Thursday, October 21, 2010

In Love With an Insect Woman

Hopefully this is the rejuvenation of the weblog. I can now fully accept my newfound, self-appointed title of adulteress. I thought falling in love with C.E. would signify yet another conquest in a series of relationships with broken, unavailable men. It was a lark, or so I thought. Now, I am coming apart at the seams with this ongoing, clandestine tete a tete.

A conversation: that is what my therapists simplifies relationships down to--a conversation that endures, that changes and becomes more complex, yet clearer, with the passing of time. We talk incessantly, which also means we listen and reflect incessantly. I feel as if I am always conversing with him, especially when he is not around. Thoughts snap and flash like Maltese fireworks in summer, sometimes lasting long enough to imprint themselves upon the landscape of my mind. They transform later into face-to-face talks we have. Sometimes they fizzle into the fringes of my emotional framework. I forget about them until the feeling resurfaces, usually brought on by touching his face, laughing loudly at his witticisms, or lonesomely reflecting on the nights he spends with his wife.

This is a brand-new thread, a dialog in its infancy--the frontiers of formality, of comfortable representation, and of shaky self-disclosure are still being forged and redrawn constantly. The brokenness is there, on both sides, and the gaps, chinks, and lulls filled, synthesized, brought together by a burgeoning--oh, let's call it happiness and ripening sense of safety.

I am unraveling, like the protagonist in "The Yellow Wallpaper." I fear that same violent abandon enveloping me, freeing me from the oppressive ennui of loneliness and inserting me into the realm of chaotic liberty. However, mine is a rage of delight, a rapture so profound and edifying that it simultaneously causes me to neglect my obligations whilst acknowledging the hegemonic nature of being in love, of being able to discard the world for awhile for the sake of this experience of unadulterated ecstasy. Love has made me both in and out of control, and it is quite weird.

Wednesday, August 18, 2010

There are no flowers. Be the first!

I'm back after a year, and the funniest part is, I'm engaging in the same behavior I did last summer--falling in and out of love and hate like kids on a merry-go-round, self-questioning, not reading/writing/achieving to my full potential. The only difference might be that I make a little more money nowadays, so I guess I'm out of the red.

I need help. Last year, it was the staunch flaunting of brokenness that embodied the spirit of my summer; this year, it is the sober acceptance of knowing that I can't go on like this forever. I still have buckets full of anger. Most of the self-loathing has fallen by the wayside, which is a positive thing, except for the fact that I still don't know how to function in an emotionally intimate relationship with someone who is not a platonic friend. That is it. I love myself; I am incredibly proud of myself for achieving all I have and for continuing to work diligently toward my goals. What I need to work on is all this hatred for men who want to get close to me. I don't understand them, I am incredibly skeptical of their motivations, and I hide behind humor as a means of avoiding vulnerability. Sex isn't what it used to be, either.

Essentially, my circumstances remind me of this Yeats poem, which I will now share with the class:

WHEN you are old and gray and full of sleep
And nodding by the fire, take down this book,
And slowly read, and dream of the soft look
Your eyes had once, and of their shadows deep;
How many loved your moments of glad grace, 5
And loved your beauty with love false or true;
But one man loved the pilgrim soul in you,
And loved the sorrows of your changing face.
And bending down beside the glowing bars,
Murmur, a little sadly, how love fled 10
And paced upon the mountains overhead,
And hid his face amid a crowd of stars.