Just an update from a VERY drunk Helen that is supposed to be checking directions on MapQuest. I wrote the following on the plane, and so am posting it ad hoc here. I promise have written a humorous and light one for Thursday, so no need to write me off as the queen of doom just yet.
As it was written, so it shall be....my post:
I am now on an airplane again, this time bound for San Francisco. I will post this once I have the ability to logon.
The wall next to me is cold to the touch, and I can feel a soft breeze wrap itself around my ankles. Is this a good thing? I thought planes were supposed to be secure. The window is closed, but it doesn’t matter-the environment lurking behind it is familiar enough to me. If I were to open it, I would see a rolling mass of clouds, black and gray, hiding the terrain beneath their shroud. I know that sitting here is likely to give me leg cramps in another two or three hours, and I will continue to avail myself of ample reading material, as I am one of those “keep-to-themselves” seatmates which I usually find to be a successful method.
The ritual passing of the beverage and meal cart has passed through, along with the clearing of the trays and then the usual rush to the lavatories. More than half of the plane is now stretched out in their armchair prisons and is slumbering away. Lucky bastards. I have never been able to sleep on planes. I find that sleeping invites feelings of irritation and panic upon awakening. Best to just plug along and stay awake. Memories of my business trip and future presentations are fresh in my mind.
I watch my reflection in the window next to me. It’s not out of vanity, really. It’s more like trying to figure out who that is behind the mask. I watch my hand come up and brush the hair out of my peripheral vision. The hand looks thin, flying through the air. A flash of my silver ring hitches the window, and I feel relief, knowing that the constancy of that strip of metal will always ground me. I look down again, nervous about being caught watching my reflection.
I have been reflecting on the whole “home” issue since my posting yesterday. For the first time in my life I can honestly say that I don’t have a home, that I don’t even really have a home base. I have a location where I keep my furniture, but even that’s changing. And I don’t really even care about said furniture…
I find that I have no sense of complacency in my life. I don’t think such a feeling has a range in my set of emotions. I have spent my entire life in a state of nomadic terror, stumbling along the United States trying to find out where I could hang my hat comfortably. I have never found a niche for myself, never found the place that I could call home and look forward to coming home to. My possessions never hold too much of an allure to me, and I walk around with almost a sense of embarrassment, an apologetic self-stance.
But maybe that is the way of life. Maybe I should quit trying to figure out where I belong and accept that really, none of us belong. It's just a sea of moments. All sense of control and comfort are an illusion. And right now, this one moment is mine. It's up to me to look at the image in the mirror and say: wherever you are, and whoever you will be, just accept this moment for what it is.
Easier said than done. But it's a start.
I'm going to bed with Luuk now. In a tequila-fueled haze.
-H.
PS-to everyone that left me a comment on my post yesterday (and all of the new names, welcome and come back!)-thank you and I really, really love you guys for that.
And PPS to the anonymous person who posted-you write just like my mom would. And maybe you are my mom, maybe you aren't. But I feel like somehow, I now maybe nderstand her and she understands me. So whoever you are, you made me cry...and thank you.
Posted by Everydaystranger at October 23, 2003 08:22 AM | TrackBackCompletely intriguing and beautiful writing (thinking)...
Posted by: Kyle at October 24, 2003 08:36 PM"Home" is yours for the making. You can make it so, if and when you choose to do so. You can't remain passive and hope that 'home' will somehow, someday happen. But it seems that you're still running from 'home.' Reality requires that you, when you're ready, make a decision, make a commitment, face the risk of loss and pain if it fails, and invest in your chosen somewhere, and eventually in your chosen someone (when you find him). It seems that you're still too afraid of loss, and that you want an automatic, a guarantee, an unbreachable security, and maybe you're relying and waiting on someone else to provide that for you. But you have to provide 'home' for yourself, and you can. You have to make it so. And then, you can healthily, and without fear of loss, open your home to share with someone else....Take some well-deserved confidence in the fact that you can, as you should, be responsible for your own happiness. Remember: active, not passive.
Posted by: anon at October 23, 2003 09:46 PMLament for H
I can hear you calling
I can see your lips moving
I can feel you reach for me
in this wash of endless sea
I can't help but feel I'm falling
but I know your arms are soothing
I miss you
I miss your wind to blow my sails
to keep me on a course
to keep me going north
I know your just a hands grasp away
My one love
my true mate.
I can hear you calling
I can see your arms out-streched
I can feel you close
in this wash of endless sea
I can't help but feel I'm falling
but I know soon, you'll be with me.
pylorns 10-23-03
(you can take this as from her perspective or his, it really doesnt matter because they are one and the same.)
Posted by: pylorns at October 23, 2003 07:30 PMA friend of my family once sat me down to talk about marriage. He'd been with his wife 30 years at the time. He said that he'd been in at least six different marriages - that every few years, they would have to check in with each other to make sure that their individual growth still fit with their growth as a couple. They were always ready, he said, to amicably separate if what they needed as people defeated the relationship.
There may never be an easy time or an exactly right moment to change your life circumstances. But the difficulty, the incredible challenge of making that decision, will be worthwhile in itself. After a certain age, nothing important we do in life is simple. Sometimes you just *have* to change, no matter the consequence.
By the way, since I was a little bit challenged on the comments below about being alone - here's what I meant. You are clearly a strong, bright woman. You have *yourself*. There's a strength there that's still untapped, and it will help support you.
Posted by: Kaetchen at October 23, 2003 07:11 PMPylorns, baby, you said what I know deep down inside.
I really love my Partner Unit, but he is not my forever. I just don't know that right now is the time to fix that. Then again, when is?
I think I will have this site for a long, long time. In some ways, it's a relief from insomnia (which I share with Jean, Sue, and sometimes Drew). In some ways, it is my take on sex, which I share with...well...everyone. In some ways, it is about moving, which I see Tiffani, Kaetchen and Daniel are a part of. In some ways, it's about being a woman, which I have with LeeAnn, Stevie, Jennifer, Melo and more. In some ways, it is the logical parts of the world-Tom, Howard, Clancy, Pylorns, Agamemnon, and Jim fit this bill.
But in all ways, it's my voice.
And I will know when I find the one and I can tell him about this blog. Because when I do find him? He will know about it.
As will all of you.
Posted by: Helen at October 23, 2003 06:00 PMOk, I didn't comment yesturday because I was swamped here at work, hence what I've been all week, luckily I have had time to post today. Now that I read your post today and your last couple posts. What I am gonna say is prob. the last thing you want to hear.
This is one of those age old proverbs and it holds true today. Home is where the heart is. Your heart has been in the clouds yearning for quite some time. Find a new home for your heart. Let someone else in. You share so much with us here on your site, you need a lover, a confidant a soul mate that you share everything with, everything you tell us, tell that person, and more. I think you had that before, don't keep on the notion that you can't have that again.
Enjoy the time with your current partner unit, but clearly he isn't the one. And once you find that next person, you may not even need this site to get things off your chest, you'll have somone that can listen and can offer advice that you will actually heed to. Cause lord knows that a bunch of strangers on the net cant offer good advice, we're all nuts and voyeurs. Well most of us that is...
Posted by: pylorns at October 23, 2003 05:22 PM