"I woke up today
to find myself in the other place
with a trail of footprints
from where I ran away
it seems everything I've heard
just might be true
and you know me
(well you think you do)
sometimes, I have everything
yet I wish I felt something"
[Nine Inch Nails, "Even Deeper"]

A friend of mine has become somewhat damaged.

I was going to write about this a few weeks ago when I told her just that, but I figured she'd read it and become discouraged, and being she's somewhat damaged, discouragement wasn't something I wanted to provide, and certainly not for the meager price of my own self-expression. But now I think she's recovering very quickly (faster than she realizes, actually), and she's got a rather admirable tenacity about it, in fact. I don't think she's quite got her bearings yet, and until she does, all that pure-adrenalin she has will continue to propel her in circles a while longer. She wants to get somewhere, and with only an idea of where it is, rowing frantically with no hand on the rudder, and maybe without quite realizing it, to get away from where she is moreso than to get where she's going. She's tired of feeling somewhat damaged and wants to feel whole again. But you can't will your injuries healed, even the emotional ones.

I've been somewhat damaged many times. I wonder sometimes if I'm somewhat damaged now, though I think I can't possibly be by my standards of the definition. What is somewhat damaged? Somewhat damaged is when someone is temporarily changed, and unable to truly be themselves, as a consequence of trauma, most particularly because of a bad relationship, or a single tragic event. I'm not talking about run-of-the-mill post-breakup depression; this is above and more serious than that. Neither am I talking about abuse-survivors; that's badly damaged and far more severe than this. Somewhat damaged lies inbetween. It's a state that few, even the person themselves, truly recognize, understand the gravity of, or understand how to fix. It's a state we often try hard to hide from those around us.

There was a time, in the summer of 1993, when I was definitely somewhat damaged. That's just one time, and there've been more, but that one stands out in my mind as the most significant example. I'd been left by my girlfriend a month or so after my mother had died, and while, months having passed since then, I appeared normal and functioned just fine from day to day, my desire to be in a normal, healthy relationship again was overridden by my fear of abandonment, and so while I chatted, flirted, and otherwise seemed like my usual self to both male and female friends alike, I was seeking out one-night stands and denying myself any opportunity at the kind of comfortable relationship I longed for, not because that was my nature, and not because it was something I allowed myself, but because it was all I would allow myself. My self-loathing had reached a new height.

I was lucky though, for fortune smiled on me that summer when I met a woman whose strength and compassion bore past that, and whose understanding of me reached well beyond my simmering hate and back into who I really was. That woman was Bernice. And when I flat-out asked her what it was she saw in me, her knowing I was already well on my way to a summertime of misogynistic womanizing, she just as frankly and credibly told me: that this wasn't who I was, that she could see who I really was, and that it was about time I found the courage to get back to being myself.

So I did.

I'd just like to take this moment, as an aside, to say two things while I think of them: 1. that I've never forgotten that she took a chance on me when I'd given up on myself, and that I'm eternally grateful for it, and 2. when I am me, not just any "me", but I mean when I'm my best me, truly myself, truly strong and everything I want to be and can be, that I'm fucking incredible, and that I love who I am, who I've become, and who I'm capable of being. If I'm so hard on myself in the other times, perhaps it's because I know what I'm capable of, and I'm disappointed in myself when I allow myself to be anything less.

But I digress. The quote above - not about me or my feelings (for the first time ever!). This one's about her, and my desire to see her regain her senses and get back on track. Because she deserves better. We all deserve better. And I long ago moved past the shit various women have done to me. And I'm sure they've long ago moved past whatever shit I might have done to them.
She has.
And perhaps we've even all forgiven one another for it. And that's all well and good but...

But the frantic rowing doesn't stop and the smooth sailing begin, until we learn to forgive ourselves.