Revolution, schmevolution.

(Family, this post isn't for you.  Please read this post, too, if you  missed it from a while ago.  If you choose to read it, keep it to yourself.) 

Under the Mopac bridge, 9 am today.

Last night was a late, pleasurable night at home alone and so it's not surprising that today I've been exhausted.  But it isn't a bone-weary thing, it's this weird brain-weary feeling.  I have been thinking so fucking hard, for so fucking long.  I think my brain is finally feeling it.

I realized a year ago that shit was going down.  If you go back and look at my August archives you can see it with your own eyes.  Of course at the time I had no idea.  None. Nada. Zip.

I had no freaking clue that in a year I'd be facing hysterical mothers, broken dreams, floundering toddlers, and gaping, open space in my closet - and, lo, my heart.

This week has been a big week on so many levels - oh so many levels.  I feel like I'm in different places at once, even different time periods.  I can feel like my 8-year old little girl self who only ever wanted her daddy to stop abandoning her.  Then it's to feeling like a warrior mother who will stop at nothing to protect her baby.  Then a loving, helpful friend and supporter.  Then I'm an almost-single woman on the loose and enjoying half-naked, glistening men on the running trails. Then, back to 19-years old and struggling to feel the way I want to feel in a house that absolutely rejected such a concept.  And finally, I'm simply a woman who someone doesn't want at all. 

All these different, big, imploding bodies pulling me in so many directions.  I am a taut rubber band, resolutely hanging on, determined not to snap.  I won't snap.  I never do.  It's not what I do.  But fuck.  This is hard.

Tonight has been particularly difficult because I came face to face with the fact that Anthony will not always be there for me.  It is the nature of a break.  And, obviously, I won't be able to offer him that same flavor of solace either.  And in the mean time, my life goes on and I continue to find myself needing someone to lean on. 

No one's going to stop being hysterical for my benefit.  No giant "pause" button will be pushed.  People will continue to do what they do regardless of what's happening to me and I will now have to endure it on my own, whereas for the last 7 years I've had a companion, a confidante, a champion to stand by me.

...

Some minutes have gone by and I've just sat here thinking and feeling and really sinking into a calmness.

I'm quieter now for having written the above angst and I feel more connected to the wonderfulness that has been coming my way the past several weeks since I went public with the new things in my life.  So many of you have reached out to me and lovingly reminded me that I'm important in some way, either to you or to the universe.  I feel like a parched, lost traveler with a glass of water in my hand when I get those missives from you.  I feel found.  Grounded.  Better.  (And, thank you. Thank you thank you thank you.)

I am about as far from being an island as a person can get.  I crave connections and attachments of all kinds, but am ultimately terrified of putting myself out there too far, even on a good day.  I feel I often misrepresent myself and I confuse and unsettle people frequently.  I am too boisterous, too intense, too weird.  I can drink too much and behave ridiculously.  But truthfully, I am more tender and sensitive than all that.  I am intuitive and caring and thoughtful - at least I strive to be.  I only want to be loved and accepted for me.  That's it.  It sounds so utterly trivial, but it's true.  The more the sands slip by the more convinced I am it's my one true quest in this lifetime. 

And all of this is tied up with the multi-tiered, multi-layered bullshit feelings I'm experiencing because although I'm going through a present-day crisis my entire freaking life is flashing before my eyes and I'm having to re-experience critical moments.  I don't want to be stuck in a hamster wheel.  I want to be able to explore more of myself.  I don't want to be chained to faulty expectations and motivations.  I want to be noticed for the woman that I am and loved because of it.  I don't care who you are.  I want you to love me because I'm me.