AS I WALK
This last week, I had some thought that simply would not stop harassing me. They were just the kind of thoughts that annoy most, you know, the ones you thought were totally done with you. All through my morning coffee, poached eggs, and prepping my menu for the week, I couldn't shake it.
So I did something about it.
I listened to these thoughts.
Some nagging news precipitated these musings which sent me reeling into a past that I had distanced myself from. A past which carried the old familiar news of me being a shitty friend and distant female. The news was nothing really shocking or surprising in and of itself...but it sent the stinging reminder to my soul that I no longer had a friend that I once had.
It's been a while since the first thing that came to mind when I screwed up or disliked my actions was a message of self-loathing. Half of the pain from the week was the realization that mizz nasty still lurks somewhere down in those murky places my soul has yet to reveal to the light. I hated myself with vehemence for a past version of me that I couldn't control.
So I sat at my desk. Lighted a candle to help me find something sacred there and I wrote. I threw down page after page of all the things you are never supposed to say. It felt good, but wasn't enough. I looked up and saw the road beckoning me. I stashed Ariel into my pocket, hastily donned my hat and scarf, and tromped outside.
The messy rot of the forest floor mirrored the fragrant detritus that is friendship...this mucking about in other people's issues, in their decay, in their deity. It's a complex business, a lifetime work at paradox whilst holding hate and love in a single hand. Humans are the most lovely creations; humans are the most horrific creations.
For some reason, this toying with paradox really helped give me some rest. We cannot help what has been done, but I do believe we can do it justice by wrestling with it until it screams uncle. I had to go into the forest because I had to honor that an old friendship with its old issues and old blood was not done with me, nor I with it. So I jumped right back into the murk of it (one does not easily forget) and though I found absolutely no answers, I saw myself more clearly.
I saw myself more kindly.
I was home.
~CRM
8 comments:
I think one of the hardest things to accept or come to terms with is the loss of a friend. Whether it is due to something we ourselves have done, or simply due to the slow wheel of time and circumstance. We remember the good times and wonder "Where did it go wrong? What changed?" And then, the hardest, do you try to fight for it, or do you accept that change and keep it just in memory?
For me, the resolution comes in knowing how I have grown and that I am (hopefully) a better person now, using the knowledge of the past to inform my present and future relationships.
The ability to let yourself into those emotions and memories is a grand feat. I am still learning that. For now, I run.
There is no inviting or turning away an old friend at times. I have first hand experience.
It is uncomfortable and lonely to feel unsettled with this friend, but I am reminded of Rilke and when he said, "So you must not be frightened,... if a sadness rises up before you larger than any you have ever seen; if a restiveness, like light and cloud shadows, passes over your hands and over all you do. You must think that something is happening with you, that life has not forgotten you, that it holds you in its hand; it will not let you fall."
Maybe we could both use a good reading of Letters to a Young Poet right about now.
Keep tredging those woods, I feel you unearthing this thing.
xo, cbm
"I saw myself more kindly."
Oh thank God. I feel like I've been stepping carefully around the same sort of thing lately and I hope to come to the same point, eventually, of seeing myself more kindly.
Love your words and that soul of yours in hues of India ink.
I think you've got some of my detritus stuck to your shoes.
And every time I hear of your struggle to remain in love with you, I am encouraged to hope. And ever thankful for you in my life.
ladies,
each and every single one of these comments stirred a deep wells spring of a new truth which has existed longer than my old truth...
the new truth being how beautiful a relationship with a friend can be.
thank you,
crm
You are a beautiful writer! xo
you're right, we can't undo the past or change things but we owe it to ourselves to wrestle with it until we've come out on top. it could take our whole lives, but do or die right?
I love your courage my bride... it inspires me. Only this morning I was watching Carl Sagan's Cosmos, and he said "We make our world significant by the courage of our questions, and the depth of our answers."
You manifest this truth my love.
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