Playing with Shadows
I wanted a girlfriend, not an epiphany. The truths I walked away with arrived bundled up incomprehensibly, and I sense so much of what I've been longing for in their unfolding. I would rather have gotten here with her though.
Why couldn't I? Part of opening those truths involves letting go of illusions I held onto for a long, long time; illusions I painted her with not because I found her lacking in color but because I wanted to absolve myself of needing a different kind of light in my life. And so colored, I could dream of her without having to live differently, without having to reach for what I wanted.
In a generally psychoanalytic sense I was well aware of this, but as a favorite teacher of mine likes to say about these things: "I know very well and yet..." It's not as if she's the only person I've painted this way, but she is my favorite canvas. It's as if I bumped into her in the midst of playing out this internal drama noticing at first how great an actor she is, appreciating her style, and wanting to find some way to exit the drama and get to be people together.
Most of us are so busy living out our own fantasies and dreams that we unwittingly demand the folks in our lives play along. There is power in exiting that, and inviting someone else to exit it with you. During an important part of my life exiting that drama with someone is precisely what I meant by love. Perhaps there are other ways to love, ways that don't dismiss the stage. Perhaps I should have looked for one of those rather than letting inertia stifle my old invitation.
Still with so much of my personhood divided into characters working against one another I mostly marveled at managing the movements society blocked out for us. I don't know how much of me she liked and how much of her fondness was for that character I often found myself playing around her. I rather suspect she found him annoying as fuck. I often did.
At a particularly inopportune moment I realized we'd found the limits of my involuntary commitment to that role, and right as I was trying to figure out what to do next, she shared some information.
We fought about it. I was angry and cruel in ways I imagine surprised her. I was quite sure I was right. At first. Now I'm less sure. And less sure it matters. I don't have a clear image of what I want next other than not re-playing the role that led here. But, I miss her. And I wonder how things might be different.