and then there are some who
believe that old
relationships can be
revived and made new
again.

but please
if you feel that way

don’t phone
don’t write
don’t arrive.

--Charles Bukowski

my alter-self's gardening style is exuberant, forthcoming to a fault

 

Dave emails, says he wants to stop by and see the roof and say hello.  Aa goes bonkerinos and actually emails Dave with something like “stay away from my woman” (lol, that’s so gansta of an impulse that although at the time I was FURIOUS, frankly now it all seems just ludicrous).  This resulted in a huge fight with his position being “that guy wants to fuck you and you still have feelings for him bla bla” and my position being Wronged ft. Righteously Enraged (o that pride and wrath combo is a doozy, boy howdy).  The jealousy was uncalled for and offensive, which he abjectly admitted once he’d calmed down after a full day of tantrum, (“you’re 99.8% right”, he qualifies, ha).  But that’s beside the point because the dust up too quickly obscured what I was actually thinking.

For a moment, I did hesitate, not just for the loss entailed in that friendship but for that in almost all of my friendships to one degree or another over time.  Is it me or is it inevitable?, that you go to a place with people, and edge of understanding, and then you can’t go any further.  Love and talking, if you follow the path it always seems to lead to a gap between people that neither words nor love can bridge.  Once, Dave and I talked so far down the path of talking that we’d have to go wordless to continue, and we could not do that anymore than siblings could or people whose orientation is not to each other etc., so we went as far as our relationship would take us and then we were done.  End of story.  So it seemed to me, anyway.  Sex is so limited that way, it’s so rarely applicable actually, people just resort to it out of desperation to keep connecting and can think of no other options. (Like what, pies? ok, but still, all metaphors are limited …).
 
(….Or do I just not want to keep connecting? Or do I give up on words too much, too soon? ...) 

So Bale emails and I hesitate, maybe I should let him see the roof and say hi?, but No. I didn't need to be coerced into that decision, Aa's jealousy (although it would have been enough to dissuade me) was unnecessary actually.  Because here’s the thing: I give up on people.  That’s what I hesitated about, a momentary sorrow that I do that in general, that I give up on people.  I get frightened of the gaps, leery lest the other person’s inability to have me understand something will lead to louder or dangerous attempts to do so, a filling sadness weights me, and I retreat back into the safer silent solitary wilderness of my own mind, terribly relieved just to give up finally, like a dying. 

And. Words fail Aaron and me, only occasionally but then drastically.  Thank goodness sex is applicable as a mode of communication (!) between us.  And I am much more frightened of the giving up than of anything else. Even so, I go terribly quiet sometimes, even here. (Heartsick? Heartdisabled, more like. Heartretarded.)

Meanwhile in my head, I'm undergoing open-heart surgery.

--Anne Sexton