perfectly ripe for pairing

I go to the nail salon every few weeks to see my favorite friend and technician, Quynh. We first exchange niceties about our families and dogs, but this is only small talk to stave off a direct inquiry into the status of our love lives. It’s as if through our note-comparison we hope one of us has found a seed. At times we trade off wearing a rosy glow, brief happiness that is visible from the vitality of new romance. But most of the time the look on Quynh’s face reads like the worry of someone in the world alone, someone who does not want to be. She is the most popular technician, always booked up at least a week out. She talks her customers’ ears off, makes fun of their crooked toes loud enough for everyone to hear, calls them on their bad habits, and then has something to fix it right up. She is as warm and comforting as easing into an old cracked leather seat. If you are lucky enough to sit in her chair, she will transfer a little bit of that warmth onto you.


The basic condition of the egoic self is one of a deep-seeded sense of lack, of not [being] complete, and it strives to fill [it] almost continuously, except for a brief moment when something [fills it up] and the lack is not felt. It looks to fill [a] hole that is always there [that says] I am not myself. I am not complete. I am not home. One of the main areas where it looks to fulfill that lack is in the area of relationship. The entire focus of the self becomes focused on one other person who is perceived unconsciously as the one who is going to complete me, make me whole. Almost an obsessive attachment forms to the image of that person. And that is called falling in love. Eckhart Tolle


Love is perpetually on the brain. Perhaps this is my lesson, a rather protracted, epic one. When I was twenty-eight my mother sent me to a reputable psychic in town. He was actually voted “Best Psychic” by readers of the local rag. Joe told me when he met me that I had a harpoon through my heart. I wasn’t surprised. The lack of subtlety to his vision wasn’t quite what I was expecting, but I wasn’t surprised. That was the last worst one, the kind that is a tumult on the radar screen of your life. Joe told me I needed to hurry up, that if I didn’t take things seriously I would end up alone at thirty-five. He got that one right, too.

I find the act of pairing up with someone incredibly pothole-ridden. On the inside where it’s just me, however, I feel perfectly ripe for pairing. Innately I know how it’s done. Someone told it to me in a breath when I entered this world. And now I keep reaching for the negative space, the thing that isn’t there.

Glimpses of love come along as slight as an evening conversation. I recognize it and somehow know it won’t be staying long. I am like Quynh, alone yet I do not want to be. And what would Tolle tell me? I think it takes time and a willingness to let things come and go. I’m not looking for the false fulfillment, but rather the sustainable one, reliant upon the self as much as the pairing.

revolving

I said goodbye to the one-hundred and twelfth one tonight. Of course not to his face. Via text. Something about leaving his stuff by the door. There doesn't seem to be any time for goodbyes anymore. Life's busy. Not like in airports where you see plenty of people lapping up farewells, but they are in love, not out. The first goodbye was Ian when I was four. When I was four I thought his name was "N," because that's what I heard people say. It's the South, and folks tend to add a few syllables to their letters. He was sweet, had dark brown hair and glasses and somehow had that magical quality of bringing out the experimenter in me. In Kindergarten it was Brock. He and I had a tumultuous relationship that centered around the playground. Skipping ahead, I have to give a shout out to Josh, who is still a very dear friend of mine today. We never made it official, but we've carried a torch for one another for almost thirty years now.

Truth be told I've had many relationships like the one with Josh. They're friendships, really. They make me feel safe. I like a male companion by my side. If it happens to remain platonic, I almost like it better because it's easier and more constant. I've never been good at making love last, even though I've gotten feedback as stand-out as, "You're cool as shit." When I was a young woman I wanted the world more than love. When I was thirty I wanted to be loved more than anything. Now I think I'm ripe for something that just might work. But what do I know?

The thing I think about today is how many people come and go. It's swift. They're gone before you've had the chance to figure out what your song is, what kind of Scrabble player you are, what your parents are like or where you come from. They take you in parts, until your whole self shouts loud enough to push them away again. I've adjusted to the piecemeal way of life. Romantic notions are more timid. I certainly don't expect much more from number one-hundred and thirteen other than some laughs. But if it happens, I'll be ready.

finalmente y otra vez

I wish I could reach the place I'm longing to go. I have been waiting. But then it seems the thing I have been waiting for no longer matters after years pass without it. Other things bring happiness in surprising ways. Writer Monica Ali describes the fickle nature of our desires in a revelation about different kinds of love. She says there is "the kind that starts deep and slowly wears away, that seems you will never use it up, and then one day it is finished. Then there is the kind that you do not notice at first, but which adds a little bit to itself every day, like an oyster makes a pearl, grain by grain, a jewel from the sand." Do you desire a well with fire that burns until it goes dark, or an ember, slow burning by your breath upon an open slate?

It's likely true that I don't have to choose, that Ali's two kinds of love inform each other and work as one. How would you know when the sand becomes the pearl if you didn't know what a pearl was? That doesn't mean that the two are ultimately the same. They fill different needs. The delight of running bare toes through cool grass is something I can feel now, just by remembering; it awakens you, but everyone eventually puts their shoes back on and steps onto the sidewalk. That pleasure is different from emotional constancy, building each day by another's presence. But the day-by-day can be a chore. Each one falters, and each one holds the other up.

I've gotten off on love, and I started with dreams and the happiness that fills empty space. That happiness feels good; it's a satisfaction with today. I used to battle longing for the things that weren't there. Now when I think of the future, if people ask me or if I ask myself, I'm okay either way. Both kinds of life are good. But even with that, I sometimes want more and wonder if I'm living in the in-between places. When your dreams don't find you, do you forget them, or do they disappear? I wonder if I'm supposed to remember something that slipped away long ago. And here I am again.


(artwork by Joy Young Shannon, RHS alumni; title inspired by Kate Zaluski's journey to the D.R. and back)

a dedication

I'm finally starting to feel my age. This next birthday I'll be thirty-seven. I've lived a selfish life when you think about it. It's been for me, not for a partner or for any children. The only time I understood what it was to give every day for the good of someone else was when I taught school. Everything that was in me was for them, and it was an easy gift, easy to give. They needed me.

When you give like that--all day and into the night--encouraging successes, soothing failures, mending hurts, anticipating questions, preparing answers, preparing people for tomorrow and the next day, it takes a toll. I aged in those years, on the inside, but it was short-lived. I reached for a lighter life again.

Even in the midst of this lighter life, I can't stop the scenery from changing around me. Friends are tending to their sick baby every few hours through the night, picking her up from her bed and rocking her back to sleep again. Friends are separating; friends are divorcing; friends are sticking it out after infidelity. Family, once made, binds you to others.

It's such an enticing idea, making a family, finding a partner. Happiness. For so many, the idea lives as a dream bestowed upon their chosen, but one that eventually they cannot find in the person sitting in front of them anymore. Those revelations often find you in your thirties. My friends call it "the reckoning," a term a little too cute to me for its impact. Aging happens on the inside, through heartbreak and loss, traumas, or simple care for the good of someone else each day. You breathe in life. You breathe out.

repeat the sounding joy

for John

I've been thinking about joy and where to find it. My friend and I have one of those trigger lines--as soon as you say it you both know kind of thing. I'm actually not sure what it is we both know except that we fall on different sides of the fence. The line is from a Lucinda Williams song. She hollers, "You took my joy!" And then she clearly states: "I want it back."

Lucinda's not my bag. She's like a grown up skinny kid sitting on someone's backyard couch in South Austin sipping on whiskey. Her drawl is so put on that it's part of her act. But really, it's her singing that I can't take--a tinny drawl laid on top of rockin' guitar. The guitar's good; the tin grates. Where's the soul? If you're riding on top of the notes you're coasting. If you can come from your gut, then you've got me.

Funny enough, "You took my joy" has become somewhat of a mantra with me--relationship goes south: "You took my joy." Family drama: You took my joy again. You took all the fun out of it. Stop doing that!

I like the blame factor. Takes it off of me.

Blaming is fun and all, but it's lonely, too, and I'm forgetting all about the second part. I'm supposed to want it back. I think wanting it back is kinda like saying: "screw you." I hate to say that. I'd rather say, "you sure?" "You wanna change your mind?" But really, "screw you" can be standing in your own so that others don't take away. You can allow them to give, but they don't necessarily have to take away from you. If you stand in your own and know when to cut your losses, you take back your joy. I keep repeating those lines of hers. She got me after all.

post-cry

I have a friend who is heartbroken. I saw her at dinner the other night. Three friends sat in a dark sushi restaurant next to a table of men speaking Japanese. We were celebrating a birthday. My friend looked fresh-faced with no makeup. I didn't notice the post-cry look in her eyes until she brought up her ex late in the evening. She talked about how she has no attention span, for our book club reads, television shows, movies. No patience to allow thoughts to rest upon something and absorb it. No tolerance to absorb anything new because this man whom she let know her all the way inside has taken himself away never to return.

It's so humiliating, demoralizing, chaotic. I don't want to love. I can't quite reach for it. And then, I feel like I'm running out of time. Saturday night at the phenomenal Neko Case and Rufus Wainwright show in Austin, Neko introduced one of her songs with a dedication to all those people who are never going to get married their whole lives. I stuck my arm straight into the air and "wooooo'd" with the rest of the contrarians. And then I felt funny.

I was perusing the blogs tonight and found that persisting stars recently featured a book called, Maps for Lost Lovers by Nadeem Aslam. I can only get to the cover, barely peek at the excerpted quotes. I feel little patience for the tedium of being a lost lover, little capacity to absorb it. Maddie of persisting stars writes, "[in] angry observations he illuminates the distance between human beings in a sparkling web of quests." I think Aslam is angry with me. He watched me raise my fist into the air, the impostor revolutionary that I am. Oh goodness me.

picture book

I looked through a box of pictures last night. Most of them span from ‘94 to ’02. A five-year gap tells me that digital has definitely put a damper on my picture box. It’s great to email photos, but the old-fashioned kind feel more life-like. I was looking for one picture in particular, of a past love. It was a spontaneous shot that a friend took as he and I were sitting in the grass. She liked to take her camera with her wherever she went, and one day she gave us a few of her shots from that day in the park. Sometimes one photo can tell you someone’s entire story. I don’t know if the picture would tell him, the past love, the same story as it does me, or even whether or not it would be a special one, with special meaning to him. It is for me. I remembered it last night and began digging for it.

I don’t organize my photos, other than a few from college graduation or big trips. The rest join the heap. I go through them one-by-one when the mood strikes. Last night the ones of Jeff and Bekkah stood out. The best ones were from the early days when Bekkah used to wear a long pony tail, slicked back, and the ones from trips I used to take to visit them in New York. Pages filled with so much energy that the memory of how it was in those moments came right back, I remember.

I’m tempted further through my life, my friends, all those people who are somewhere else now. I ran into the ex in the photo this February. I hadn’t seen him in about 7 years. When he walked in for some reason he looked left and I looked right toward him. In that one look it came back, our moments together, or just him. Time travels around inside us like a Ferris wheel, making stops mid-air. I found the picture I was looking for at the bottom of the heap.

some love quotes for Valentine's Day

1. "There is always some madness in love. But there is also always some reason in madness." Friedrich Nietzsche

2. "Love is not about losing freedom; it's about sharing freedom with a partner who's as talented a liberationist as you." some chick named Sarah

3. "I hunger for your sleek laugh and your hands the color of a furious harvest. I want to eat the sunbeams flaring in your beauty." Pablo Neruda

4. "Between whom there is hearty truth there is love." Thoreau

5. "Love is being stupid together." French poet Paul Valery

6. "Love makes your soul crawl out from its hiding place." Zora Neale Hurston

7. "Love takes off masks that we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within." James Baldwin

8. "Love is the difficult realization that something other than oneself is real." novelist Iris Murdoch

9. "I love you not only for what you are, but for what I am when I am with you. I love you not only for what you have made of yourself, but for what you are making of me. I love you for the part of me that you bring out." Elizabeth Barrett Browning

10. "Love is the most difficult and dangerous form of courage. Courage is the most desperate, admirable, and noble kind of love." poet Delmore Schwartz

11. "You can search throughout the entire universe for someone who is more deserving of your love and affection than you are yourself, but that person is not to be found anywhere. You yourself, as much as anyone, deserve your love and affection." Buddha

12. "Our love is like a well in the wilderness where time watches over the wandering lightning. Our sleep is a secret tunnel that leads to the scent of apples carried on the wind. When I hold you, I hold everything that is--swans, volcanoes, river rocks, maple trees drinking the fragrance of the moon, bread that the fire adores. In your life I see everything that lives." Pablo Neruda