
I miss her.
Till I have her.
Then I miss me.
Till I have only me.
Then I miss her.
I have a habit of ripping my heart from my chest and tossing it in the trash. I wish it would stay there. I would rather not feel. Feelings are causing confusion.
She opened my heart. Caused me to feel. Now I feel all the time. Why is it always so bad?
I don't understand why I feel so good when I am with her in my memory. Even when I remember the bad times, of which there were plenty, I don't care. I don't care about the pills or manipulative jealousy when I don't have her here with me. I only think about the way she would laugh without changing her face. I think about the way she would run around crazy and come back to me and take my hand. As long as I was where she wanted me, it was fine.
Which makes sense.
I told her once that she only wanted me to be happy if it was with her. She agreed. Is that okay?
I used to say no.
What is it about her that holds me? I can't move forward. I want to. Then I see a picture of her. She is beautiful. No arguing that.
I think I keep killing it because I can't face what it would mean if I were to admit what I really felt. What I really feel is shrouded in the guilt of feeling it. What I really feel is strangled and choked under the weight of what I believe the world wants from me.
I am weak.
I used to think she was weak, but she held on through all of my storms. I don't know why. She says it's love. Is it? Isn't it?
I long to remove my heart and lock it away. It would be safer that way. I am tired of feeling and being human if being human means I feel the way I do.
I would trade it all for just a little peace of mind.
I am going to make a beast out of myself. It gets rid of the pain of being a man.
Facing the Addiction
She is what I want.
She is what everyone wants.
Weak and powerless, I face her. Every kiss is shot in the veins, a sweet warmth that fills me, satiates me, takes me away. When I fight against her, the trip takes a bad turn, walls start melting around me, anxiety becoming my name.
For a long time I didn't tell anyone about her. Sneaking our love in daily doses I fell apart and was washed away in her emotional tidal waves. It was a dirty secret, one that threatened to bury me.
I walked away. Just not far enough.
She is my addiction and like any addict I can't sit in the same room with her or I begin to feel the cravings rise up inside me. Trapped like an animal, I salivate at the thought of sliding insider her, her words slipping into my brain sending me floating on bliss.
I thought I could handle it this time, but I can feel the need closing in again threatening to consume me.
Does she do it, or is it me? Am I my own dealer?
My thoughts, once clear, begin to cloud over. I have taken too much. I need to take a step away. Let my soul detox from the emotions she stirs up inside me. It used to be guilt of being with her that was destroying me. Now it is guilt of needing to turn away from her. Confusion is the name I take when I enter her. I can't leave her, though I know I should. It was too ugly last time. I can't stay with her. I know that we aren't forever.
She deserves forever, doesn't she?
She has taken steps to find herself. Our last attempt at fucked up love nearly killed her. She knows that now. She dates. She talks. She flirts. I don't care - then I care again. I walk the thin ice over an ocean of jealousy and soul rotting emotions.
She is finding her path. Her way is lit by hope but shadowed by me. She needs to stay out from under me. I need to be on top of her or I can't breathe.
They tell me to get away and stay away. Like it's that easy.
Does the addict riddled with punctured veins just turn around and roll down his sleeves?
She is my air.
She is my drug.
I am addicted again, only this time I see light amidst my drug induced haze.
Ignorance is bliss. Knowledge is confusion.
I have lost my name.
Waking From Dream
A choice has set my mind to maturity. I chose to pursue something with the woman I write about, my drug or maybe my prescription.
Is she an answer and not a question?
I am scared. Fear is sitting in my chest, but not just of her. I do not fear her, but fear her hold over me. She has only the power that I give her, but I give her a lot and I give it willingly. I fear my friends and family as well. What will they think or say? I would like to believe that it will be all support and love, but there will be anger as well. They have seen what she can do to me and what I can do to her. They see the destruction that we can cause, but they don't see the flowers. They have only seen the mushroom clouds because I have only given them an idea of an idea of her, a glance through shaded window.
If I prayed, I would pray that they give me a chance and that I have the strength to tell them with honesty. They are good, but even the best would be angry to see a friend running on hot coals hoping to not get burned.
But I love her. I will tell them.
Perhaps she will set me in motion beyond my thoughts. I may be able to begin living some semblance of life. It will be slow going for me. She says she is okay with that. I pray that she is. But as I move forward I am beginning to see the trash around me. Irresponsibility when I had no purpose has left me in a messy room. Time to clean up.
Money, job, bills, friends on the wayside, family in the blind.
I am tired of mess. I am actually just really tired. I thought I could grab a nap, but life has other ideas. I could use some sleep, a lot of it, but maybe staying awake for a while longer will stop me from missing the show.
Finding the Why
But, how do you let go? How do you let go of emotions and memories that changed your life, made you who you are? I can't remove an arm and still be whole. I can't take out my heart and leave the emotions on the floor where I set it. The pain and the crying and the happiness and laughing and the sleeping and waking and daily blah blah blah are part of me. They always will be.
I spoke to my ex wife yesterday amidst a storm of shit and hale. She is good, moving along and finding her way. I am lost in the weeds that have grown over the grave of my life. How does that work? I left and she is happier than I. I don't want to take that from her, I never would. She is a good person and a strong woman and deserves all of the sunshine she can muster. Perhaps that is why she is happy. She sees that. She can see that whatever treats she can find amongst the cluster of fuck are there to help her.
She does have one advantage over me, though. She doesn't have to forgive herself.
I can't take a step forward without doing that one little thing. As little as it is, it is the single hardest thing I have ever had to do. I find it hard to forgive myself for nuking
It doesn't seem to matter the ropes dropped down, either. For all the helping hands and supportive words, I am the only one who can find my way. I have found friends amidst all of this. Great friends. And I can't ever truly show my love for them and for what they have done for me. I don't know where I would be without them. I might not have set the knife down next to the bottle. But they can't make the journey for me. I have to do it. I'm not scared, I just don't know how many times I can press reset without getting tired of starting over all the time. Each time I falter, I find it harder to love myself. I forget why I even want to try. Without loving me, all I see will always be shrouded in something I can't cut through.
Now I know. What's the next step? Doing it, I suppose.
"We have to forgive our fucking selves. No one can do it for us."
- Hank Moody
The Icarus Complex
It wasn't all that long ago that I had the taste of something amazing. At the risk of sounding like an over romantic ass hole, I felt alive. I don't know that words can really explain it. If you have ever felt like every step was a cloud, like your heart could explode from your chest and you are filled with wonderful agony and bliss with every breath, then you will know the feeling. I am not pretending that it will be just like that again, but I can hope. There is nothing wrong with hoping.
The hole that I have torn into my soul has begun to heal. There is fear and trepidation in my voice, but I want to find love on my tongue again. Is it too soon? Maybe. But I find a new strength in myself. Upon the rubble of my life I am picking up the foundation one stone at a time. I set one down and find the next. At this point, I can only begin to climb up again. If there is a deeper hole than the one I have been living in, I would rather stop breathing than to see how far down it goes.
I am scared. I can not live in fear anymore. I have always been afraid.
Afraid to get "old"
Afraid to be hurt
Afraid to lose myself
I walk a few steps and take a breath. I would like to believe I can turn my back on living that way. I can do it one step at a time. My tendency to take off running pulls at me like a dog on a leash. I resist. I practice patience. I breathe. I take a step. I breathe. I can see the edge of the cliff ahead of me and know that when it comes time to step off the edge, I will either watch my wings spread and fly or see them melt around my shoulders.
But, I won't live in that fear.
The Breached Hull
I am still looking to the future.
I am still looking to the future.
I am still looking to the future.
I can't even write my heart any more. The integrity has been breached. Now what to do?
I find myself subconsciously editing.
I must get over it.
This is my only outlet.
I am hurting today.
It's more like a gentle ache that had become familiar for quite a while now. It is circling my soul, but not ready to land and tear my gentle flesh. I won't allow it. Shoo, vulture. My pain is not yours anymore. I own it. I control it. I will help it grow into something beautiful.
A simple pain grows quickly amongst the dried twigs on my soul. Nothing burns on low. It's a ravaging fire at all times, or it is a calm ocean with only possibility in front of me.
I am working to getting my head turned around to face the open horizon. To see the gentle hand. To move forward again.
maybe I am just tired.
I could use a nap.
Sleep is my friend.
I wonder what
Weeding the Garden
I am not a jealous person unless I really care about a person. Then it burns in my chest, a constant pressure of heat and pain boiling in my blood and feeding my brain with dreams and visions and anxiety.
Next to guilt, jealousy sits as queen of shit.
Today I am floundering under a flood of both.
I don't always know how to ask for forgiveness and when I have asked for it, I don't always understand why I don't get it. I know that I am thick when it comes to emotions and feelings. Maybe this is why I don't understand. Trust comes easily for me, but it isn't that way with everyone and I have to realize this. There are times when I deserve to be punished for my lies. I accept that.
How can I apologize and make it mean something?
I lied. Again.
It has torn at my soul for a while now. I admitted to my lie and felt relief for that, but then felt guilt for lying instead of not telling the truth, if that makes sense.
A lie is a constant cycle of self deprecation.
I'm not going to lie anymore.
My heart is aching today. Under the weight of a lie released and of jealousy and anxiety it is suffocating. She is having a hard time forgiving me, not of my lie (at least I don't think), but of the actions of the lie. It is hard when you know that someone you love has touched another, whether you were with them or not. I know this. Dreams and visions project onto my world in a display of hardcore torture porn. It is not easy. My chest is a hole.
So I can imagine that her world is hard right now. I wish I could help her, make it all blue and clear.
I am an ass, though. I find it hard to see past my shit to see how it is all affecting her. Is this wrong of me? I just want this chance that we have been given to work, for at least a minute. I thought she wanted that too. She said she did, but that was old-her.
As she said, the world is against us. Or maybe I said that. I don't know. I think it is more a case of we are against us.
I see her texting and I want to scream and rage as jealousy fills my brain. Sometimes I see the names on messages when her phone lights up. I turn away as it isn't my business. Or is it? I don't know. I don't know much these days. When I do feel like I know something, it crumbles away like an old photograph that hasn't been taken yet.
I am trying. I don't know how to do more.
I have forgiven. I can't do anymore.
I can only wait. The end will go one of two ways.
I feel like she is starting to be finished. I cry. I really thought we had a chance.
It's all so hard. I thought love was easy to slide in to, like a warm bed.
I guess not.
Maybe it's more like having lived your life deprived of food and you are used to hunger pangs. So you work to grow a garden and bring it to life and watch it overflow so that when you finally eat, you feel you can never be dissatisfied again as long as you water and weed your garden. And sometimes insects will destroy your fruit. As long as you can kill each of them, you can grow again. If you can't.....
Or maybe it's all shit.
Sorry for that turn, but devil's advocate is always in my shadow.
I have no answers. Only hopes and anxiety and the true anguish that is love.
She is All
It is her passion
her wild eyes
the way she makes the world live with every breath she takes.
When she sleeps, she twitches in my arms
When she opens her eyes she smiles the sunshine
She is the hand that stirs the silt and the current that washes it away.
When she places her hand on my neck, kisses my lips
or holds me as I cry from words delivered from her tongue
the world makes sense for a brief moment.
She is the sun and the storm
the rain and the blaze.
with every word that raises me up
there is a look that can break me down
she is agony and bliss
she is torture and release
she is everything and nothing
and in all of this, she is love.
Power in Words
I have spent a morning in near agony from my dreams and ungrounded visualizations.
With three words she takes the anxiety away. I have given her power over my heart and I don't know if this is good or bad. Imagining the repercussions is mind blowing. With a look she can crush me. With a word she can leave me in a desert and destroy my hopes in love.
Is it wise to grant this power to a single person? Is it possible to stop myself? Could I take it away if I wanted to?
I don't know any of these answers for sure, but I feel like it is no. So why do I? Why does anyone?
Love?
Possibly.
It is hell and heaven, agony and bliss.
I am at a loss. I feel like a child, a baby trying to learn to speak so I can say I am hungry or scared or cold. The romantic poets were all right. Love is terrible.
I live and die and breathe and suffocate and starve and feed and bleed and heal all at the drop of a word or a look.
There is so much aching in my heart. I would like to put a door on my chest so I can take it out and set it down when I need to and put it back in place when I am ready to feel again. Then her eyes couldn't break it or glue it back together again.
I am so tired. Mentally, emotionally, spiritually. Tired.
A moment's rest is all I need. A moment's reassurance that after this Winter there will be a Spring.
Are there flowers under the snow?
My Personal Cthulu
It stops me from taking deep breaths. My heart feels like it might explode from my chest. All of it is ungrounded, or is it? When you know that there are shady things happening, is it silly to feel paranoia or jealousy?
I know that the best thing to do is to talk it out. And talk I will, though it is hard for me.
I don't talk.
I lock it up and wait for it to die.
It never dies. It just waits. Eventually, it will rise up and destroy me....again.
It haunts my dreams forcing me into an ugly mood from the moment I wake.
I dream of blank faces, but they have names of people I know even though those names are never spoken. They come in and out of a room where she is and she sits on their laps or holds their hands or kisses their mouthless faces. The whole time, she is talking to me. I can't walk in the room. I can't move but slowly, almost frame by frame. It is agonizing.
A man in
I hate when you can feel something slipping away and aren't sure what to do about it. I am me. I do what I do. Isn't that good enough?
Buddhism teaches us to let go of the negative emotions that swirl in our brains. Acknowledge and let it slip away. I am trying that. It is not easy when it is the only emotion that I am feeling.
I have no power. I have no control. I have thrown myself to the winds like a kite on a string attached to a hand that can let go at any moment.
I will not survive the year. Not as the man I am. Something big is going to happen soon. I can feel it. It will change me. I feel like my skin will become stone.
Survival. We do what we must to survive.
I feel kind of silly.
These are my problems. I don't run from bullets or fear exploding people day to day. I have food and shelter. I have friends and family.
These are my problems.
Money and an aching heart.
I have it pretty good, actually.
This seldom visited blog is my savior. This virtual wall filled with my ridiculous rantings of vomited honesty is a life line.
I have it pretty good actually.
Walking to Frisco
I can feel something slipping from the precarious perch on which it was set.
As amazing as it is, I am surprised that I feel this way. Ready to give it a real chance, able to see that the world doesn't really give a shit who I spend my time with, it feels like there isn't a future. I am not ready to believe it though. I can't. I have to believe that there is something, even if it is just for a minute. I have been through fucking shit, wading knee deep in misery and depression. Now that I can finally see a ray of sunshine through the looming clouds over head, how can I possibly believe that love is going to dry up with all the puddles.
Now I sound like her. She says things now that sound like me.
It seems unfair that at a moment of clarity and decision has led to a complete turnaround. Is it possible that two people are always meant to be on the opposite side of a merry-go-round constantly moving in the same direction to get to each other?
I miss the way we would hold on.
People change
We have to or we don't grow
Our love was born of fire, can it survive without?
Did our meeting have a purpose or was it all coincidence?
I want to believe that we found each other so that we could remember that there is love and passion in us. I want to believe that something else is there. That can't be all it was.
Or can it?
Does the universe play cruel games on us? Does it even care enough to do so?
Why so many questions with so few answers?
I want peace of mind.
I want to know what is happening to me.
I want to know how I can walk away from long time and still want to live with myself.
I want to know why I have to write everything to be able to see it.
I want to know why I am 33 and still wandering amongst the trees, lost like a foal covered in spots and barely standing on shaking legs.
I want to walk to Frisco and sit on the ocean where the answers to life are laid out in the waves and sparkle of the sun. Sitting on the beach, a hand would find mine. It would be a hand that I would accept without fear. It would be a hand that understood and accepted. It would be a hand that would shut my mouth when I was being an idiot and stroke my hair when I was in need. It would be a hand that I would take with me to all my fucked up places and that I would follow to all the places it led. Maybe I already have that hand.
I want to know if we have a chance.
I want, I want, I want. I sound like an asshole.
Someone needs to beat my ass. I doubt it would be too hard to find someone to do so.
Our Self Sabotage
I don't think it is scary for all the reasons that we always say it is. It's not the fear of being held down and not kissing anyone else for the rest of your life. I think that it is the fear of failing at being married.
A friend told me he was scared that he would do something stupid. He is afraid that he will amongst the 60% (or whatever ridiculous number it is) that get divorced.
I was never afraid of failing because I protected myself with a 5 year plan. If after 5 years I wasn't happy, I would move on. I put up a shield to protect me from the fear of failing. I knew I was going fail. In that "knowing" I made a choice. In that choice I also made the choice to never really be "married." We were two people living a parallel life. I had control. I always have to have control. She had no idea, or maybe she did and was okay with it because she was scared too.
I told him that failing was a choice. If your marriage didn't work out, it was a choice. Life is not against us. It is for us. We are against us. Humans have no natural predators. We are at the top of the food chain. Nothing is trying to sabotage us except us. If you give yourself to your wife fully and she to you, you can't fail. I have married friends. They find a way to make it work. They fight and the are mad and the scream and things are thrown and said and people are hurt, but they heal. They are brave.
To let it go without a fight is cowardly.
I was a coward.
Maybe it's different when you actually hate the person you are married to.
I told him that if he ever contemplated divorce, he should hit himself in the nuts a dozen times and multiply that pain by a million. Even then he would not get close the pain he would feel after seeing the face of his wife as he walked out the door. I have spent the past months drinking, taking pills and contemplating suicide on a daily basis.
I will never forget that face. Every time I see it behind my eyes, I die a little. It isn't as hard as it once was. It has taken nearly a year to realize that I have to move forward. I am. I can't go back. Things will never be the same. Sure, I miss being a poppet or having treats or tea (I miss it a lot, actually) but that is gone. I crumpled it up and threw it away. There isn't any going back to pick it up and smooth out the wrinkles. A good friend told me that, a couple actually. Another person told me that it was okay to make new memories. That is the hardest part. But I will try and get there eventually.
Marriage is a big deal. Not the institution, but the emotion. The institution is a crock, a piece of paper, a tax break, a way to allow a loved one to see you if you are dying in the hospital. Marriage the emotion is real. It is two souls sharing a life, perhaps longer if you believe that kind of thing.
Marriage is scary. But not because you won't ever fuck another person. It is scary because you might fail. It is scary because you might not. You might actually be happy.
I know for me, that was one of the hardest parts.
I also know that I would never have learned what I have learned if things hadn't happened the way they did. Perhaps I will grateful for the lesson in 5, 10 or 20 years.
I learned that I am scared and immature, a controller, a child with a peter pan complex. I care what the world thinks more then what my loved ones think. I have learned much. I am growing.
It is unfortunate that my biggest mistake was my greatest lesson.
Hopefully, he won't follow that path. Sometimes, the people who love you can show you all the same things minus the self deprecation and thoughts of suicide.
Tired and Old
I don't feel like I should, though.
The past year has seen me fuck up a number of relationships, turn my back on the advice and caring of friends, take a turn attempting to destroy myself, and walking out of a life that was good into a future that has been shit up to fairly recently. I have seen close buddies fade into a clouded background. I have seen the face of a woman I love filled with confusion, sadness and loss. I have jumped into a relationship, scrambled to get free only to slip again. I have seen a woman I love go to huge extremes to get my attention.
I have loved and hated.
I have screamed and cried.
I have walked and run.
I have been overflowing with regret.
I have grown.
Rebuilding should be deserved, right?
Do I deserve it?
Does anyone?
Live like you deserve to be loved.
To do this you have to feel like you deserve it. With all of the shit that I have shat into the world over the past months, I find it hard to believe I do.
But this is that tragic me speaking. When I discovered him, we talked and I realized he is a dick. But I let him back in for a while. He is on vacation today. Maybe he will stay away.
I am tired.
Tired of fighting. Tired of ups and downs. Tired of super happy and terribly sad. I want that gray area now. I'm not going to fight fate anymore. What will be will be and I will drift along on this river of life where the currents take me till I see something I must paddle towards.
No more merry-go-round.
I'm too old for those.
There was a time when I went with the flow. I was happy then. I went after the few things I wanted, but never placed expectation on life.
Life cares very little for what you expect.
I liked that path, that branch of the river. The rapids are short, but exciting. It's the calm flow that is the best. With the people I love floating beside me.
I might actually be ready now.
Today I stand on a precipice that I have stood upon before. Straight ahead and below is unknown. It is filled with good and bad and uncertain. Behind is known. It is filled. 10 months of shadows and shit have faded all my photographs. For all the good memories I have, the pictures have all turned to black. How easily the sun drops away. I can go back to feeling like that. Or I can wipe the dust and wreckage away, take what I need and dive into the mist below.
Feeling like shit every day is getting to be tired and old.
I don't know in what direction I will step. I feel like jumping, but don't know if I will. I like the familiar. It is comfortable even as it kicks you in the nuts.
One step at a time. The edge is always there. I will know when I am ready.
Sat Chit Ananda
I would like to believe that we don't have to make any, really. I have had friends that gave up friends to be with a woman because she didn't like them. But aren't friends a part of who we are? They make up our past. They make up a part of us.
I have set a friend aside for love.
Does this make make me bad or wrong? My father told me that with every decision comes a cost. The cost that I am paying to make this thing move forward has been to cease talking to a woman who was a good friend to me. No one asked me to. I just did it in an attempt to smooth things over. This friend was a part of the lie that I told.
She is being punished because I lied. How is that fair?
It's not really.
As I was going through the emotional process of my divorce, the friend was there for me to talk to. She was an experienced ear, since she had been through what I was going through. She asked for nothing in return. I also listened to her when she needed a friend.
Then there was a drunken night.
Now all is fucked because I lied about it.
I am completely clueless here. I don't know what the right answer is. I have made my decision to move forward with a relationship, but in doing that I feel like I have to give another relationship up, a friendship. Is that true, is it real? Is that my cost?
It was my choice as all things in my life are. Choices. In times like these, I would like to be in a culture where choice is not something you have to worry about.
I can feel some guilt crawling up again, but not like it used to. Instead of devouring my thoughts, it is simply whispering in my ear. I must be getting stronger. I am looking forward to the future. I know that I will have to make sacrifices to get there. Maybe this is one of those. I feel bad for hurting someone. I don't like doing that. What are my other options?
One of my growing pains has been the removal of the blinders that I typically put on when I am making choices. In doing this, I see the destruction that I leave around me as I barrel forward in this fucked up life. I also see that there is no other way. Joseph Campbell said, "Sat Chit Ananda", or existence, consciousness and bliss - which he translated to "follow your bliss." He said that in doing so, others will be hurt by your choices or they may not agree with them or they may tell you that you are wrong or stupid. This is the nature of the beast.
What I want or believe is not what you want or believe and that is fine. I love you for you and your choices are yours whether I agree with them or not. I may be hurt or I may disagree. Those are my choices.
Now I must find my honesty and hold on to it. Honest with me. Honest with you.
So I will sacrifice and sometimes it will be a popular decision and sometimes it won't.
It is hard to realize that not everyone will like you or agree with you.
How is it that I am just seeing that now?
Is Mature Old?
Not in the sense that I will age, but that I will mature and become that man who works and sleeps and works and sleeps. The guy that has kids and a wife and pays bills and mows the lawn on the weekend scares me. I used to see my married friends doing that and wondered how they could find happiness in any of it. It all seems so routine.
But I like routine.
So, what's the problem?
I don't know.
I believe that one of the reasons I left my marriage was because I was afraid of losing myself, of sacrificing my identity. The fucked up part is, I don't know who I am. What is this identity that I am afraid to lose? No one asked me to be something that I wasn't, but I created some kind of fear that wouldn't allow me to be married.
A college professor of mine told stories of the way he and his wife were married, but were living their own lives. To a 20 year old with massive commitment issues, this was the Shangri La of relationships. Looking back, I don't know how that was a marriage. It seems to me now that a marriage is the joining of two lives not the parallel living of two people who are scared to truly commit. That commitment is part of being in a mature relationship (I think). In our society, it is expected.
Men are expected to date and woo and marry and have a job and a wife and a house and mow lawns and fix plumbing and all that cliche stuff. But if you ask a guy if that is what he wants, how many would say yes? Perhaps more, perhaps less then you would think. I don't know.
For a long time I have fought maturity.
But my hair is getting gray.
Maybe it's time to suck it up and find my definition of maturity.
I'm getting tired of feeling lost.
I don't think it is possible to reinvent the wheel here. Nor is it necessary. There are aspects of "getting old" that I wouldn't mind sometimes. The stability and the routine wouldn't be so bad as long as it received a bit of spice from time to time. I am not so sure about the marriage part which means I am definitely not sure about the kids part. I don't see myself marrying again. What's the point? I still view marriage as a piece of paper with some legal benefits.
Maybe this will change. I don't know.
I would like a spicy routine.
I would like a house. I like mowing the lawn and doing some yard stuff. I would like a big dog to lay in the sun while I do yard stuff. I would like to drink iced tea afterward and nap on a puffy couch with a cat curled on my chest.
I would like friends to stop by.
I would like to take vacations.
I would like a career that I love and wouldn't mind doing as I got older and grayer.
For now, those are the things that I would like to see happen as I get "older".
It has always been a challenge for me to answer the "what will you be doing in 5 years" question. It's not so hard now. I will be doing whatever I get off my ass and do. I would like to be a professor in 5 years. That's what I would like. Maybe an author too.
The definition of what it means to be grown up is changing around me. This is good, but it is confusing too. There aren't as many rules that don't bend. The choices are a double edged sword. I guess I have to decide for myself what it means and go with that.
"I only wanted to be 16 and free."
My Self Flagellation
I know that I am no altruist, but I often wonder if any of the things I do have any benefit to anyone but myself. When I have told lies, I would tell myself that I did it for whomever I was lying to. It was for their benefit that they didn't know. I recently filed the paper work to take my wife off of my health insurance. I have dragged my feet on this for a long time because the thought of screwing her out of health insurance burned my heart. But, is that why I did it?
I am not known for my motivated personality. If I can push something off, I do. Is that why I waited? Or did I wait because it was one more thing that reminded me what a piece of shit I can be?
Just the act of taking her off the insurance has set me back a bit. My self esteem has taken a dive. I don't think this is undeserved, though. Do I not deserve to be punished in every way possible?
Am I just beating myself up now?
I find myself on the verge of tears and I don't know if it is because of the words from my ex that bite or from my own shit that crawls back up out of the hole I have attempted to shove it into?
Howdy, Frisco
It would be so much easier to run away. Leave it all behind and grab a fresh start.
I don't really deserve easier. My self flagellation can not begin to reach the level of punishment I should have.
My friends leaving me. My heart being crushed and ruined. The tears that ravage my face. The pressure that stops my breathing. Anxiety. Guilt. Self Hate.
I was always told to take what you want, but eat what you take.
This is what I have taken.
Now I get to eat it.
I am beating myself up now.
I will be better. I shouldn't be. I will be, though. Undeservedly.
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