Self-indulgence.

I think I am full of self-pity today. The moment I wrote that I got a little disgusted, so I suppose I will only write for 5 minutes.  (I am all for truly feeling your emotions, but I also think one should not encourage such habits as self-pity).

Here I am. On a couch.

I am surrounded by beautiful women. SURROUNDED by them. And, you know, it's an odd thing...   How many think they are....NOT. The children I teach: it INFURIATES me to hear 10, 11 year olds...older, sometimes even younger go on & on about how fat/ugly/unlikeable they are. DISGUSTS me. Not at them, of course. At our world. That makes women feel so imperfect. Makes EVERYONE feel like they are unnatural & not up to par, just so we can promote the sales of products.

..........and yet. Here I am. Sitting on the couch. Staring at pictures of one of my friends...and trying not to cry. But all I can think is: why not me? I will never be pretty like her. I will NEVER  be skinny like her. Plenty of people tell me I am beautiful...and yet. It's not enough.

She is one of the girls who walks in a room & jaws drop. And all Ic an think is: why..why, God/World/???, WHY can't that be me? I've never known what it was like to be skinny enough to show my mid-drift without starting to sob, later, in the bathroom. I've never known more than a handful of days where I didn't wake up to look in the mirror to wish there was SOMETHING I could do to FIX me...

That seems so.......incredibly wrong. I don't want to be jealous or scared of every woman I meet because of how beautiful they are. And I find them all beautiful. Why...not me?

Some days I feel like I'm pretend. I am a pretend good teacher. A pretend actress. A pretend dancer....  Pretend pretty.  Pretend smart.

Like there really is nothing to me of any value or substance. It's all just a show. And if anyone were ever to scratch deep enough to see beneath the surface.....they would know it's all wrong. All of me is just an act.

But I am afraid to become anything more.

I think I am afraid that if I...................really embraced/looked at/found what I want/who I am/want to be.......what I want to really pursue in life...   That it wouldn't be anything I ever thought or believed. It would have nothing to do with who I have been in my life up to this point...  And then...what would I do?

What if, to truly be happy & comfortable in myself & feel as though I am not living a lie, I would have to throw away everything I believe I am & have always been? What if I would never be perfect/known/noticed?

What if I were just a nobody?  And what if I were fine & could be happy that way....for life?

What if then, I would be perfect? What if I already am?

PERFECT at all times?  
 Beautiful all times...?

Why is that so earth shattering a thing to believe?

And why am I so unacceptable.....to me ? 

Strangers, the silence & the desert...

 "I do believe it's true, 

There are roads left in both of our shoes,

But if the silence takes you, 

Than I hope it take me too..."

~ Death Cab for Cutie

 .        .       .

It is some time ago, now, that I realized: this sort of ache & longing, emptiness, 'in-completeness' (though that's not really quite right)that one feels cannot be satiated by connection with another. It cannot be given to you by someone else because it does not lie in them; it lies in you-- the emptiness AND it's fulfillment.

Wine cannot quench it, food cannot satisfy it...but I find that, even for me: art, passion....the act of living (things I am told are the panacea to such a state of wanting) cannot seem to quell my hunger...

Only build add to the fire. A momentary gratification that leaves me tired and alive...but in the end, wanting even more.


.........I know. I have written about this feeling often.

I once thought it belonged to me & me alone. Then realized it resides within all of us, we merely have varying degrees of it's awareness & different addictions, vices or aides we use to 'cure' or 'mute' it. Or....so I thought. Now, I am unsure.

Perhaps it IS just me. Perhaps there is something wrong with me after all & I am just uncomfortable in my own skin; needy...perhaps I have 'childhood issues' or have not truly found my 'bliss.' Maybe it's just a constant state of spring fever or delusion or an inability to face my problems. Perhaps.

I think not, but I don't know, now.

I DO know..........I have connected with strangers of late. No matter how closely or distantly....

It is THERE. It is strong. And it is devouring me, now.

I worry about the decay of my body. That's an ugly sort of sentence, I know: leaves icky sorts of images...rot & death & smells & dust & age. But I do. I worry there is so much in me & at the rate my body is deteriorating, what should happen if I am still vibrantly alive at 60, still full of hunger & burning....and my body has all but destroyed itse;f?

I have lines. On my forehead...   They were not there before.

I will be 30 in a year & 1/2. This should be a big deal. In some ways it is; in some it is not. However, I do feel myself, I think, transitioning out of 'my youth'...and into....? The next stage of it? The next age? The next era? The next stage of it ALL....

But this hunger remains in me & will not be satisfied. And the more art I do, the greater I realize there is capacity in me for art...but also the greater the void does grow.

I have, as I said, become more & more aware of late....that it cannot, cannot be filled with someone else. It makes me sad, but also relieved. At least it might prove easier to traverse & navigate the waters of love, intimacy, connection...sex...friendship.......everything...now that I am at least aware of it. I am fully & completely aware of the fact that I alone, ONLY can give myself what I desire. The expectations are fading which makes the connections that much more easy & enjoyable....but also less..........fervent. ('I need nothing from you; you cannot give me what I want, only compliment & amplify my own joy & company for a time'). And I realize that I like, very much, my own company. I have....everything I want...in me.

How surprising.

But this also....saddens me. What can I do? Where can I turn? What place or thing can I seek to feed this hunger? This...wonderful but unbearable emptiness?

...................There must be something, right?  (I keep telling myself that).

I feel like it must be so...but what if there is not? I walked away from my closet just now & thought....what if there....IS no 'reason' for being alive? What if we were wrong? Is this what people cling to in religion? A hope for & a reason for this maddening emptiness? And the capacity to justify being right?

I hear the wind outside, and something in me stirs...that seems far more.........tangible than gravity. I am drawn to reach for the stars, in the most literal of ways. I am often driven absolutely mad by this sudden certainty of how vast the world, the universe & being alive actually is...as though my whole body s far too porous & delicate a substance to contain the explosions within me that want to reach out & become part of everything, again...

.......and how does one say that? How does one live that? Is life, merely the answer for it? The only cure: to live. Fully. Utterly. COMPLETELY...live? And by living, to fuel the fire until you cannot stand but seek again for air?

I looked up the word elixir. It's a good word. I like it. I like the way it looks & sounds & feels on my tongue...

 ....the example in the dictionary was, of course:  'Elixir of Life.' There are many stories, of course, about an elixir of life... I was surprised, however, to discover that the word elixir does not me potion, but instead: CURE. A cure for life... ??

How odd, I thought. Is life so horrible a thing, one needs must cure it? I'm sure they meant for aging, so that one should never die.... (Though with how much so many people complain about having to struggle & stumble through life, a cease-aging substance seems like the last thing that would be on one's mind).

Perhaps someone, somewhere....when they coined the phrase, felt a I do now. They felt this yearning & dreamed of a compliment, an easing, a 'remedy' for this wonderful, terrible longing...

In the definition, it also defined elixir as a 'cure-all, often ineffective'... Life, perhaps, is it's own elixir. I suppose. One could say so, yes.

.............But the pulling is so strong, to go... I think, feel deep within....the answer MUST lie somewhere. Somewhere in the stillness. Somewhere in the rustle of leaves or your first dreams as a child or the nightmare you cannot recall; somewhere in the way the stars aligned one night or in a memory half forgotten or a tapestry of  elements woven so intricately they cannot even be seen....somewhere.... there MUST be a key that unlocks it all. And brings an electric sort of...  Peace.

Somewhere.      (Or...perhaps I am simply mad).

They say to go up, one must hit the very bottom; to find the light, you must walk through the darkness....  So perhaps. Perhaps I'll seek my answers in the desert: far, far from the cradling arms of pools & streams; from  waterfalls, wine & sweeter company...

Perhaps....  Somewhere in the silence & bareness & heat.... Somewhere in so much seeming death & nothingness....  

There my elixir lies.