On Love, and LIVING while you're alive....

Day 24 - A picture of something you wish you could change



Okay...... getting a little personal.... I wrote this morning's journal before I knew what today's challenge was!!!! But it's perfect. Here it is (with a few edits made to protect the.... can't say innocent.... but those who did not sign a disclosure on being my friend! hahahaha.)



I have spent a lot of time considering this man woman relationship thing. A lot of people ask me why I'm STILL SINGLE. Oh my god, I'm an old maid. And for a while this question bugged me, because, really, why am I? Mostly, I cite the need for extreme freedom to run around and do my thing. Guys can be... so... needy. None of the ones I've dated (insert sarcastic laugh here) and since like attracts like, I know I resemble that comment. I mean, let's check out my dating history and we know, my best relationships seem to be the ones that were clandestine, forbidden, secret, boundary crossing.... god. My life is like a Russian novel. And so, since I no longer want "crazy" as a way of life, and since I am a recovered Drama Queen, answer part two about why I'm not married is because I don't know, or haven't known yet, how to get into relationships with men who are creative AND independent AND smart AND fun AND also not possessive and not obsessive and not nuts. So, the following logical answer is: I don't want to be in a relationship. I'd say this is pretty spot on. They take a lot of work and it takes a very strong man to be able to stand next to a very strong woman. And a lot of the time I'm too busy having fun to notice the great guys all around me. So, a combination of rotten luck historically (bad picker), being fiercely independent, and, oh!



The really important one:



not really buying into our cultural concept of "dating," "hanging out," "relationships," "marriage," etc.



It seems like so much of the time, whether you are male or female, straight or gay, it seems to not matter gender or orientation on this one: dating is a series of needs and fears covered over by "getting the other person to like me" whether or not "I actually like them" and then suddenly one or both has been talked into a relationship by the other and no one really is sure it's a good idea, but damnit, I guess it's better than being alone.



Then, there is the Erin style, wait until you meet some crazy amazing prince who sweeps you off your feet and then notice they are a drug cartel leader, not a revolutionary poet. Dang CIA is STILL calling me about that one.



Okay, then there are the inspirational ones. My parents have been together 40 years. My brother and sister in law have been together for, um, ever, I guess, and I see them in love, and then working with each other, and dedicated to each other and their lives together. That's amazing.



But mostly.... mostly..... I see..... a bunch of expectations so high they can never be met based on an idea that has nothing to do with who the person actually is in his or her heart, because..... he or she doesn't actually even know who he or she is.....



Lots of hope and fear.



I am done with fear. I am done with people who hold me back. I am done with ideas that suck me dry. I am done with hope and I am on to faith.



And so, until then......



What I wish I could change, and what I am changing about me, is my relationship to SELF and, specifically, to SELF AS WOMAN. I am changing my attitude about glorious womanhood, so that I may change my relationship to YUMMY MANHOOD.



Interestingly, I spent a little time with an old guy friend yesterday. He's lonely, and I know he'd like girls either for getting laid and maybe more (no judgment, I feel the same way) and.... he has no problem "getting" girls, but does he actually want them the WAY he can get them? I share his dilemma..... but on the opposite side of the gender coin.... apparently, we are Artemis and Apollo here.... he doesn't actually want to get into a relationship for whatever reason, just as I'm not sure I want to either......



And, I think so much of it has to do with how much we, as a society, as a culture, have been perverting and deviating our faith in our masculine and feminine energies...... Just as women are taught to be thinner, to be more perfect, to be the sexiest according to an IDEA outside of self, instead of WITHIN..... These guys just don't believe in their manhood. And why should they? They have not been celebrated for it. They have had to buy into a series of cultural rules and laws that are conflicting and yet stoic patterns and methods of behavior that are mean, unjust, unmanly, fucked up, and so they saw the bullshit but were born into this society just like I was, and, having no tools and no way in and no way out, decided to start drinking or drugging or TV-ing or eating or smoking or work-aholicking or lying or cheating or prolong the intimacy game or cutting off or masking or lying to self or distracting self from the no choice wallowing of modern society--- at the urging of their fellows who were receiving, at least, some relief from the ordeal of being alive--- and suddenly they were sucked into a game of treachery, lies and deceit- against the self- with little chance of freedom.



....Now, they have been given a glimpse of a diamond, and they know they can crawl out of the dirt to grasp that diamond, but the path is full of old regrets and lost chances and pain and sorrow and misery, until they see the opportunity of possibility, the chance at "me" and then.... then........ when they can be okay with the worms and the fungus and the dirt and the muck, be in joy because they be, then they can be men. But how do you say that to a man? You don't.... I don't..... Because guess what?



I'm going through the same thing as a woman.



So, I write this instead..... I celebrate them in moments and instances for being men. I let them take care of me. I let them hold me. I champion them not just as a friend but as a mother, as a lover, as whatever woman figure is needed in this moment. Kwan Yin, Mother Mary.... Lakshmi, Aphrodite, Freya..... Athena, Hera, Maeve.... Durga, Kali...... Venus, Isis... Tara..... I become that with which you need, as you need, to be of service to you, and no with disregard for me, but with the highest integrity of my being, the highest integrity of my soul, for I am a woman, and I know that ONLY against the backdrop of your manhood. i.e., I'm not turning my back on feminism. I know what those women did for me, for us. I would not be writing this today if it weren't for my ladies of history who FOUGHT for this right.



Only, I wish to invite a sort of balancing of the energies into our world. As we begin to see that we need to tend and turn more and more to our mother, earth.... I aspire to practice my own behaviors as such. I wish to BE NATURAL, not mimic nature. Why? Because I'm part of the natural world, too. I'm a monkey, I'm a rose, I'm a river.



And when, in this parceled out, sanitized modern society, when do we truly get to be women, truly receiving our men? And I am not talking about gender roles, I hope we all know I am meaning also the true center of self and energy feminine or masculine, be you man, woman, or something else. I mean, when does feminine TRULY get heard, allowed, received, given to in this society in which we mostly just make jokes about women drivers while emasculating our men? My god. How many more women need to have eating disorders through their dying day? How many more instances of rape and pillage must we pretend are happening to some person OVER THERE? How long will we allow this game to continue until we crumble, a species that could have been? The Holy Grail is right here! Take it. Drink from it. Be here.



Well, for me, the time is now. Done. I was born. I made it onto earth. I'm alive. So I'm here and let's play!



I'm into life. Not my idea of life. Not my philosophy of life. Not any rules or laws "I'd" like to see about life.



But being alive while I'm living.







What would I like to change?



I want for every person, man, woman, child, otherwise (why not!?) To have the freedom to be ALIVE while they are living.





xxoxxoxxoxxoxoxoxoxooxoxoxoxoxooxoxoxoxox



with love of the deepest sort,





Erin