To my almost . . .

Almost my better half-

My thoughts are devoted to you right now. I am trying to not think about you, let my thoughts just be. But your eyes and your words are too distracting. I hear the charming words, I see you on top of me as you pinned my arms and tried to tickle me, I see you next to me in the car, staring and touching my beauty marks, I feel the heat of your body as we passed each other in the gym, touched lightly and made everyone take note that perhaps someone had me, I feel your hands on my hips as you taught me balloneta, your fingers on my lips as your attempted to teach my tongue how to roll it’s r’s. The many moments of silence as your listened to me and always digested my words, pausing before you spoke. Truly soaking in the minutia of what I said. My heart hurts with these memories. My heart hurts more with the knowledge of what could have been.

My girlfriend’s words last night on how much she likes you, how great you are. I could only think in anger then that she should have been using past-tense. I felt she was not helping. How attractive you are. What a gentlemen. Yes, I know. I said. Can’t we just focus on how him and I were not right?

I wonder now if that was truly our end. “Take care Smith”. (Substitute Smith for my last name, which is what he called me) I wonder where you are in this moment. Your childhood friend/other business partner is visiting and your itinerary is booked. I imagine you laughing, enjoying. I sit typing, hearing the crashing of the ocean. My lights dim as a second light has met its end in the 24 hours since ours. Perplexed at how I change these lights that are 14 feet above me. I wish our end had a solution—was simply challenging but fixable, like this hard to reach light fixture.

For now, I will sit in darkness, the white saliva of the ocean as the light to this dark. 

 

 

My ocean before the darkness:

I hate the words I love you.

Because work is taking over I will post a writing whose title has remained by my side since the day I wrote it

August 1, 2007

I hate the words I love you. A feeling of relief as a few moments pass. No doorbells. No returned anger. It is over. This war. His unleashing of anger in the elevator made my body shrivel, longing to disappear into itself. A part of me jumping, another trying to find some safe haven in which to hide. The moment of waiting for the elevator door to open, for me to quickly unlock the door—I long for Jamie to be on the couch serving as a convenient obstruction to this screaming match.

The moments are quick, abbreviated, like one of Mozart’s fiery staccatos. The feelings produced linger, the rest remains a blur. My soul chuckles and mocks, amazed at the drama produced from a friendship- an assumed relationship, however vastly premature. I want to crawl in bed and burrow my head in the covers. Jamie sits on my porch- finally stopping my actions- albeit a few moments late. I haven’t eaten. And I start. A hole feels larger. I stop and wonder, Why? Wasn’t I simply amused at the evening’s lunacy?

Searching for the hole. It brings me here. And I say to myself—– I hate the words I love you. I sit, part still, half empty.

Overcome with this fortunate problem of being loved.

Laughing at how others would respond to the prospect of such a problem. And I only feel emptier. I think of the picture that is so easy to paint. “He is in love with this girl. The chemistry. But she is afraid of her own shadow.” How convenient, no? What a pleasure it is to be told how I feel. I think about how this would seem from a distant perspective. Words from the argument float back.

Oh on the contrary! as I spew the facts. Resistance. The truth sits in the air and refuses to be grasped.

I stop the battle I cannot win. A battle where anything other than me having feelings, me making this person feel wanted, is a losing effort. The pressure. The manipulation.

This is crazy. Crazy. Crazy. I am still aghast at this evening. My thoughts travel to the moments before of I love you. And now I am hollow.

A false truth. Again.

I know. I know love is a fleeting feeling, fickle from the mouths that say it or the minds that believe they are in it. This night a testament to how false feelings are.

Love— And I am compelled to stop.

For now, I feel too much. More than the loss of a psychotic connection is the quiet message in all of this. I think back to the moments when I would cry at the words as a teenager.

How rare these three simple words; a childhood with a lack of them—–an adulthood with a false abundance. I can accept I am “loved”. I am lovely. I am kind and good and I love. I care. I long to not hurt others- instead I am paralyzed at the prospect.  But I am not really loved.

And then a different feeling washes over me.  I was overly aware of each daunting threat. My actions were all in line with my words. How could they not be—my actions, a carefully choreographed tiptoed approach. Another story was being told. I listened to this story. I listened to this painted picture and I am amazed at what a mind can create. I am amazed at this unwarranted drama. I am amazed at the threats, the volatility, the contingencies . .

the I love you . . . BUT.