1 Feb 99/Seduced
30 Jan 99/I Don't Buy It
29 Jan 99/Duality and Hate
28 Jan 99/Unnamed Wanting
27 Jan 99/Sleepless
26 Jan 99/DuckPond
24 Jan 99/Little Things
24 Jan 99/Misdialed
23 Jan 99/Proof
22 Jan 99/Wonder
21 Jan 99/Bitch
20 Jan 99/Confusion
19 Jan 99/Mysteries
1 Feb 99//SEDUCED
I've been thinking of a recent comment that most women, myself included (maybe especially
myself, considering the comment's source) equate sex with love, or at least emotional intimacy.
What I think most men fail to realize, though, is that it's not the sex that confuses us, that
winds around our psyches, that steals inside our common sense, lays bare our defenses and leaves
us hurt, betrayed in any leaving.
It's the deliberateness of their attentions, the time and effort spent...in getting to know us, in
flattering, in winning, in making us believe not only ourselves but in another. With time we
become more trusting, more believing of the words and coaxings. And if there is some modicum
of attraction on our part, we accept, reveal, rejoice in one who espouses interest - who takes the
time to share the pathos and the joy, the pain and mortal bliss within themselves. One for whom
we open up, grow voluble, lay down the barriers. We grow comfortable, relaxed and sometimes
expectant - not necessarily for any magicked long-term misty future, but of the simple daily
pleasures - drawing our conclusions upon past actions. It's the time spent together, the
investment of energies and concerns that seduces us...the day-to-day coming together in
conversation and sharing. And because we hear, are told, are shown over weeks or months or
years that we are wanted, desired, cherished in whatever form, we give up the mistrust, lose sight
of the possibility that it's not real, that it's all a game, a ploy, a trap.
Sex itself is not the proof, but rather just a fillip...something nice to have but not the
whole shebang. That - friendship, love, true affection - takes time, an investment in
communication and emotional honesty and forthrightness...
...makes one wonder sometimes how it can still exist.
30 Jan 99//I DON'T BUY IT
Someone has explained to me that the differences between men and women and their
relationships are due to genetic instincts, the primal memories handed down to us from
millenium ago. And if we were all still Neanderthal, or CroMagnon man, I might just buy
it.
They said that men are hunters, pursuers, gatherers of women, vendors of their seed.....that once
they interest you, land you, bed you, make you believe and kill you (as a conquest, inside their
heads), they tire, grow bored and leave for the next chase, the next contest, the next kill. As it
was a man that said this, I can't totally discount the explanation - as a woman, a reasoning
one at that, I can't accept it either.
There seems to be a piece missing from this puzzle - or several pieces, come to think of it. What
happened to free will, intellect, ethics and just plain ol' common decency? Perhaps I just
ascribe too much to men.
What happened to honesty and communication, of the value placed on another - not because of
sex, but because you've shared...time, energies, interests, concern, pain and laughter.
Perhaps I just ascribe too much to me.
29 Jan 99//DUALITY AND HATE
Fuck! I hate being the weak one, the human one, the woman-one nurturing in her pain,
unnourished in
return. I hate that I'm stung by hurt and confused by deceit, unseated by betrayal...looking for
answers
that will never come, buried by my own belief and trust. I hate the duality of my
anger
and my understanding, and the schizophrenic battleground of logic and my heart. I hate
that I
am so touched, so vulnerable, so pathetically gullible...towards friends and lovers and those that
don't
deserve my care.
If I asked the world, the moon or stars, a lifetime - if I demanded payments for my caring - gifts
or
proofs or promises, I could perhaps find sense. "Too much, you want too much."
But betrayed for honesty, because I do not know well how to lie, to hide, to play the games, or to
manipulate for gain? Friendship abandoned, lovers gone, for the simple ease with which it can be
done?
In stealth and cavilled phrases, no substance behind the lies, no balls behind the
leaving.
I care, goddamit......why is that not enough? I've seen the human heart inside of you....how is that
a
crime? I've held you when you cried, believed when you couldn't believe yourself, felt the
humanity
and divine pouring from you when you were blinded to it all - how is that a fault?
That I believed? That I trusted?
Or that I could not play it as a game?
28 Jan 99//UNNAMED WANTING
Relationships are a bitch. And while I'd like to say I don't want to do 'em anymore, I
know
myself too well...know the "connection" junkie that I am, know the craving to matter to another
human
being, that I'm not invisible or insignificant in the cosmic wholeness...to know the give and take
between
two people, the reciprocity of affection and respect, the sharing of ideas and thoughts, the mutual
support and bolstering of self and other...to be held, if not 'in love' then at least in some esteem,
to find
the simple joy of being touched, of being seen, being of some small importance to
someone
other than myself.
It's not a matter of dependency, or not being sufficient unto myself....I can wield a hammer with
the best
of them, fix a lawn-mower, spackle and paint, swap out computer chips and pull the simple
maintenance on my car...I stay calm in emergencies, fairly cool in a crisis and seem to be able to
efficiently handle the simple mechanics of auto-eroticism, the rudimentary side of sex. Neither is
it a
fear of being alone as I enjoy so much in my own company - reading, work, music, just being
alive, watching the earth, and my daughters, move through their days...
It's more an ache, the unnamed wanted filling of a void...a known hole inside me, something
lacking,
some part of me unnourished, some bit of me clamoring for existence, for release, for comfort
and for
measure. It's a wish to trust, to care for little things and how another feels, to feel the sure return
of
such...to nurture and be nurtured, to hold and then be held...to ebulliently abandon myself to a
generosity
of spirit with no sense of risk and no regrets, no fear that it would pressage doom, be
mis-perceived, or
thrown away unwanted.
I don't find this strange at all, this need, this wanting to be of some account. I'd rather
feel it
than hide that need inside a bottle, a pill, an unfeeling heart, a life of sterile sameness. I am - as
are we
all, I think - a social animal; wanting warmth, companionship, an emotional place in which to
rest, revive
and grow ... the comfort of a pair of arms, a sympathetic mind and heart, the belief in one outside
ourselves and their sure belief in us.
With everything that's gone before, I wish sometimes I could say "stop, no more" - no
risk, no
hurt, no disappointment ...with everything that might yet be, I fear I can't....
27 Jan 99//SLEEPLESS
Scant hours before dawn, sleep a demon in its lacking tonight...twisting, turning, writhing amidst
the sheets, pillows flipped to cool side, back - frustrated sighs as covers are tossed aside, and
muffled curses as they're layered back in various combinations...head shaken in disgust at the
lack of rest, at the whirling mind, the peace escaping me tonight....the clock ticking the minutes
over in its silent march towards day and the assurances that if I could just fall asleep
now I'd get three hours sleep, then two....
Angry with myself for my inability to coax the drift of slumber, for not being able to lay
whatever interfering ghosts to rest, for the restlessness which sparks my nerves and the mental
twitching rumbling through my brain...dark and dead of night not the best for ordered
thinking, not now whilst teasing sleep escapes...up for a glass of milk, then movement to the
other
side of the bed (does some scent or phantom linger here, prodding me to wakefulness??), the
shift from side to back to side again, then rolling over to curl around a pillow, hugging it closely
in scant imitation, no real comfort... up to check the doors and locks again, deliberately setting
aside thoughts of the late-night empty call, no need to fear or wonder who or why, just
sleep.....just close your eyes, and empty mind, and breathe.....deeply, in rehearsed sync with the
beat and flow of blood within these veins.....feel the tension drain away, limbs grow warmly
heavy as the envisioned sun creeps up them on the beach-within-the-mind......
...and groaning as the eyes start wide, the cycle somehow broken, the admission that this night I
do not sleep.....
26 Jan 99//DUCKPOND
A stolen hour at the duckpond in the midst of workday ruts, just to get away, to breathe, to close
my eyes and turn my face to sun...rays glinting over breeze-riffed ripples, shooting darting
reflective sparks against closed lids and chasing shadows in the pine boughs overhead. Two stale
half-loaves sitting in the grass beside me, awaiting the demanding arrival of the resident geese
and odd duck or two, book butterflied in skirted lap and shoes kicked off, wintered grass prickly
against my feet....remembering the last time I fed the ducks here, smiling as I spot the one
that grabbed crackers from my hand before....carefully tearing off huge chunks of bread to toss to
hungry, honking mouths - laying a trail that leads ever closer to my side and laughing quietly as I
am ringed.....wings flapping, necks craning, snaking, whipping side to side as beady eyes track
the hand with food......laughing louder as the bolder ones nibble at toes or sidle against my back
to better position themselves for begging......'til bread is gone, the bags upturned to let the crumbs
escape and flap against the breeze itself.....always feeling a little sad as the gaggle moves off, at
silent command, to roust for morsels somewhere else, their need for me (or at least my plastic
bread bags) gone......
...and slipping on the heels and brushing grass from skirt, return to the car and work and the
humdrum day.....
24 Jan 99//LITTLE THINGS
It was a day of satisfying little things today......from arising late, cocooned within the blankets,
their weight resting comfortably on sleep-warmed skin and caressing every curve - a shrouded
embrace which makes one want to wriggle and turn and stretch and deliberately kick one's leg
just to feel the covers shift.....and so I did, smiling sleepily as the cats decided it was a
game and pounced on blanketed, wiggling toes.
The sound of rain shushing through the open windows, back and side, in stereo as it splashed and
dripped and runneled off the roof, hitting the broad winter-browned leaves outside the window
with staccato taps......the scent and then the first delicious sip of morning coffee, wrapped in a
sweatshirt and sitting on the porch, eyes closed, feeling the rain and day and drink. And
later on, cradling the warmth of dryer-hot towels, burying face in their heat and inhaling deeply
of the fabric-filtered air....a day of blues turned loud, and amenable steady work spiked with
breaks - for a perfect apple, split into even fragrant sections and crisp against biting teeth,
suckling tongue - a glass of merlot and a chapter or two of Anais Nin in defiance of the
work....
A laughing spell with Evelyn as she touted and danced and pranced her way through the tale of
MungoJerry and Rumpleteaser, complete with flitting eyebrows and twitching hips 'til we
couldn't giggle any more......the sparkle of the sun as it braved the rain, clearing a momentary
path through the storm clouds and setting the hanging drops on fire, diamonte sparkle flashing 'til
the clouds closed in again.
A creative evening with color and pictures, coding and design, the pleasure of making something
out of nothing but imagination...the goodnight snuggle, complete with "MoonSong", Evie's
hands reaching up to pull me down for one last hug and a sleepy pat on cheek, cat purring by her
side...a long hot bath in now-quiet house, hair piled up on top of head and drifting on the steam,
neck pillowed and toes idly regulating the flow, eyes fluttering closed in the delicious scented
warmth and sliding down so water covered chin....the glide of lotion over damp slick skin and the
strong soothing pull of brush through hair....
And sitting here at day's end, fulfilled and blessed, smiling at the simple little things that filled
my day. There's time enough later to worry and dissect - for now I'll just enjoy.
24 Jan 99//MISDIALED
Two hours after midnight, returning from the porch... the chill of rain-slick brick still imprinted
on bare thighs.....hair dampened, tendrilled by the wafting mist of an almost-springlike rain and
mind slowly wandering through its compendium of images......the Balzac of the earlier evening
put away, the Chopin sleeved and cased, the still-rich taste of one last hazelnut-spiked coffee
coating tongue and palate...candles highlighting BB King and electric buzz of terminal
screen......
...thoughts drifting over the empty call which came not unsurprised one hour into this
morning...silent but for the steady breathing and repressed sobs, of pain or passion I could not
tell......and as I pressed the disconnect, unsure of who it was (but leaping in my mind to whom I
wished it was), a barely breathed whisper of 'sweet dreams'......
It's funny the faces that one puts to such......the relative few that know the number, the ephemeral,
the past, the gone but still remembered....the quick rationale of the logical side which claims it as
a mis-dialed stranger, but the mind caught up nonetheless.
And looking towards my empty bed, Lucille's sound waning within the speakers and the candles
guttering upon the dresser, putting all such thoughts aside to face the remnants of the night.
23 Jan 99//PROOF
I've just realized that I like to cry. I like the great weeping sobs or the tiny slide of tears,
the labored salty gasping breaths for air, for self-awareness.
Face it, I like the melancholy strength of pain, limning as it does the joys of life - the passion of it
all, the realness, the tangibilities of this all-to-fleeting time. I crave the feeling that I'm
feeling, not dead inside to all that passes, not blind to those that come and go...the pride
in being touched when others remain walled within themselves, the hope that somehow staying
grounded inside my emotions, any emotions, will keep me whole for some unknown
future. Not warded by stoney heart or blinded eyes, nor shielded by an ersatz wall of
apathy.
Now mind you, it's not my favorite of pasttimes - I much prefer to laugh, to smile, to touch and
feel and wallow in the passions and the joys of life. But barring these, I like the feeling
that I can be touched, that others matter, that life is sweet enough - worth enough - to
weep for.
It lets me know that I still live - and living, hope.
22 Jan 99//WONDER
...sitting quietly amidst the nighted shadows, overlarge cup in cradling hands and face turned
towards the star-specked skies....too-warm air for this winter's night slipping ethered over bare
and hungry skin as introspective thoughts slip inside a quiet mind...
I wonder at the mission, at the meaning of it all.......the blessings that we've all been given, the
interconnections seen, unseen, sometimes unfelt, unrealized...the bittersweetness of the joys and
the harsh, rude depths of pain....the knives of loss, the bliss of memory, the strong sweetness of
being part of a greater whole.
I wonder at the quickness with which so many come and go......frantic couplings to stifle the
silence, to quicken a somber life of sameness....rude gropings into another's mind and heart and
life to fill some emptiness inside their own.....backs turned on spouses, children, friends and
lovers - pasts forgotten, futures unrealized, the now a vague, amorphous stolid wall to pierce, to
just get by, to weather with no joy, no peace.
I wonder at the eyes unseeing, hearts unfeeling, the lives sealed against the salvation of being
touched, of mattering to another, of being held for the simple joy of holding....at the lost
redemptions that can be found in the smile of a friend, the arms of a lover, the eyes of another. I
wonder at the lives around me closed to the bonds of humanity, the peace of acceptance, the
closeness of shared honesty, the brightness of the most simple joys.
I wonder at the fear which seems to grip the world, the stolid harshness with which some guard
themselves - as if another would steal their soul or grind their lives to dust, their hearts to
powder. At the stoney faces turned against all others, the reined-in minds and hearts, the
calculated efforts to keep the world and life and love at bay.
I wonder at the pain so easily inflicted, the lies breathed from quiet lips, the ease with which so
many simply drift through life - their own and others; unheeding of the unseen threads,
unmindful or uncaring - it doesn't matter which - of the marks they leave in passing.
...and in wondering, turn my eyes to the stars again - for answers or for the simple assurance that
the world still turns, I know not which.
21 Jan 99//BITCH
I want to be a bitch when I grow up.
A raving, psychotic, quid pro quo bitch.
No empathy, no rationale, no Zen acceptance to muddy things up. No cosmic wholeness, love
thy fellow man, turn the other cheek, "Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus" bullshit to
get in the way of what I want; just hardcore, down and dirty 'my way or the highway', 'I've
got mine, so see ya, sucker!'.
No concern for what another needs or wants, no care for their personal tribulations, no
recognition of their difficulties or acceptance of their shortcomings; just 'I come first and last and
always!'.
WHAM! Goodbye supportive. HELLO, 'what have you done for me lately'!
KA-BLOOOOIE! See ya, quietly abiding. C'MON DOWN, 'I'm all that!'.
Yep, I want to be a bitch - less painful that way, I think. Men like 'em, or at least don't
use them - women secretly respect them, even if they publicly revile
them.
There's only one question...
.............. where can I find a heart/soul transplant to allow this metamorphosis to occur?
20 Jan 99//CONFUSION
Some I know call me wise. More probably call me stupid, or at best naive. Me?? I know I just
don't get the hang of it sometimes.
"It" isn't understanding people - I understand them well enough...better than well
enough I think at times. Their fears and needs, their pain - god, how I can feel their pain and see
the need within them, sense their wantings, almost read their minds. "It" isn't even
dealing with the complexities of the day-to-day nor the solitude I feel enshrouding me.
"It" is more the sense of disconnection - the understanding that I don't matter - not
truly matter - beyond an assuagement of their need or a comforter in their pain, the holder
of hands, the dispenser of kindnesses and of an earthy wisdom, a 'fill-in' until something better
comes along or until the quiet isn't quite so silent...the binder of wounds and the mediator of
confusion. Everyone else's confusion, that is, excepting my own.
I find that confusion bewildering. (Redundant, eh, because that's what confusion is
supposed to be, isn't it - "bewildering"?) A double-dose as it were - a core enveloped in
a cloud of ethered, needle-prickly phantoms... disorienting, maddening in its shakiness.
Being the 'packrat' of life that I know I am, a holder-onto of things, I'm baffled at the ease with
which something wanted and desired is so quickly cast away...okay, the ease with which
someone's discarded, cast away - no thought, no explanation, no attempt at understanding
just what such means, the larger picture as it were, or how hurtful it can be, and
is.
Even sensing what might lie behind such abandonment but never knowing in hard
certainty is unsettling... never being able to dissect it or see it in the open, never hearing the
words or having the answers but being left instead with guesses and 'what ifs' and 'if onlys'.
Never being able to explain or rationalize or assure, to mend or reason or to clarify ... to
'pooh-pooh' the fears and lay rest the demons. Never being prepared with defenses against the
leaving...
Sometimes I think I'm just too full of myself. What should it matter that I can see and sense and
empathize ... that those few I do let close are willingly elevated to 'important' in my life, become
meshed in my thoughts and in my concern, my affections, my caring for them both as separate
beings and as parts of a greater whole. Why should that be a guarantee of
anything...let alone reciprocity? Why should I expect anything as I've made the choice to
give, to accept, to empathize and support. Why shouldn't I be surprised when, one by
one, they close the doors and turn their backs? Since I've developed a habit of collecting such
people, doesn't that make me the foolish one?
As I said - I don't do this well.
19 Jan 99//MYSTERIES
This keyboard quiet, pages silenced for the past 21 months - reviewing all the previous entries,
reliving all the months between, feeling all the things I hesitated to put in realizing black
and white.
Not that they weren't felt as the time passed, but rather stifled as too revealing ... a
shared glimpse into the muck and mire of my everyday that sometimes took more strength to
keep inside than that needed to scream it at the world - a stoic resolve to stare them down, outlast
them if you will... to resist the urge to whine and moan and beat my breast and plead for
understanding.
And yet I'm back again. Back to open up my world and thoughts, to ponder on the conundrum
that is our life - to marvel at its glory and its complexities, and to stare with melancholy
bemusement at its confusions. Back to bear witness to the fragility and the blessings of its
wonders, to proclaim the depths and grasping hands of pain, to search anew amidst the words for
some clue, some hint, some breath of understanding.
For without understanding, without looking deep within, can one ever really know oneself? And
being blinded to oneself, can one every truly grow to know another?
That, I think, is the greatest of all the mysteries.........
-----BACK TO-----
