Carpe Noctum
25 August 2009 19:30![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
amulI mentioned before, however obliquely, that a recently-made friend of mine is a cancer survivor who might be experiencing a recurrence.
*long pause*
It is a strange, hard thing. Because it's not just her whose company I enjoy, but her whole social network. There's this strange sort of tribal node-like societal thing that happens like gates into rooms with gates and puzzle traps like a game which distracts me from my thoughts in really provocative ways but I'm avoiding the thing I'm trying to say and I should get back on topic.
I can't really fault her for bringing it up all the time, because I know it must be on her mind, and it is important that the people she cares about are kept in the loop. It's just a bit odd to be constantly reminded that I'm in that circle, for all of the handful of times we've met face-to-face. When....if...if it ever.....I will be hurt, to a degree disproportionate with the physical measure of time spent together. Losing myself in that horrid daydream for a moment, I firmly believe that her boyfriend, a gruff and reserved kind of guy, wouldn't think twice about crying in front of me. That kind of friends.
At the same time, I am the new guy in the group. My bond to the others is precarious, and travels through my friendship with her. I'm still very much in a place where if our association ends for whatever reason than I'll lose those other friendships too.
And, let's be honest, I'm not spending all that much time with these people to begin with. They don't even live in the same state as I do.
Because of all of this, with each step towards greater (platonic) intimacy, there is a pause. There is an uncertainty. There is a question that lingers between us which I've never heard asked inside a friendship before. Are you sure? and the asking of it is in itself a strengthening of bonds such that I don't know how to not grow closer and closer to these amazingly awesome people, without walking away outright. Which would be a horrible thing to do.....
....if she lives.
I've been inexplicably aware of my mortality for months now, unable to understand the root cause of this growing sense of brevity to my life, but it is here and in me, and I don't want to waste time. I want to pursue my dreams with newfound vigor. I want these moments to act as the cathartic soap opera scene which changes myself forever. I want to reach out to the women I still love whom I've lost contact with, and embrace them, and tell them to forget about the past, the mistakes, the anger and let us just be with each other again. Life is too short, I want to tell them all, and I miss you too much.
I cannot bring myself to do it. The last time I reached out like that, the rejection hit me too hard, and I let myself wallow in it for too long, and life is too short for me to risk the happiness I have for the happiness I want, and the thought makes me feel small and worm-like.
I was always a Good Little Boy, when I was sick. I'd never lie about how I felt, never tried to get an extra day off school. I wouldn't try to get out of bed too soon, either. I would lie in bed and wait until my mother told me the fever had passed, and then I would get up and be on my way through the world again. As a Man Grown, I pick at the scabs to see if they've healed yet, and in some ways I try to pull the cast off before the bones have finished mending and in other ways I lie in bed pretending fever.
And the core truth which runs through all those hollow expressions of myself, is that I am not satisfied with my answers to the question of Life. I am not yet half the man I want to be, but the paths seem to conflict.
Should I reach out to my past, or stride boldly into the future?
*long pause*
It is a strange, hard thing. Because it's not just her whose company I enjoy, but her whole social network. There's this strange sort of tribal node-like societal thing that happens like gates into rooms with gates and puzzle traps like a game which distracts me from my thoughts in really provocative ways but I'm avoiding the thing I'm trying to say and I should get back on topic.
I can't really fault her for bringing it up all the time, because I know it must be on her mind, and it is important that the people she cares about are kept in the loop. It's just a bit odd to be constantly reminded that I'm in that circle, for all of the handful of times we've met face-to-face. When....if...if it ever.....I will be hurt, to a degree disproportionate with the physical measure of time spent together. Losing myself in that horrid daydream for a moment, I firmly believe that her boyfriend, a gruff and reserved kind of guy, wouldn't think twice about crying in front of me. That kind of friends.
At the same time, I am the new guy in the group. My bond to the others is precarious, and travels through my friendship with her. I'm still very much in a place where if our association ends for whatever reason than I'll lose those other friendships too.
And, let's be honest, I'm not spending all that much time with these people to begin with. They don't even live in the same state as I do.
Because of all of this, with each step towards greater (platonic) intimacy, there is a pause. There is an uncertainty. There is a question that lingers between us which I've never heard asked inside a friendship before. Are you sure? and the asking of it is in itself a strengthening of bonds such that I don't know how to not grow closer and closer to these amazingly awesome people, without walking away outright. Which would be a horrible thing to do.....
....if she lives.
I've been inexplicably aware of my mortality for months now, unable to understand the root cause of this growing sense of brevity to my life, but it is here and in me, and I don't want to waste time. I want to pursue my dreams with newfound vigor. I want these moments to act as the cathartic soap opera scene which changes myself forever. I want to reach out to the women I still love whom I've lost contact with, and embrace them, and tell them to forget about the past, the mistakes, the anger and let us just be with each other again. Life is too short, I want to tell them all, and I miss you too much.
I cannot bring myself to do it. The last time I reached out like that, the rejection hit me too hard, and I let myself wallow in it for too long, and life is too short for me to risk the happiness I have for the happiness I want, and the thought makes me feel small and worm-like.
I was always a Good Little Boy, when I was sick. I'd never lie about how I felt, never tried to get an extra day off school. I wouldn't try to get out of bed too soon, either. I would lie in bed and wait until my mother told me the fever had passed, and then I would get up and be on my way through the world again. As a Man Grown, I pick at the scabs to see if they've healed yet, and in some ways I try to pull the cast off before the bones have finished mending and in other ways I lie in bed pretending fever.
And the core truth which runs through all those hollow expressions of myself, is that I am not satisfied with my answers to the question of Life. I am not yet half the man I want to be, but the paths seem to conflict.
Should I reach out to my past, or stride boldly into the future?
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on the off chance that wasn't just a rhetorical question:
Date: 26 Aug 2009 17:46 (UTC)stride boldly into the future and enjoy whatever is there- if your past wants you it'll drop in for a visit or something :)
your past should help shape your future: it shouldn't be your future... but you can play there from time to time if you really need to
Re: on the off chance that wasn't just a rhetorical question:
Date: 26 Aug 2009 17:48 (UTC)Re: on the off chance that wasn't just a rhetorical question:
Date: 19 Sep 2009 06:26 (UTC)Beautifully said and true.