rue42

I have been experiencing what my father used to call "the deep breath before the pain". In some ways this time of reflection before the unfolding design is even more unbearable than what is to come. The anticipation was infecting me like poison and I yearned for it to end, to embrace the oncoming onslaught if it meant for the agony and anxiety to cease. Something inside me was decidedly close to breaking down, and I had no means to stop it anymore. I couldn't remember the last time I had meditated. Or slept. I mean really SLEPT, through the night, without waking a dozen or more times in a fit of writhing and silent screaming. I was barely able function, running on autopilot while my mind burned with endless questions and considerations. It was always in my nature to exhaust or very nearly exhaust all possibilities present in a situation before I even responded to them, mathematically calculating the obvious and most likely end scenario within various extremes of outcomes. I was rarely disappointed, but even more rarely surprised by anything that happened.

I believed the lonely state of neutral was becoming to me. My entire life, in all its complex splendors and disappointments, had never made much sense to anyone else but at least it was of my choosing. It always was, even when all was dire, but I'd lost the ability to stay focused. I'd just been so very tired; my soul had been ill. I have had options, so many options, even as it seemed all doors were closing. I am nothing if not a survivor, but I was struggling to find that instinct. When had I become so jaded? I wanted to see so much in this world by keeping my eyes closed as I tried keep my mind open. The sight I was striving for had nothing to do with the landscapes my eyes would show me. Truly, I know enough to know I know nothing at all, and I used to take comfort in this truth. Then it began to burden me. I always thought I would have done more by now, changed things for the better, become the catalyst I always knew I was capable of. Who is born with this much empathy to simply waste it? Perhaps I had been hard on myself but I only wanted a purpose. A way to distract myself. A way feel better about the bitterness of the world and the resentment I felt deep inside. My own shortcomings could be overcome, in time, with enough sacrifice. I thought I knew the score. I thought I knew myself and what wanted. Needed.

When others tell me things, their stories and dreams and hopes and terrors, I feel them as if they are my own. My heart had always been strong enough to bear it but recently it fell sick. It was all too much, there was just too much going on all the time and I couldn't do enough for the balance of my Self, let alone to shoulder burdens of others. But it wouldn't stop, not ever I thought, not as long as I breathed, and so I knew I must learn to control it or become lost in myself and the workings of my own mind. I missed my innocence, fleeting as it was, and while I was never long standing in its glorious conceptualization, I did try to maintain it as long as possible. If I couldn't be naive, at least I could use my knowledge gained at its cost for good. At some point the campaign for my salvation took its toll and damn near annihilated my ability to cope.

I did wonder...what was good for me? Where would I go from here? And why in the world, since I was a youngling, had I felt the need to do anything with my abilities at all? It's not as though anyone in my family or childhood encouraged (or discouraged) it in me. I just knew, somehow, that my journey in this lifetime - for whatever it was worth in our mutually constructed perception - would never bode complete or worthwhile unless I made something of my ambition for transcendence. I was found wanting, within my own expectations, and to hell with any others. Nobody would ever hold me to the same standards, or torture me more ferociously than what I had inflicted on myself. I feared I would drive myself insane if I did't solidify my purpose here. I did not realize that I was pushing myself so hard so I would not have to examine my own feelings of emptiness. And when I did touch on those yearnings for something I could not place, as I did every so often, I would lock down my emotions as quickly as possible and focus on my mission.

I had always envied those who are content to love and live. I wished I was capable of it, to wrap myself in the simplicity of such beautiful abandon. I did not think I was one of the lucky ones, but that had never bothered me before. Not until a few moons ago. I felt I didn't belong anywhere, fully, and thus far it had suited me and really could anyone say they had this supposed comfort? Maybe if they were lying to themselves. It wasn't until I found a kindred, a true soulmate, that I began to worry. When you learn of that which you never thought you could have, much less find, you panic. Everything is fleeting, change is constant, we all die alone, adage after adage, thoughts whirling in my mind as I tried to justify finally...just this once...letting someone in without any defenses. I don't think I ever have before. Not with my mother, my siblings, my best friends, my lovers. Oh close enough, surely, and doubtful any of them knew the difference. I claim to be a bad liar, but in some ways I am a fantastically good actress. I've always observed my fellows closely and I know how to school my expression and what to say to be convincing of my sincerity in all relationships. Even my general bubbly, quirky personality is something I picked up and refined to throw off how hollow I truly felt. Oh I did feel, a great deal, but I forced it to be about everyone but myself. I couldn't afford the luxury of being myself, of being truly open with anyone. I wanted instead to use my energy for others. The irony of this facade was not lost on me but I glossed it over.

I knew there was something off about pretending that I was whole. Nobody is perfect and nobody is normal but there are some things that make us the same. Human beings are social creatures. We need one another, on some level or another. We have more in common than we have differences even if we choose not to see it. But even so, I thought I could fake my way through. I was good enough to make everyone believe, maybe even myself - wasn't I? And then I didn't know anymore. My game had been discovered and for the first time I was allowing myself to indulge in what I had always craved. I didn't feel hollow when touched, when conversing, when conspiring, when laughing...my emotions were genuine and genuinely shared. It scared me. If it ended, if the whole experiment blew up in my face, the recovery would be...for the sake of not sounding melodramataic (or moreso) I didn't know if I wanted to go down that road at all. I was happy. Happy. Truly happy for the first time. And I was terrified. It took 25 years of searching and waiting and hoping to feel that way. The way everyone else talked about, the way you read about in stories, the way you knew it should be. I had stopped trying a long time ago and just let it be. I wasn't sure I was capable of it. And of course it would come at the cost of relying on someone else to provide it, or at least to open my mind to it. I wanted to do it on my own. Maybe that's the point, that I wasn't ready before now. I was finally Listening. But can I maintain this alone?

If you leave...what will happen? Things won't be the same, of that I am sure. But for once I can't predict with any conviction just how it will play out. My heart, it HURTS, just to think of this, and my mind won't slow down, won't let me rest or have any peace. It is too excited by the grey, by the fact that this can't be calculated. Something new. Something honest. Something real. Finally. And if you stay...oh gods, I can't imagine. I'm not prepared. If you stay and this is as wonderful as I so stupidly hope it could be, what then? Would I finally be content? Would my wanderlust cease, would I be able to sleep again? Would everything be suddenly, blindingly simple and lovely, and would everything fall into place in ways I couldn't explain but could FEEL as I never allowed myself to previously? Would I finally know acceptance and love and be part of something more than my hypocrytical atomistic lifestyle in the pursuit of my altruistic crutches? All those tears I shed, were they really for everyone else, or were they for me? I thought I was marred, I never felt...human. I accepted this as fact. I knew it with every fiber in my being. Believed it deep down in my soul. Lived it with every iota I commanded. Why now? Why NOW? But I am not ungrateful. Timid, and afraid, and perhaps at times reluctant, but not ungrateful.

Thank you. I love you. What comes next? Don't tell me. Show me. I trust you, for better or worse. I will never regret that you make me feel alive.