Sure Things

There is only one thing in life that everyone can count on... death. While this seems morbid, I feel it is important for me to document my fear of life and equally my fear of death. I can't stress enough how my mom's current fight with cancer has impacted my life in this regard. I wake up every morning wondering if I'm going to get the call telling me her fight is over. Thankfully, I've not had to deal with that call yet. Sadly, I am living 3000 miles away from home, and I now live with the fear of never seeing or talking to my mom ever again.

I guess I should have seen this struggle coming from miles away much like a meteorologist sees a hurricane on the radar. I was too consumed with my own self pity and loathing to see how dire things back home were becoming. Moving was a way for me to find a new life in a local where only a handful of people new my name. For some reason, this was very important to me. Getting out of the Seattle area was the only goal I had in live, now I wish I had made different plans. Running away no longer seems like a reasonable way of dealing with my own depression. Then again, I guess this is something I could have only learned from running away.

To some, it may seem like I ran away from something that was pitiful at best. I won't even begin to sway one to see things my way, but running away was, at the time, the only way for me to deal with loss. I felt like everything I had in my life was stripped from my clawing hands without permission. Everything I loved and lived for was gone, dead. The sad truth, the people I loved and very much loved living with went on living without me. This was the most painful thing I've dealt with in recent years. It was much to hard to acknowledge, so I ran away to a place that only felt like home.

This place will never be home, and again, I think this is a lesson I could have only learned from moving. I've learned that home is where you can be yourself at all times (even if that means being crazy and melting down). I don't have that freedom here in North Carolina. The person I live with doesn't allow me the freedom to break down from time to time. I feel like a prisoner in my own life, and now that I'm here, I want to turn around and run home. Running back to mommy and daddy brings pains that I purposefully ran away from. I will have to go back to looking for jobs that might very well find me employed at the same company as my ex, Frank. I can't think of a life worse than having to see him every day. Well, that was until I found out that my mom's fight with cancer was turning into a pointless fight - the cancer will win, I just don't know when.

Now, moving home means potentially causing a terrible situation for my mom. I don't want to cause her pain or strife. I fear that if I move home, I will cause a great divide to be built in our family. Things will go back to the way they used to be with parents picking sides and fights with long silences that seem to never end. This is not the life I want for myself, nor is it the life I want my mom to have. I really can't do that to my mom, so while life might be safer for me if I move home, out of love, I will stay in North Carolina. I will stay here until my mom passes. This of course means that I may never see my mom again. It also means that I am purposefully saying it is ok for my mom to pass away without me near her. I think this is the hardest part for me, but my mom has my sister and my niece. I guess she doesn't need me there when all she ever wanted was time to get to know her granddaughter. when I think about that, it some how becomes easier for me to know my mom's death is closer than I'd like.

Good Times

“These tears are not tears for you! Please – Don’t be so fucking arrogant. I stand here on this ledge not because of what you’re doing to me, but because of what I’ve allowed to you take from me. So go! Leave me here. In the beautiful place we once shared! Just run! Meanwhile, don’t look back. This place will soon be colored the shade of my blood. I will leave myself here where you found me and left me - on this quiet bluff where lightening strikes. Just know, this is where it all ends.”

These were the last words I ever spoke. He took one step which caused me to falter. I had not meant to leave the world that day. At least the day I died was a day to be remembered. The moon was just rising with a perfectly orange colored crescent. The thin sliver that should have been pale was perfectly stained with the acidity of my tears. The world could feel my pain. The willows wept ever deeper to the earth.

“I never meant for you to be dealing with all of this. I’m sorry! Please…”

The rush of the wind was all I could I hear. My heart raced – impact was imminent. “Brace yourself, this is going to hurt.” These words echo loudly in my soul. Oh how rational I was even in death. Never once did I cry out in anger at you. Oh no. I was never angry. I died willingly in the place we met, where we went when things were tough. We spent hours talking about how to love and lose love. There were times we shared tears from fear of having to watch the other die. Oh the Irony.

Was it not I that told you I would be the one to leave this world unexpectedly and due to your ineptitudes? Oh yes. I think we shared many laughs about this. Now, you’re sleeping in our perfectly made bed with another lover. My death, witnessed, wasn’t enough to make you feel. You have my soul. I’m bound to be here for eternity if I must. As if the life we led wasn’t torture enough, I’m bound by love in the afterlife - the sick joys of purgatory. I wish you could hear me now. I’m thinking so loudly. I know how to get to you, the alarm. YES – I have bested you. You may have caused my death, but death cannot keep me from making you know I’m still here. I win. Down for the count you may seem. Just wait. It will all hit you in the face, and like my death, you cannot stop this. Now is the time, 12:16am.

“Beep… Beep… Beep”

With a start I jump to my feet. Could it be I had slept in again!? “I am dead!” were the only words I could muster. My body was sore. I felt as if I had made love with boulders. I lay awaiting the sweet sounds of Sirens for a good ten minutes.

“Beep… Beep… Beep…”

Alright, the Sirens sing. The last cramp is slowly worked from my leg. As I look around the room I begin to feel the pains of not being home. These are lonely times. Times that leave me tripping over my own fears and insecurities. While walking so strait, so tall, and so sure of myself, I wonder how I became so broken. "Cosmically unfair...," your words now echo in my mind - always the master of understatements.

“You know,” I begin my monologue as I stare myself in the mirror “I think I’d still give you everything I have. There are a few things I’ve learned in my short life of 30 years. The most important thing is love. It is the most difficult feeling of all to quantify, and yes, you are so right ‘love is felt differently by every person.’ Of course it is, you fool! Have you really thought of how silly you sound right now? Everyone feels things differently. What I feel will never be what you feel. This is human nature. We are allowed these times to feel free in the comfort of our loved ones. Oh – that would be assuming our loved ones accept our feelings and know we would not give them unless we trusted ourselves to give freely without the expectation of return. I was never so lucky. You never allowed me the chance. Still, you move me in a way that I find myself standing before this mirror sick with love (ugh, the pain. Perhaps vomiting is the only solution?). Oh, where are you now? I’d love to say this to your face. You used to cry for me – for the fear of watching me leave your life. Well, here you go. I’m nothing more than a skeleton. You have put me on this path of proclaimed cosmic unfairness. It is up to me now to do something with it.”

With those last few words, I try to divert the pain of my dream and the loss of love. I do my best to dwell on the amazing night that was had not hours prior. I wish I weren’t so unsure. This time is clearly not the time to be venturing down a road paved with gold. It is, however, so very tempting. I crawled into bed so peaceful and happy. There was a moment. It seemed as if Mars had finally aligned with Venus. Then you blurted out, “Good Times!” oh you. I smile in a way that is seen by only you. It is the smile of someone who knows why these words are spoken.

The implied insecurities are as toxic as my drunken breath. Ok, that’s a lie. I’m not drunk in the technical sense. Could it be a metaphorical feeling - one of drunken freedom? Oh – fuck it all! Let it all go. This will be the end. Perhaps I have finally learned that fighting is only going to get me so far in life, and with life hanging by a thin thread (granted it is spider’s silk I cling to), I will let it all wash over me. These are good times. These are the times in life we learn about ourselves. These are the times that allow us to just dream. Yet, I’m still hanging. My grip getting ever looser, grab me now or watch me fly.

You Ask Me Why

My Weighted Companion Cube asked me today what the point was in dating if the person to be dated wasn’t the “one” or didn’t have the potential to be the “one”. I’ve been thinking in quiet rage for not having an answer. Then it came to me as quick as lightening. We can never know who the “one” will be until we spend an exponential amount of time with the person.

I suppose it goes back to me thinking I had it all figured out with the ‘Stache Master. I looked in his eyes the first day we met. From the base of the escalator I said a silent pray – “please god let me have this one thing in life forever for if you do allow it I will do your bidding without question.” Perhaps I was praying to the devil instead, but I did know in that very moment the ‘Stache Master would walk away with my heart and simultaneously break it.

Knowing what I know today, I cannot say I would not have ventured down the same journey. It would have been so very foolish to walk away. What would have I learned? Nothing! I would have continued life as I did back then never really learning how to trust or love, although I am sad that I did not come out of it the same person. Then again, relationships rarely allow us the chance to ever remain the same while still finding growth. That is the inherent problem of being close to another soul – after a certain amount of time both souls learn to feed off each other and thus changing their very core.

So, I go back to what my Weighted Companion Cubed asked me today, “What is the point of dating”? I would like to think the point of dating is not only to better ourselves but to explore ourselves. One can only hope that along the way they will meet a soul that so touches them as to fuse with their own. This could be considered the “one”, but again, even when we think we have found that soul there is always the chance that life will tear you apart. I think of the song “Origin of Love” when I think of my soul being separated from the “one” I thought would meet me in my grave.

Last time I saw you
We had just split in two.
You were looking at me.
I was looking at you.
You had a way so familiar,
But I could not recognize,
Cause you had blood on your face;
I had blood in my eyes.
But I could swear by your expression
That the pain down in your soul
Was the same as the one down in mine.

That's the pain,
Cuts a straight line
Down through the heart;
We called it love.
So we wrapped our arms around each other,
Trying to shove ourselves back together.
We were making love,Making love.
It was a cold dark evening,
Such a long time ago,
When by the mighty hand of Jove,
It was the sad storyHow we became
Lonely two-legged creatures,
It's the story of
The origin of love.
That's the origin of love.

This quote makes me think almost every second of everyday (yes I have a very busy brain) that nothing is so certain in this world, least of all love. We all have another half – a perfectly paired soul that mirrors our own, but who is to say that we will every find what reflects in ourselves to a T? We can search our whole lives, we can wander this earth trying to “shove ourselves back together”, and we can look through blinded eyes and still never be able to see or feel. Perhaps this is the reason for dating? Perhaps it is this constant searching that makes us so willing to search and search with heartache being the imminent outcome, for even when we find true love it will surly end in one form or another – the most likely meeting your other half six feet deep.

Who am I, Where Did I Go?

I once thought I had a tale to tell - one singular tale. As time progresses, there becomes clarity in my current situation. I have not one tale to tell, but many tales to tell. It seems most logical to explain how I ended up in this turbulent twister I currently reside in, the place, where even I cannot recognize myself. This tale begins some 4 years back with the meeting of one on the Internet. This tale is long and traumatic on many levels, yet it is important to parse through in order to find the soul that somehow was left behind.

I used to be much kinder to myself than I am today. I had taken roughly two years to heal from my last relationship before meeting ‘Stache Master. Granted, my previous relationship was very hard on me personally, perhaps it was harder on my former lover? I shall never really know all the answers to that question. There are many and very few opportunities to find the truth as my former half lays six feet deep. I have been told that he went quickly and pain was not felt, but I wonder still to this day what could have driven him to his actions. I nearly lost my own life the same day he lost his. I suppose that is another story for another time.

The point being, I once cared enough about myself and not as much what others perceived me to be. I acted in my own accordance living for my own beliefs. So, how is it that one relationship, seemingly wonderful and perfect at the surface, could have left me so scared and unsure? This I am not entirely certain of. I do know that I fought hard for the love I felt to exist, but the love was rarely, if ever, truly reciprocated. Today, I feel as if I may have wasted four years of my life, yet at the time of meeting ‘Stache Master, I was so excited to have finally met someone that may have had similar experiences. This can lead to dangerous adventures. Taking a leap of faith and jumping into the excitement without really thinking things through can surely lead to one’s own death.

So my death in this story is metaphorical but still important. It is this death that I need to figure out because I started this journey a very different person. I began with hope and vigor, and now at its end I find myself lost and withdrawn. I was once the life of the party with sparkling eyes and a bright smile. This has all faded into the shadows as I am now nothing more than a meek wall flower. I hope that this journey of purging helps me find where I was lost, for I know it was lost amongst the four years I was with the ‘Stache Master.