thoughts after the storm

the process of letting go is obviously hard for me, but i feel better after having ranted in prose last night.  i remember back in the day people practiced primal scream therapy.  maybe that wasn't such a bad idea.  we have all these pent up emotions and the need to express them.  

when i lived in the country, away from neighbors with just the woods and fields around, i could go outside and scream if the need to do so presented itself.  we all have that need to release what we're feeling but we think we have to act so damn civilized...and we do.  it's that or end up in the psyche ward because someone called the police on us, right?  after coop died i remember walking the road and the corn rows in the middle of the night, soul searching, talking to the "is", trying to find my way in unfamiliar emotional territory.  the freedom of space and the cover of darkness and solitude helped to give me clarity at that time.  

i don't want these feelings.  and all the "think positive" bullshit is just that, bullshit.  so, i'm just trying to figure it all out, process, not so much hide or repress my feelings, but become the observer of them.  i told my therapist i needed to understand myself, why i am how i am and how i can find peace with myself and my life as it is because it actually is what it is. 

i don't want to push people away but i think that's what i do.  i don't want to be a victim to love, but that's what i've become.  so, i think the best thing for me right now is to be alone.  and if i am literally alone now or for the rest of my life, be accepting of that.  and by alone i don't mean living alone, i mean being without the sacredness of an intimate relationship as well as distant from others.  maybe 2020 is just a practice run to help me get it right.  i really like the freedom of living alone, doing as i please even if that entails nothing.  i can eat, sleep, watch tv, read, cook, create, come and go and everything else, as i please.  no schedule and no obligation with the exception of the dogs.  that doesn't mean i don't want an intimate, meaningful relationship or to feel like i matter most to someone.    

it's ironic that i have always felt alone even when surrounded by people and in a relationship.  well, until i met someone truly compatible, someone i felt really got it and got me...which would explain why this feels so difficult right now.  he says he wants to "be there" for me.  trouble is, he really can't be.  given the circumstances that's pretty impossible.  can i call him?  no.  can i see him?  no.  can we be together when we want?  no.  can he truly be there for each other?  no.  there is no freedom or "being there" in the way things are.   there has only been fleeting moments that have left us wanting more.   i don't think wanting these things is wanting too much.  it's not.  we all want that.  sooooo, back to my previous words, i need to accept my life how it is because things may never change.  i need to to cut the cord that tethers me to him and to hope, because that is why i struggle with my own worth and why i struggle on a daily basis.  i am tired of time and my life slipping by and to quote leonard cohen, "waiting for the miracle to come".

countdown

my silent screams.

the things i don't say.

can you hear them?

i say too much.

i don't say enough.

discontentment will always exist

until we choose something...

choose SOMETHING

to make this end!

i'm trying to choose me.

i'm FUCKING trying!

but this endless loop of my heart's desire

keeps overriding my good sense. 

fuck me 

fuck my life

fuck this shit.

tonight i am angry at both of us.

i'm angry over indecision...

your indecision

my indecision

my fucking need for you

your mixed messages

for what we created

for what this is!

i am pull my hair out angry

i am spitting nails angry

i am clenched teeth angry

i am pound my fists angry

and it won't stop the hurting or the wanting.

i am tired of life

tired of loss

tired of endless days of pretending i'm ok when i'm not.

tired of anticipating 

exhausted by thoughts and hopes and disappointment

but i keep hanging on

hoping every day i will feel differently

that i will feel better.

sometimes i do for a moment    an hour.

it never lasts.  

i keep recycling it, all of it...

things spoken, things experienced, 

things felt, things learned.  

i feel too much of EVERYTHING! 

can you feel it?

the anxiousness and anticipation?

all the emotions and thoughts exploding

like a 4th of july celebration?

only it's not pretty fireworks.

it's a fucking time bomb.

boom!

we're all becoming "lighter"

Me: Hello God.

God: Hello...

Me: I’m falling apart. Can you put me back together?

God: I'd rather not.

Me: Why?

God: Because you're not a puzzle.

Me: What about all the pieces of my life that fall to the ground?

God: Leave them there for a while. They fell for a reason. Let them be there for a while and then decide if you need to take any of those pieces back.

Me: You don't understand! I'm breaking!

God: No, you don't understand. You're transcending, evolving.

What you feel are growing pains. You're getting rid of the things and people in your life that are holding you back. The pieces are not falling down. The pieces are being put in place. Relax. Take a deep breath and let those things you no longer need fall down. Stop clinging to pieces that are no longer for you. Let them fall. Let them go.

Me: Once I start doing that, what will I have left?

God: Only the best pieces of yourself.

Me: I'm afraid to change.

God: I keep telling you: YOU'RE NOT CHANGING! YOU'RE BECOMING!

Me: Becoming, Who?

God: Becoming who I created you to be! A person of light, love, charity, hope, courage, joy, mercy, grace and compassion. I made you for so much more than those shallow pieces you decided to adorn yourself with and that you cling to with so much greed and fear. Let those things fall off you. I love you! Don't change! Become! Don't change! Become! Become who I want you to be, who I created. I'm gonna keep telling you this until you remember.

Me: There goes another piece.

God: Yes. Let it be like this.

Me: So... I'm not broken?

God: No, but you're breaking the darkness, like dawn. It's a new day. Become!! Become who you really are!!"

-John Roedel

summery

in maturing i have found that i love harder and break more easily.  one would think the opposite to be true, that we grow more calloused with age.  some do i suppose, but i think that loss has literally broken my heart open.  i feel more, i love more deeply, but along with that i hurt more intensely and cry more easily and more often.  they say the measure of pain one feels is equal to the love they feel.  this seems to be accurate.  and for me it seems each time i fall in love i fall harder.  

one would think after a certain age and two lengthy relationships, the desire for love would fade.  while married i always thought that if my husband died i wouldn't be interested in partnering again.  boy was i wrong.  in less than a year i was living with Mark.  eight years later, when he died, i even told myself that was it.  and it was for awhile.  but eventually i was craving intimacy and affection, so i ended up in a couple of "relationships" that left me feeling used.  then i met Jason.  this was entirely different.  we actually got to know one another and developed a relationship before we met.  he was different (not to mention married) and although i didn't know how i would feel eventually meeting him, i knew i really liked him...a lot. 

my feelings were pretty strong before meeting Jason.  i thought i could handle it, thinking it would never go as far as it did.  but after we met i knew i was in trouble.  i tried diverting my attention, meeting other men and going out on a few dates.  i mean after all, Jason was married and i didn't want to feel the way i did about him.  the problem was that every person i met wasn't Jason.  every man i went to dinner with wanted to see me again and i turned them down.  my ex lovers still wanted to see me.  i turned them down.  (it's funny when i think about it that they were all younger than me.)  i could have had any number of lovers had i wanted that.  there was just one problem...they weren't Jason.  this man had worked his way into my heart so deeply i didn't want anyone else.  it's two years later and i still feel the same.  

never have i been with a man who seemed to cherish me like he does.  and never have i opened up so intimately to a man like i have with him.  i still get butterflies when i think about him or see him.  i still grow weak at the thought of our love making.  he has no idea how hard i've tried to not want more than he could give me, but yet i do.  and i want for him to live authentically, not deceitfully.  sometimes i wonder if he's keeping me on a string or whether i should trust him, but the truth is, i believe his feelings are genuine.  i also think he'll never be happy as long as he's fighting what he really wants.  that is the freedom to be himself (which would also free him up to have time with me without the hassles and burdens that have come with this affair).  

as for me, my desire for him has not changed, but i have let him off the hook.  this is despite the fact that i can't imagine never seeing him again.  this is a decision i had to make for both of us, one i made on more than one occasion but couldn't carry through because the pain of not seeing him was worse than the pain of his coming and going and never knowing anything.  but this time i knew i couldn't continue my cycle of pain no matter how much it hurt to stop the affair.  did i do the right thing?  i have no idea.  i hope so.  i do know it was a risk.  this whole damn affair has been a risk as much for me as for him.  i'm risking losing the man i love forever and he risks losing me forever. and neither one of want that, yet it all depends on the choices he makes and the action he takes, or doesn't take.    

sometimes it all seems so insane, that two people who love each other, want each other and share such a deep and intimate connection are struggling so.  he tells me i have far more influence than i know.  i wish i had enough.  i fear that since i'm no longer chasing him he'll lose interest.  but i have nothing to prove.  he knows how i feel.  i am no longer battling because i am the prize and if he doesn't want me enough to make room for me, then he really doesn't want me.  

my battle now is with myself, no one else.  i have to be willing to let it all go despite the lingering hope i have.  i must live my life for me and hope i can move past this if the end turns out not in my favor.  i do however despise the thought of him accepting less than he wants from life.  i equally hate the thought of doing that myself, but again, the ball is in his court, not mine.  so here we are at an impasse and here we will stay until one of us decides enough is enough.  

 

for Jason

this is the song that keeps running through my head today

then and now

"You were a powerful freakin' woman.

A witch.

A wild, wise woman.

A creatrix.

Your womb was an oracle, your intuition was revered.

You were badass.

You were divine.

FYI: You STILL are."

~ 

Lisa Lister/The Sassy SHE

Kat Shaw Artist

quicksand

thoughts and insecurities

not wanting to feel this need in me

to be loved

to be needed

to be desired

wanting to not know

what i have come to know

about myself 

and love

and how that feels

i was better off

not opening up

not forfeiting my heart

to know love

but it's too late now

i can't undo the knowing

so i fight myself

my feelings and desires

but they don't go away

all that i resist persists

and i sink deeper

i know i must reach out 

in order to save myself

and my sanity

to reclaim the light

that has been hidden

in the mire of doubt 

and self sabotage 

i want to be that woman

i intended to be

and thought i was

the woman who knew her strength

and always always always

managed to pull herself up

i want to live for me

not for another 

but for me!  

i want to be enough

not just for another

but for myself!

i don't expect anyone to save me

that's not how it works

but i must reach out my hand 

ask and accept help this time

to extricate myself

before i am buried alive

sunday morning thought stream

awake, sad, not wanting anything but him.

why does it have to hurt so much?

the world is sick of me.

i am sick of me.

why why why did the universe hand me a gift i'm not entitled to? 

why is fate so cruel?

i don't want another, only him.

why is it we seek and never find anything or anyone to keep?

i have myself and that feels inadequate.  

every time i think i may be ok i find i'm not.

i'm not ok, not ok, not ok, not without him but i can't be ok with him as things are.  god why do i love so hard only to break so hard?  

every day i wait for night to come so i can go to sleep with some shred of hope for tomorrow.  but every day is lather, rinse, repeat.  tonight i can't even go to sleep because the tears won't stop.  

i don't want anyone else, i don't have it in me to want anyone else.  

i am not destined for anyone else. 

i don't want it to be over, i so don't want it to be.  

 how do i live?  how do i even begin to want to? 

Sad Lisa by Cat Stevens

the nearest place to god

 

simple enough