I Don't Want to Live the Wrong Life and then Die

Someone I care deeply for said not too long ago that I'm a control freak. My therapist said that she thinks it's more that I like to control situations.

Tonight, that same person I love so much kind of fought me about a recent injury I want to take a look at to make sure it's healing well. It kind of all coalesced with this pensive moment today when I thought about if I were an actor, what would be my dream role? My first thought was Lady Macbeth. Scottish as I am. Then I realized I could be Macbeth. I could be Puck. I could be...anyone. And I chose Cordelia.

I want to do good. I want to be the good child when being good serves no purpose, even. I want to be good. I want do do and be the good. And if that means tearing through my life like I'm on fire, then light me on fire. Or just let me believe you have so that I can burn for good.

I haven't written much lately. Frankly, I haven't created much lately. I had a temporary, jealous, possessive, truly controlling distraction. And even before, life was just heavy. So heavy that I couldn't stop and take time to feel it. I've written a couple poems that may be some of the best of my life. You know they're good when the subject tells you that you got it right. I don't know that there has ever been a higher compliment to my creativity than that. And I've heard it exactly twice. And they've both been in the past year. As if this is the age when you get past your own self to art that's really meant to touch someone else. I guess you can make all the art you want for yourself, but when you tire of that, you make art that carries a message to someone else. And if you've spent enough time talking to yourself, maybe, just maybe, someone else can hear you.

I had a not great dating experience recently. I thought the first night that it was a good idea, when I met him. That was the last time I was with him that I thought it was a good idea. A man who is greedy with you isn't the one. A man who takes liberties and doesn't wait for the right signs. A man who can't be responsible in any real sense and lets you. A man who lets you be a trophy and not an asset. A man who sees you as his accomplishment, but can't trust you when you say "this is the way it should go." I so rarely stand my ground that it's important to listen when I do. Well, stand my ground for myself. I'll stand my ground for anyone else until I can't breathe or see or think. I am a Valkyrie. I choose a cause and I carry it on horseback, with my shield and my sword until it's dead.

Anyway, I'm finished with that. And likely dating at all. I'm tired. It was exhausting. I felt swallowed up. I made decisions that got flattened out of a sense of ownership. If that had gone the other way, I might have died from it. I don't guess anyone but me can see that look. I wish it was a thousand yard stare. It's that other thing. The thing that comes after that. The awakening from the numbness that causes that look. I have seen it. And I have held the lifeless aftermath in my arms. And that is the moment I became a valkyrie, a banshee. 

I want to be the good that stops that for people if I can see it. And to see it and have my instinct sidestepped, and to let that sidestep happen is enough to show me that I have no business out there going along to get along. The only way I can stand my ground is knowing that my opinion is the only option I have. I will always second guess myself if there is any alternative. The terrible thing is that I'm usually right on matters of my gut. Listen to my gut. It's right. It's literally never let me down. I let it down. When I warn of death, death follows.

So all of that is that I don't want to date. I think I said that in February. And in late January. And in November. And last year a thousand times. I keep hoping love won't let me down. Well, maybe I've let love down. I have a thing that checks most of the boxes. Maybe "most" is all you get. And it's enough. More than enough. There is a depth in the missing pieces that makes it exactly right. Makes it a total. Makes it a real desire and not a lust. Real desire. All of that romantic lingo never appealed to me, really. Say what it is. Say what you mean. I was at the long red light from Peachtree Industrial to Highway 20 when that changed. Maybe I had just never really known more than lust.

I do now. It's falling in love with the place a premolar used to be because that absence means happiness. It's the feeling of a smile that causes the skin beneath your lips to crinkle. It's a Spotify link that helps you understand a whole existence. It's wanting a sweaty, stinky hug because it's a crushing wave of safety. It's trusting what someone else says even when they know your gut says something else because they love you more than you love yourself. They love you more than you love them. And your gut tells you that and that you have to pick sometimes which gut feeling is most. It's the patience you never had. It's faith you'd forgotten. It's God whispered in your ear. It's the look that's all eyes and cheekbones and a glowing smile with all the teeth when you say it out loud after twenty-five years of missing that thing. It's powerful. And it's different because it's not your love for someone else. You've had that for a couple decades. It's exactly what you were told and never believed. You see. It's been proven. They showed you.