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18 de Febrero 2009
its true
we have been moping around too much lately, so you are right.
i probably shouldn't have thrown that book at you when you said that you want me to stop being so mad at myself.
because i borrowed it from the library--not myself, the book.
and because it is about pneumatology.
and it wasn't a shitty thing to say, even though i said it was,
you are right about that too.
it was the appropriate thing to say and it made me feel shitty,
i was confused about what exactly was shitty in that moment.
not you, not the thing you said, but how i was feeling.
most people who don't know me don't know what they are missing.
most people who do know me don't know what they are missing.
and when they are too busy to worry about it
it becomes easier for me to pretend i have disappeared, that i don't matter.
so in the moment when i should just look at the dearly departed and now returning
and say to him/her (mother, father, brother, sister, lover, friend) loud enough for even my self to hear:
"you should have missed me (i missed you, which should signify to you that i am someone who wants you and if you go away, you are lucky enough--and ought to be grateful-- to have someone hoping you will come back and all the while you are gone you should be thinking about how happy i will be to see you and that should make you hopeful and hungry for me to be hungry for you. that should be enough...
at the very least you needn't be worried that i will lock you out of the house or be cold or be mean so there is no justifying detaching yourself from the possibility and mystery of my love for you. you should be very curious about who i will be when you come home to me, what i have learned in your absence, begging me to tell you why i am so glad you are home, but exactly
and
prying open the story of how the days unraveled in your absence because you happen to know that i want to tell you, if only you would extend a tiny invitation) because i am the only place you get loved like this; i'm the only one who can do it this way, tell you these things, i'm the only one offering and don't kid yourself into thinking you don't need what i have to offer: all that i have to say about who you are to me and who you are to the world around you.
i don't say any of that. instead i keep hoping you will lie and tell me you missed me because in that i hear that i exist in your world, which sets the bar pretty low with regard to what i need from you and perpetuates the cycle of my limping along toward self-awareness, using your ideas about me as crutches rather than the flashy accessories they ought to be.
you can see, it is entirely fucked up.
i am always afraid of departure, it is true. it may be my worst fear.
i am terrible at hanging up the phone, walking away, falling asleep, watching you go.
i don't even like to see the back of your head. of course, when it comes to men, there are times i think about the curve of his ass or the lovely way his shoulder blades push against his tee shirt, and like it a little and i wonder if this is what old ladies mean when they say they could watch that boy walk away all day.
i just keep pushing you away because i am so afraid you will leave, and i had better take some preemptive action or get blindsided. and since i am then super red ass pissed off that you would leave, of course i am broken in half, tired, weak and needy when you return.
which is a shitty way to treat anyone but also is a pretty impossible way to live in relationship. and i told you i can't help it and you said i can and i looked at you and in your eyes and i remembered how vulnerable you are most of the time and how i've often hoped, when you couldn't hope for yourself i took it up and hoped for you, that you could do something you never thought you could and that it actually felt good to hope for you and i wasn't going to punish you if you didn't deliver because you just don't deserve to be treated so badly. so who would i be to deny you that same pleasure by dashing your hopes for me against the rocks of my need to be angry at myself?
but that is just it: i've always needed to be angry at myself, it was the only way i knew to respond to myself in any meaningful way. you know this firsthand: in an atmosphere devoid of anger the child of a mother like yours and mine is like a fish out of water.
and though i didn't mean to make you angry, i probably had to a little or else i would never have listened to you. and it was beautiful to see you angry but not so angry you couldn't still access the words you have to tell me that you see me, hope for me, need me to grow, be, become, learn this.
you sat there, a good foot away and facing the screen of your computer so i could tell myself that you weren't even aware of me and said
i feel you.
you didn't say the things i was afraid you would say. even though i was desperate to make you.
you didn't say i should get over it, or that i had to grow up.
i read your exhaustion as a way to slough me off but maybe everything about you was working, grinding, striving, climbing over boulders and jumping hurdles trying so hard to find the way to press past my defenses.
it just might be true.
in fact i am beginning to hope it is true because i am growing tired of playing the game the old way with my friends, neighbors, spouse, coworkers, classmates.
it is a fuck off game and i've really got to quit it. i know, so thank you for hoping i will even when i try to tell you not to.
i think your hope is your best feature.
help yourself | By crymytinyflood | 12:31 PM
