Tonight, I broke down and cried.
You might not think much of it, but to me it was like lightning ripping through the bottle. The last time tears have rolled down my cheeks was a decade or two ago. I honestly can't even remember. Through the years I've often pondered if I've forgotten how to cry at all, but to my surprise and relief, I now have my answer. As my head fell into my hands and a soft burning sensation filled the corners of my eyes, all I could think was: "This is happening. This is really happening."
The catalyst? Something as simple as a song; one that would probably mean next to nothing to you, especially after I've built it up to such degree. A song that spoke to me - to her - with words I hadn't been able to find, words I didn't want to utter... yet words I felt were written with my blood, standing as an audial mirror forcing me to dig deeper and, by effect, tear down a wall inside. A thank you disguised as a farewell, dressed in a eulogy. The act of unravelling gave way for something to flow unrestricted again, tearing itself through the cracks of this stone carcass I've unwittingly allowed time to construct around my vital organs. A painful yet liberating experience.
Though we hadn't felt the tender thorns of romance for a long time and I'm genuinely glad we can both continue our search for whatever lies beyond the horizon, I am absolutely terrified that time will gnaw away at the foundations and I will lose my best friend. It frightens me more than words can describe. As a result, my insecurities have ushered me into completely uncharacteristic, weirdsville-esque situations on a handful of evenings out and about. No doubt a byproduct of the walls and support structures of yesterday crumbling down and re-forming around me, but surprising and bewildering nonetheless. These sporadic excursions into the Twilight Zone have yielded positive and negative experiences, but they've been equally strange and alien in nature. I'll leave the gory details out for now, but let's just say I don't trust my self-control to stretch to its normal extremes during this time of shedding skin.
There is a lesson here - nay, more than one. Some discovered, some still locked away and others hiding in plain sight. That's the reasoning, if any, that shepherds me through the wilderness of my heart and grants me at least a measure of stillness in the midst of all this. I am a half-blind explorer charting treacherous terrain, an inept translator lost for words at the center of the myriad of my own nerve endings locked in incomprehensible dialogue with one another. One emotion confuses another, giving way to more questions that continue to stir the pot.
While I may be somewhat apt at exploring the stormy seas of my inward turbulence and subsequently recollecting the path I've tread for the edutainment of myself and others, I am an absolute novice at showing emotion. It's certainly not a macho thing or some such; my operating manual is simply filled with too many dead end solutions, wordplay and meaningless bravado for even myself to decipher the bottom line. From the cliché of being in touch with one's self has been erected a thicket of truly unconquerable terrain. What I know of myself I have often deducted and reduced from discussion with myself alone, often neglecting how important it is to have faith in the rewards of being bone-bare on the outside as well.
I certainly need to educate myself on where, when and to whom I open up to, but the pickings available to me are honestly too slim to fathom and sometimes I simply can't help myself. At worst, it is quite a sad sight - my tongue tries desperately to hide itself or my fists tighten in front of the keyboard, while I slip into a labyrinth of cold aphorisms and half-truths as I try - truly, truly try - to shine a light upon the bleak landscape within for others to see. My voice seeks comforting echoes, but is generally met with such disdain I want nothing more than for these shells of humanity around me, weighed down by gravity alone, to be swallowed up by the sky's hungry jaws.
Perhaps this lesson offers no depth beyond the indifference that seems to surround me like the river Styx flowing through the streets, alleyways and living rooms I pass by. Perhaps I am an alien in your world after all, simply ill-equipped to sustain myself in this climate. I don't know what to make of it all, but then again, the highest steps rarely divulge their secrets until you've climbed well past their height.
People shroud themselves in crushing disregard, stop pedaling and sink into the milk of featherweight trivialities, wrap their exposed skin in the comfort of the heartless and fill their eyes and ears with the tempest of white noise readily available to all wanting. And this I can say with all the might left in my heart - I will NEVER become one of you! I can breathe a little easier after such realizations, but it comes at a price of feeling even more like a fish out of water.
Most believe that the pale light is comfort enough and succumb to shiver in its depleting warmth, but for us blessed & cursed with wanting to peer beyond its harsh halo, it can be a very lonely existence.
