Tag Archives: personal history

reflections within

Diorama

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It’s all in my head. It’s all in my head. They’re all in my head. Now who they are exactly is something of a question mark.
There are a lot of them. They are hard to discern, so it often sounds like one loud voice. But it makes more sense that it is a combined effort. It’s interesting, because I give people a pass, assuming there’s no bad intention. They didn’t intend to become a nightmarish mantra in my head. So that absolves them. Not that I’m really interested in blaming anyone. But fact from fiction is important here. One must accurately identify the culprits in the course of history, regardless of intention. You can only surmise intention. Even the party in question may not know their own intent. Intent comes partly from the gut, rather than the mind.

There are those who have inadvertently or purposefully drilled their poison into my brain and soul. That is the situation, and I am left here to pick up the pieces and put myself back together. I must retrieve my shattered soul from it’s little corner where it likes to hide from the nasties. It must supplant all the chaos and hopelessness. It’s kind of like the Tao Te Ching, right? The strongest force is watery. The quiet, flowing true soul (the Way) has the capacity to erode any behemoths. Love is akin to this, too. If I were more in touch with my loving self over the years, I could have had some protection from those nasties.

originally published on 2/3/10

reflections within

Barnacle

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I just realized a funny juxtaposition. I love to dream about the past, but I rarely allow myself to reconnect with it. I can hold it in my imagination but never hold it in my arms. That probably carries over to the present moment, too. It takes a lot to connect. There is this gap, some kind of vacuum wind tunnel barricading me. I end up being oddly choosy about whom I get intimate/close to.

originally published on 8/6/10

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Faure Elegy

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For my close friend Dick Carter, having passed away November, 2011.

You were at my wedding! (Not much pomp and circumstance, but it meant a lot to me). I miss you. Especially when I need some sage advice from a close friend, one who knows things about my life no one else does, and could understand the way you do. I do think of you in the present tense. It actually hasn’t sunk in that you’re not here anymore. A year-and-a-half later. It doesn’t seem very long. Just a blink of an eye.

I wasn’t ready for this. Even if the thought had occurred to me. Our age difference didn’t create any gulf between us. From the first EA meeting when I heard you speak and then introduced myself afterwards, I felt a kinship with you that is rare in my experience. Perhaps a lot of people felt that with you. But it carried me far when the going went rough, both in meetings and in the rest of my life.

Remember when we had an ad hoc meeting in your living room with a few of us guys? Remember when you helped me out (!) with my crazy summer tenant? And you were the most beloved devotee of my music making here in town. You would always ask me about my summer music plans with great interest. You wanted to come hear me and visit me, but your loving curiosity about it was just as good as an actual visit. We did have a few nice phone conversations from across the country. You always had great interest in when I would be returning, in which months, so that we could reconnect. Basically, you cared.

But of course it was your wisdom on more personal matters that I miss most deeply. That I need. How many discussions about romantic relationships (mostly mine, but also some yours) did we have? God knows. And thank God for all of them. I was so happy to hear about your good feelings, both with and without your significant others. I think we had a similar style of looking at certain aspects of life. It’s called friendship. I’ve never had a friendship like ours end like this.

But you were my sponsor, too. I put you in, and you accepted, a position of advisor and guide for my emotional and EA progress for quite a few years. It was wonderful, believe me. Invaluable. It went way deep.

Thank you for all the bottled water. Thank you for that dinner you shared with me. And Cody. You were sweet with Cody. Sweeter than me. And my God, how sweet you were with your granddaughter. Ha! She was one lucky girl.

I’m sad I haven’t been able to connect with Cherry. I don’t know if she has some issue with me, or if she has simply moved on. I loved spending time with the 2 of you. You were really sweet together.

I am not going to say goodbye to you. You have SO not gone. I actually want to grow closer to you, if I may. You bring out the things in me that I should hold dearest. You are absolutely alive, in my heart.

originally published on 4/8/13

reflections within

20

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Is it not enough to pursue the things which make you happy? Do I feel a true void in the absence of the sad, weighty things? Is it habit? Maybe it’s a viewpoint which needs tweaking, maneuvering.
Maybe I know what makes me happy, but I haven’t had much practice immersing myself in those things. If I only touch upon them occasionally and reluctantly, naturally I’ll still yearn for the other stuff I have become old friends with. The somber, melancholic stuff.

Maybe my childhood observation about my multiple personalities should tell me something about the possible cause of my moodiness. I liked to talk about how frequently I felt like a different person. I’m sure each different person was in a different mood.

I have observed that focusing more on what makes me happy engenders a state of mind which hearkens back to childhood. More unfettered mentally.

originally published on 12/29/09

reflections within

19

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All the paths I have taken, all the roads down which I have detoured, few having completed, and yet it seems I have a path which is mine and mine alone. These other detours and disciple-ages have permitted me to continue on what ends up being the only way I was ever meant to go. It would seem I have an internal, natural drive, somewhat akin to inertia, which leads me from point to point in the epic of my life. I believe I and others are in control, but what they seem to be doing really is helping me not to fall off the tracks. It kind of reminds me of being a character, a protagonist, in a novel, rather than a person in real life. I sometimes feel a kinship with book characters, but I always put the book down and end up feeling more indecisive and meandering than anyone fictional. I have always assumed that is the deal with real life. You don’t get the luxury of a script. You have to make it up as you go along. But maybe we are actually characters, just by virtue of having character. It defines us and determines our fates. It gives us inertial tendencies, like a magnet.

originally published on 12/25/09

reflections within

2

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No, no, no. I feel the need to rebel. It is not such an easy act for me, as it seems for others. To put my foot down. Either in a defiant posture or in true passion for something. I tend to hold it in, letting it out in fits and starts when the opportunity arises. I need to make more opportunities for myself. Then it might not be such an exercise in keeping the horses gated in when it comes to my heart and imagination. Let the air out of the balloon, slowly but surely.
It’s interesting to find the myriad ways of doing this. It has been one of the most personal quests I have ever undertaken. This is something few talk about, at least in my circles. People are a tad surprised about this blog, for instance. They didn’t know I had it in me, or had an urge to express it like so. It is rather a natural act for me to write this. It’s my exhibitionistic journal, you know. I would not have been able to foresee the usefulness and serenity this brings me at times. And that is true for many things I have dabbled in. I have to leave myself open to trying things which may seem to contrast with other aspects of my life. The greater risk seems to be too much closed-off-ed-ness, so it’s safe for me to keep my options open.

There’s also a temporal side to the experimentation. Knowing how long and how often to stay in a situation or a feeling is equally important to the acts themselves. Time can be your friend or your enemy.

originally published on 8/22/09

reflections within

7

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I can be just as alone with other people as I am by myself.
But I’m not alone, even when I physically am. I am really rather cluttered with company – all my ghosts. Like Scrooge. He had his 3 ghosts. And like him, my ghosts would be willing to teach me some things, if I could redirect their repeating tapes. There are ghosts whom I am drawn to (much more than is realistic or appropriate or advisable) and there are ghosts I detest (again, more than recommended).

But all these ghosts keep me in a loop – their loop – and my life progresses at a snail’s pace, if I’m lucky. I am stuck in a small room with lots of bodies – disembodied ones.

But I don’t know the way out, is the problem. I am good enough at ignoring and blocking out all the ghosts while in the same room. That is not a great accomplishment. Or is it? Are they that scary and problematic that I should consider myself lucky to eschew them temporarily?

originally published on 12/21/09

reflections within

8

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I hate feeling stifled. I am envisioning times in the past with no sense of that. Am I exaggerating reality? Falsifying memory? Living in the past that never really was? Why do I do that? It is so very confusing to not be in the present, and to misconstrue the past, longing for something that never was. That means you are left with nothing. No real, true memories and no present, and a deep fear of the future.
And what is the cause of all this? Bad things that happened, which I am spending great energy denying, and which laid the groundwork for not living in the present moment. Not only not living in the present, but being deathly afraid of the present. Much more than most people, it seems. I am truly trapped in the nether-region between the non-existent past (which could be anything, really, since it is no more than dust now) and the intimidating present. Where is that? Nowhere, really.

The past, present and future are all closed off to me, psychically. They seem to be laden with ghosts. Perhaps that was why a lobotomy seemed appealing for a time. Simple surgical removal of them. Seems so easy. But then you realize that the ghosts have great value, if only you could befriend them somehow. They are really the keys that unlock various doors.

originally published on 11/11/09