charlie dickens, write me a benefactor.

January 13, 2009 candacemorris 13 Comments

I was composing a long email to my dearest friend today, and I finalized something that has been pin-balling around in my head since the new year. I will include the excerpt here 1) for you to hold me to and 2) to solidify for myself. It's vulnerable, I know - but I am probably too okay with that.

Dec 26 - i take my coffee black.

  • I will let go of what I assume others are thinking/feeling concerning me.
  • I will let go of feeling guilty about needing so much alone/non-social time.
  • I will let go of my need to be needed and let god work more fluidly in my relationships - feeding and acting upon what authentically pours out and refraining from acting out of obligation.
  • I will let go of feeling abandoned when others get together without me, realizing that I am indeed thankful that they are taking care of each other and not overly reliant upon me.
  • I will let go of the thoughts that I hate people and that I am bad at loving them and that I can exist without them.
  • I will let go of trying to preserve my image and instead preserve myself.

There is nothing like the advise, "just let go" to stir up my rebellious anger. I have never been able to do that much less find comfort in the words. In fact, they have served in the past as a demonizer of my already hellish issues. But for whatever reason, I have lately been finding some sort of courage and determination (dare I call it thick-skin?!) to let go. It has been very intentional and meticulous, but so far, not as toilsome as I anticipated. I do not think telling someone to let go will bring about the release they need, so it feels like a very benevolent gift from the cosmos...or perhaps it's all the psychological work I have been determined to see through finally paying off in some way.

Dec 26 - kettle one straight up with a twist
Perhaps if I let go organically, I can rely less on vodka. Here's to hoping.

In other news, Joel and I walked to see "Slumdog Millionaire" last night and fully enjoyed it. Though not the goal of the movie by any means, I walked away with the bursting desire to travel. There is so much of this world that I know nothing about. I was close to going home, selling all my possessions, and moving to wherever the wind takes us (this, of course, presents obvious problems for someone with my personality type, but I try not to kill my dreams before they get their own breath).

In the spirit of not killing a dream (that I know won't happen- HEY STOP IT DREAM CRUSHER), let's take a trip down my future excursions.

  • One month taking Joel everywhere I went in Europe (Paris, Avignon, Cassis, Nice, Venice, Florence, Rome).
  • One month of Joel taking me to the village he stayed in on a work trip to Poitiers, France.
  • One week in the Almafi Coast of Italy.
  • One month in Portugal and Spain.
  • One month in Morocco.
  • Six months at home.
  • One month in India.
  • A couple of weeks in China and the Philippines.
  • One month back to Germany, Switzerland, Denmark, and Norway.
  • One month in London with trips all over the British Isles.
  • Six months at home.
  • Two weeks in Mexico with my parents.
  • Two weeks in Costa Rica.
  • Two weeks in Brazil.
  • Two weeks in Chile.
  • Six months home.
  • Two weeks in the Caribbean.
  • Two weeks home.
  • Two weeks in Australia and New Zealand.
  • One month in Hawaii.
  • One year visiting friends and family in Washington DC, Orlando, Savannah, NYC, Cincinnati, Chicago, Arizona, Idaho, San Diego, Los Angeles, Lancaster, Sacramento, San Francisco, Redding, and Portland.

Yes, perhaps then I will feel as though I have lived. I have no wish to travel as an American, but would instead prefer to live with local families while in these various countries, or build houses, or feed children, or any kind of project that puts the local culture right into my hands.


So I am taking names for the position of my benefactress.
Oh Miss Havisham*, where are you?

~determined, released, and dreamy,
crm

*Actually, Miss Havisham is not the benefactress, though Pip thinks so for most of his adult life. In fact, his secret benefactor was Magwitch, the convict. Sorry to spoil the book you should have read ages ago.

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13 comments:

she said...

dear mme: thank you for your bravery, for your self-awareness, and for putting yourself out there to be held to something. the things you want to let go of are big things indeed, which means that when you pry your fingers open and let them drop, i imagine you'll feel 3.4 tons lighter. you'll be able to be dropped in the ocean with ballast in your shoes and still bob to the surface, no problem. also, your travel itinerary sends me into conniptions of delight and know that you always have a place in (rather non-exotic but still favorable) chicago, even if it's my nun-like twin mattress with me sleeping away on the floor beside. xoxo, she.

oh benevolent lady raven,
i pray for the courage and resolve to continue this quest. and i hope you are right...even though i have no idea what ballast is.

though you have never said it, i know i am always welcome in your home. but i will never, never steal your bed. i will fight you for it - king-of-the-mountain style.

TO THE DEATH!
(j/k. i could never...)

jordan said...

aaaaah, spain and portugal....my love and i are seriously thinking of these two countries for a belated honeymoon to take place within the next year. we've been watching Anthony Bourdain (our lives revolve around food, so much so that we watch tv shows about it almost to the exclusion of everything else...well maybe not but almost)and he recently had an episode about northern spain.....OH MY LANTA does it look amazing. the food looks soul wrenchingly delicious, the scenery amazing and diverse, the food wonderful (did i mention the food?!) and the people sweet and welcoming. So. if we do end up going there, i'll tell you all about it and make you want to go there even more. bah. what a trip. can't wait.

Unknown said...

forgive the structure, but i need to organize everything i love about this post (i know, i'm laughing too).

1. I will let go of trying to preserve my image and instead preserve myself... POETRY

2. obligation, abandoned, rebellious, reason, courage, release, benevolent, cosmos.

3. your photography screams with the voice of vocation.

4. i'll meet you in italy and finish the tour with you until we return to the states. then i'll pick back up with you in chile.

5. i recall some pact detailing the first to receive a check for over $10,000 was to do something... can't remember. let's reassign it to buying 2 first class tickets to one of these locations.

6. yes, to the convict, but she was the benefactor of her niece (?).

7. if they haven't yet read Great Expectations, they deserve to have it spoiled for them.

Dutch said...

"deserve to have it spoiled for them?"

snob

jordan- i saw a rick steves once on spain and i totally knew it was a place for me - you are right! the food, the people, the wine, the cathedrals, the gorgeous men. sign me up.

jmg-
1. eyes welling. thank you.
2. how is it that everything i feel is accepted and loved by you? you are a feat of openness with an embrace as expansive and breathtaking as our california sunsets.
3. screams...how to answer?
4. it's a deal. but you cannot speak spanish to the waiters and embarrass the latin socks off me.
5. it's SO like you to forget. :) it was shoes, remember? you are willing to forgo your first pradas for such a plane ride? fuck that, we NEED the pradas for the plane ride.
6. she was indeed the caretaker/benefactor of estella.
7. did you actually read it or are you pulling this when pip looked an awful lot like ethan hawke?

bmw-
you crack me up. you have totally read it and yet you still side on the "look how snobby you are" side. EMBRACE you inner snob. Everyone's doing it.

Unknown said...

sir wigand-i felt nothing but admiration and praise from that pronouncement-which is, i am sure, how it was intended.

mme-it's simple, you perpetually awe me. of course the pradas! they must indeed precede our flight. as to your last...i shall not endeavor to defend my literary achievements ;)

emilyclare said...

Miss Hav,
(I admit, doesn't quite have the same ring to it - but funnily enough Dickens based her on a Sydney woman - that's right! Miss Eliza Donnothorne). I admire how you so freely and openly admit your thoughts and fears and worries - it takes a lot to actually acknowledge what we feel, and I guess the letting go comes after that. You do inspire me, so much. And Your future excursions are absolutely delicious, and I admit I would want to do a great many of them... but it looks like this year I'll be off to Israel for a week-long conference, and at the very very end of the yearoff to the UK for some work and then to your great country, for a holiday I have dreamed of but haven't even started planning. But all I know is that I must come to Seattle.

Leiflet said...

Oof. i appreciate the very nice thought, but god help us if we are settled down in cincinnati three years from now.

i love how 3 of my 10 comments are mine! i am going to comment on all my blogs more!

Em- do tell us more about Miss Eliza Donnothorne...how did my literary prowess escape such delicious esoteric knowledge. Seattle would host you well!!

Leif - okay fine. i will adjust my travel itinerary accordingly (and was admitedly hoping to skip the midwest if at all possible).

she said...

well frick. i guess i'll have to move, then...b/c i wanna be on this travel itinerary no matter what it takes.

chicago is a forgiven midwest because it's a major metropolis.

Two weeks in AU and NZ is not enough!!! I spent 11 months in NZ and 1 month in AU and still, my desire to tramp around down under hasn't been quenched.

While you might think that you over analyze things, I think your methods are perfectly necessary and when all is said and done, the notes you take on the state of your life and soul and mind can offer me a pinch of a glimpse into a mirror of my own life from time to time. For which I am extremely grateful.

Love you so.

PS The men in Spain...there was a man I passed on a sidewalk once in Barcelona. Ocean eyes. I cried once we were back to back.