Requiem for a Dream

The problem with being the door, is that after people cross through, they're off, and I'm still here.

I try to convince myself that I'm projecting, that I'm letting my imagination get away with me, that I'm hormonal or emotional. And while these things might be true, they don't stop me from also being completely right. I might not get the "why" at that very moment, but I'm really good at the what, even from different zip codes.

A few months ago, I found something. It was in rough shape, but part of my talent has always been being handed a dead stick in a pot and breathing life into a thriving plant. I coaxed it, nurtured it, I saw our timeline together grow long and beautiful. And then something came up. I thought I was being irrationally jealous, that the narrative in my head was paranoia and that I should really just get over it because everything was fine.
People who want to be right all the time should try it.

And now it's gone. Not completely, not yet. I'll have it for a few more months, until another gardener moves in, and then I'll get to see my plant less and less, because whatever assurances, I'll always be the one who did a thing that they didn't, and they'll never feel quite at ease around me. I'll be able to visit my plant when other people are around, but really, that will be it for a while.

There's a fork in that timeline, one way, they sprout, and for seven years tend the garden until it doesn't work anymore. That has a fork, one the other gardener feels that the new sprout, and my new sprout will secure our positions enough to feel comfortable. I'm not sure what Future Me will do with that, because Present Me's heart feels ripped out in that spot. You see, in my original timeline, I was the one with that sprout. I'd even named the wee thing. The other fork simply wanders farther and farther away from my path until I can't even hear their sprout chattering anymore.
The other way, they don't sprout, and the garden becomes too difficult to work in about a year and a half. At that time, there's a small possibility I'll get my plant back. More likely, my plant will feel that its roots have been too long out of the garden, it'll see that I have a sprout of my own and set out to find another patch of earth. Future Me will have to see what happens when we get there.

Either way, what I had is gone now, and the only thing left to do is clear my presence from that patch of earth I'd come to call home and step aside like a lady.

A year ago today

I woke up early and wasn't allowed to have breakfast. My stomach had to be empty so that when they put me under, unpleasantness wouldn't follow.

I'm sorry we didn't quite connect there, little one. so very much has happened since then. so much that couldn't have if you'd stayed. you dropped in to say hello, and left again, courtesy of general anesthesia and a latex free OR so I wouldn't have to wait again to see when nature would take it's course. You have a friend now to keep you company. When your time is right, I hope you'll come back.

Ch-Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes

When you learn there's a baby that looks like a baby in your BFF on Facebook, it's safe to assume that your relationship status has officially changed to "friend."

Also, To Jeremy, Jason, Sushi, Deacon, I miss you.
Melissa and Suzanne, you were just wee babes, I'm sorry I never got to meet you.
Kyle Aaron Huff, I don't have anything left but sorrow for your family. I know that no matter what I feel, their confusion and anger and grief at what you did will always be greater. I pray that they find peace, and that when the next time comes around, you can get what you need with compassion, grace and beauty. I wish that I had met you before you broke, before you decided that there was nothing but pain in the world. I don't know that it would have changed anything. I wish my friends were still alive.

Life at home....

Him: I need to shower. I'm covered in invisible hospital cooties

Me: well if they ever become visible cooties, we're fucked

Him: we'll just have to train special attack rats to kill the giant cooties.

Me: You're just trying to get back into breeding sentient raccoons again, aren't you?

Him: they don't have to be sentient.

Me: have you ever tried to train a rat dear?

Him: No, but if we want to train them to do anything but fuck and escape it might not work.

Me: *facepalm*

Quote of the Day

"I find that as I get older, my brain requires as much stimulation as the rest of my body.

So, yes, when I say talk nerdy to me? That's fucking foreplay. Do it right."

Back in the bread line

My contract ended yesterday. Was going to go until June, but later that day I found out that the thing needs to be tweaked so the other thing can work and use the things we've been doing (does this violate my NDC?)
So I'm trying to get in gear around the house. I felt less lonely in a quiet cube farm because I could talk to people online. My house is empty. I like having people in it. I like it when people come over and just do their thing and chat while I clean. It makes it more fun. I used to do things like drunken house-cleaning but then I eventually forgot to get around to the second part.
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It's a bit more under control at the moment. back and forth with the chatting and the getting things done seems to work. I know my brain is happier when I have less clutter, my house seems ot reflect my inner state, and the other way 'round.
Tomorrow I'll be updating my resume and availability with the temp agencies, applying for any jobs on my usual haunts and praying that something comes along before I have to deal with the dicks at unemployment for too long. I'm not working at the school this quarter for a few reasons, among them that the job costs me more than it made me last quarter. I have to pay back ~$600 from winter break because I had a "promise of the same work next quarter" and thus, though I'm making paid claims during the quarter as I work, when I'm not getting paid by the school I don't need to get paid by unemployment either, right? They can't seem to figure out how the jobs with education work, esp in the ad hoc grader/PT tutor department, so I'll just leave it for now. I need to look for something full time with weekends anyway.

I had something profound I was going to say on the matter. alas, all my give-a-shit has been sublimated into domesticity and there's none left to make with the pretty words.
I want a garden this year, with proper beds.
I want a clean shed and house without loads of extra baggage reminding me of all the things I've never gotten to.
I want my home to reflect the mindset I want to have .
I want to stop being paralyzed by the things that should/could be and live what is.
I want the stories in my hands to make it onto a page.

With both hands open.

I first heard the phrase "with both hands open" in the movie version of "The Joy Luck Club." Something about the stories of women struggling to survive in other countries through radical culture changes and then coming to this country to make a new life, only to see their children who never knew the old life scoff until it's almost too late tugs at my soul. Maybe it has to do with how I grew up, and how little people understand of things unless they happen to be members of the "hellish nightmare of childhood" club. We're not having jackets made. A few knowing remarks and an unspoken sense of relief that someone knows, not imagines or sympathizes but *knows* the true depths that cheeky hyperbole and flippant remarks really indicate.
In the film, one of the mothers is watching her daughter desiccate in a loveless marriage that bears too close a resemblance from the very thing she fled China to escape. The mother urges her daughter to leave this cold gray house and her cold, gray man and not to give herself over until she finds a man who loves her with both hands open.

This phrase resonated with me, and does to this day. I started with this idea before I'd actually seen the movie when I came ot the realization that I should not lend out books that I could not afford, financially or sentimentally to make a gift. This prevented me from getting cranky at having given out something precious without laying out clear terms and just expecting that the other party would naturally see things the way I do.

A good scientist cannot afford to be attached to outcomes.

I do consider myself a scientist, and not just because I like science and finding stuff out. in my hallucination of the world, the universe is a conscious entity, and it is learning about itself with every experience we have. I don't believe we are heading toward any predetermined goal, no heaven or hell, but that we are simply seeing what we can learn and where that takes us.

Part of my experiment is figuring out where I fit in all of this. I know that I'm here to interact with other humans, and here to be acted upon. I know that my experiences have given me a ceratin outlook on things, that I have tools and tricks for getting through life that can be helpful in a number of situations. I have, for as long as I can remember, stood up for my friends against greater odds than I probably should have, spoken for those who were too timid to speak for themselves, and finally stopped when I realized I was doing it to keep from noticing myself. When Middle School Me is focusing on her friend's step-father rape, the beatings pale in comparative importance. And yet I know I did make things better for others. I know I did help, and often by taking over at least part of the problem and going into 'stage manager' mode. Years later, I would acutally become a stage manager, and be damn good at it.

Now I'm an adult, and one of the most important cards in my deck is the "no rescuing" card. That doesn't mean no helping, it means that I can't whirl in and take over, that my bossy-pants have to stay in the closet as I let people do their thing. I still haven't figured out where this crosses the line into 'witholding'. See, I also believe that we were each put here with a certain deck, a certain set of gifts and views and words that others are here to bounce off of and benefit from. I believe that if we try to be less than we are, if we let guilt or shame or doubt or fear make us smaller, then the people we encounter who are here for the "full delta experience" are not getting it. And that is a disservice to them. And I also believe that we are all exactly where we are supposed to be at the time we are supposed to be there, and that if things should have happened any other way they would have.

So am I supposed to help or not? Do I go with what I know and what feels right, or with what I think is the right thing to do? Do I let them flounder and wait to ask for my help? How can they ask if they don't know what I have to offer? It might surprise you to learn that I've grown rather accustomed to having one or both boots jammed firmly in my mouth, and just set a place for awkward moments at the table, because they're going to stop by anyway. Much like I came to terms long ago with the fact that I am Newton's bitch, I also surrender to the fact that I'm going to fuck up more times than I can count in life, and the best I can do is try to learn from it and do better next time.

And now we return to the title theme. The line I walk now is an attempt to give what I have to offer without trying to hold on to the outcome. I think this is the best I can do at the moment, and sometimes....often times it feels like it's not enough or I've done something I oughtn't. I have to trust that I'm not that big. That I have influence and sway, but that everyone I encounter has their own ship, their own guide and their own agency to make their life go the way they need to.

I have to give what I have to give with both hands open, for the greatest good of all involved, and trust that the thing that keeps me out of the dark places is strong enough to help us all.