50 in April

you train for this kind of shit, even if you don't realize it.

i am bone weary, my thoughts have an  actual discernible weight and they are ponderous.  i am irritable and i am sadder than i have a right to be.  i say that because i initiated this.  Lonnie has pointed that out to me, not as a critique but trying to help me encompass and move past this point.  i know that i could have said nothing, allowed the sarcasm, the pointed barbs and the change in attitude slide by one more time, in order to keep the image of closeness within my grasp.  i don't know why i was just so tired of pretending on Thursday.  but i was.

you train.  each insanity you negotiate is a preparation to get through the next insanity.  that is a depressingly true statement.

i have been waking and praying.  as always, i eat, but my appetite is fucked up and my stomach churns.  work has been like lifting a stone slab from the garden of my childhood, amazed and revulsed simultaneously to see the myriad of worms, slugs and bugs beneath it.  i see now that these are genuinely children.  they are adults stunted in their ability to grow, retarded socially and adolescent in their decision making.  they get bored and self-destructive.  they want the prize and avoid the work.  it is tiresome to a great extent.  it is wearying along with what i am currently engaged in.  but i am doing it day by day, which is the only way to manage this kind of weight.

you get stronger, i guess.  or your weaknesses become more manageable.  you definitely learn how to do more with less.

i've not cried again since my counseling visit, but i still feel the same.  something in me, something that is so desperate for love or companionship that i'll overlook the distance in order to accentuate the proximity.  like having a relationship with someone through a telescope.  but you get tired of that.  you get tired of nights alone, of wanting, of plans that are just ways to spend the least time doing the least amount of things.  i guess in ten years it wouldn't' matter at all.  but i'm not ten years old, and i'm not yet ten years older than now.  and it matters.

its funny in a way.  i used to think that heartbreak was the worst thing in the world.  it's not.  it hurts like a motherfucker, but it's not the heartbreak that kills you.  it's building a world with one support post and then finding out the support post has termites.  that's what kills you.  when you set everything you believe on one person, one thing.

and i realize that's not what i've done.

i've built around Rachel, but i've not built on her.  i doubt if there is actually love personal to me left in the world, and there may not be love left that i'm willing to share.  for what?  i'm as selfish as the women i've loved.  in my own way, i want what i want.  i don't want to continue to bend and move and alter in order to accommodate.  i miss closeness and real intimacy.  i miss creating.  i miss conversation from deep places.

i'll be 50 in April.  i guess maybe that's the point where i'll decide what comes next for me.  but for now, i'm still above ground.  i'm only writing this so i stay visible.

i know that i'm blessed, and i am still grateful to Jehovah for each breath i enjoy.  but i know i'm not grateful enough right now.