What calm looks like: the throwing and slamming of things, the use of the fuck word. Irritation at simple things like light and noise but not light and noise of home, light and noise of commerce and cars, retail and reinvention of self. A need to clean house. Cleaned my closet, left me feeling vulnerable. I don't know if I want to get rid of these things. But I don't wear them. Almost like the pants that are too wide in the waist and too short but I wore them today. What part of "I used to..." doesn't fit this sentence? Pardon my calm exterior. It is fear. Vulnerability. My quiet. I do not find this relaxing. This is not my idea of a good time, nor is it my idea of a relaxing day off. I wanted to say that. Instead I kept quiet. For weeks I didn't touch my letter writing stuff because you piled it all in the middle of the table. I am particular about how it is organized - it does not live in a pile. It was a neat pile. I was paralyzed by it. How am I supposed to feel when the top of the pile is a skeleton: photo taken by exboyfriend who invited himself on my grief vacation. (But it's a good photo...) I had planned a solo vacation to re-arrange things in my head again. Now I cannot return to the same place without those memories. And sure some were good but there was too much booze and half of it was my idea because I didn't know what else to suggest and I didn't want to stay home because my emotions were not in the same place as his. I guess what I'm getting at is "I'm going to go there too" doesn't work when I've already said, "It's over." How do I be a bitter bitch? The heartbreaker by virtue of breaking hearts never gets to whine about how the end of things really made her feel. I quietly say leave me alone, you don't listen. I say fine and suck it up. I still owe you money but I don't have your current address. I haven't heard from you in months. I feel bad about that. I want to ... yet I'm living with someone else and how what went wrong went down is still haunting me. I don't like that. Doors slam around the home and things are re-arranged and put in different places and I am confused by this. They were fine where they were. I am not ready to re-arrange things.
Tranquility eludes me. I do not understand why things are done the way they are done tonight. I do not understand the lack of communication, the shut off answers when I ask questions. I wander from room to room in squashed silence - I was not squashed, I merely have less than nothing to contribute to this particular sequence of events. It is not mine yet it transpires in my house. It is not directed at me, but it occurrs in my space, in my presence, and once in a blue moon a verbal exchange is directed at my face.
A reassuring hand on my body in passing. Love. It feels so strange that the sequence of events excluded me in such a hardcore manner. I may as well not have been here. I do not feel unloved. I do not feel taken for granted like the furniture. I feel more like an observer presence. I see and hear and feel the events but have no part in them. I can tell you exactly how it went down.
Now ice cream and laughter and I do not understand the sequence of events preceeding... I do not understand the emotional transformation. I do not become edgy when the home is cluttered. It does not affect my ability to function. Out of the home pollutants of noise and sound and smell get to me. When I walk into the grocery store and the lights glare and the music is obscenely loud and the lineups are monumental and everyone pays with plastic including the dude in front of me who has to try his card three times before accepting that it isn't working... the cacophony leaves me wanting to drop my purchases where I stand and just leave. When did anywhere start creating such hostile environments? But it is not the only one. Malls play music outside of the stores and everything is brighter, shinier, more expensive to catch the eye of the consumer who has no attention span.
In the magazine shop it was silent and the lights were turned up no brighter than necessary for reading. Why can't all places of retail be places of relaxation like that? I don't want to go shopping anymore. I save major grocery shopping for Planet Organic once a week and have no desire to go out in between. I have wasted too much of my life standing in lineups for things I don't really want in hostile environments.
Peace at home is my sense of loss. Items piled on top of my sacred objects. Other sacred objects piled into a corner. I feel like I am the one in the corner. I don't live like that.
I am trying to take deep breaths and remind myself that I am loved. I don't think that's even the issue though, or perhaps even relevant. I feel vulnerable because someone else touched my stuff? As crazy as that sounds, maybe that is it. There have only ever been two things no one has touched in my life - my sacred objects and my writing utensils - because you can't put shit on top of the Koran and I don't like it when paper is piled in between envelopes. I think the first one will get you to hell and the second one just plain annoys me.
Today I have learned lots. I suppose that is the day's saving grace.
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