Let He who is without a Partner Cast the first Aspersion
Moving through my life, moving through my day, moving through the vagaries and pain that comes with my situation I keep hearing something from a substantial number of my friends. These are not CASUAL friends, rather they are friends who have known me for a long time and have watched me flail about like a drunken Zombie looking for some sort of happiness and fulfillment. They have watched me tilt at feminine windmills in the past, comforted me when my lance was shattered and the knight of the mirrors showed me how truly pathetic I was (or felt I was anyway). At moment like these my friends will place a caring hand on my shoulder or pour me another cup of coffee and say:
"You need to find a friend in yourself, you need to be happy alone before you can be happy with someone else!"
The funny thing about all of these friends is that they all share a single trait in common. ALL of them are on my "don't call after 6 PM" list. The reason for that is pretty damn simple:
They all HAVE SOMEONE.
I will go even further and say they all HAVE someone and HAVE HAD someone for sometime. They are all in secure relationships with partners who share similar aspirations and goals. To go further, since most of them have been my friends since BEFORE they had these relationships I can safety venture that in few, if any, of them did I EVER see th kind of strength and resolve that they all want me to pull out of a hat like some birthday party magician. Some floundered from relationship to relationship like their emotional gyros were outta whack. Some traded an old relationship for a new one, some have been together so long that they cannot remember what it was like to be alone (or if they do it is a memory as old as Senior Ball or grad trips to Disneyland).
She and I argued about this very point long and hard, her being of the "you gotta suck it up and be strong" school of thought and me of the "...it's a sorry bastard indeed who never allows himself to care enough to lose a bit of himself in a "We" or "Us" relationship. No resolutions were had, many words were exchanged.
Now you have to understand that I postulate that there is a difference between "need" and being "needy". If you are NEEDY that means you cannot survive without the aid of someone else, either tangibly or physically. If you NEED someone though, that means that you know who you are and what you want, that when you find the right person you are wise enough to know that if you let go of just a little of yourself that the benefits you reap will be worth it. It is like a chemical reaction that yields more energy that it requires, the combination of two hearts, two spirits, two people becomes an "us" that is greater than the sum of its parts.
In the same way that I believe that people from Canada never actually hear themselves say "EH?" I believe that people who have an established bond like that are pretty much unaware of it. They take it for granted and don't recognize, or allow themselves to recognize, that other people want what they already have so badly that they will go to amazingly extreme lengths to get it. They are oblivious to the fact that something so simple in their own lives could be so valuable to someone who doesn't have it.Add to this that everyone loves to make decisions for other people. They are like that because if they spend their time assessing other peoples shortcoming they won't actually have to deal with their own.
I'm sorry but given those stricture I have to say that as much as I love those friends their perceptions are as valid as a Priest's views on sex.
One foot in front of the other. Tick Tock, tick Tock. I am learning who I, in fact, am by living my life alone. I am learning not to define myself by the judgment of others, or upon other people's presence (or absence) from my life. At the same time though I have been alone long enough, even when I wasn't "alone", to know when something comes along that makes me better and brings me that much closer to the person I want to be.
That thing might be my work, or a hobby. It might be a place or ritual. Then again it might be part and parcel of having a certain person in my life, the nitro to my glycerin. The presence of THAT person in my life, in whatever capacity, make me just a little stronger, just a little taller, just a little happier. Their presence makes the days brighter and the burdens lighter. Their presence makes me just that much closer to the man I want to be.
What kind of fool would not NEED that in their life?
"You need to find a friend in yourself, you need to be happy alone before you can be happy with someone else!"
The funny thing about all of these friends is that they all share a single trait in common. ALL of them are on my "don't call after 6 PM" list. The reason for that is pretty damn simple:
They all HAVE SOMEONE.
I will go even further and say they all HAVE someone and HAVE HAD someone for sometime. They are all in secure relationships with partners who share similar aspirations and goals. To go further, since most of them have been my friends since BEFORE they had these relationships I can safety venture that in few, if any, of them did I EVER see th kind of strength and resolve that they all want me to pull out of a hat like some birthday party magician. Some floundered from relationship to relationship like their emotional gyros were outta whack. Some traded an old relationship for a new one, some have been together so long that they cannot remember what it was like to be alone (or if they do it is a memory as old as Senior Ball or grad trips to Disneyland).
She and I argued about this very point long and hard, her being of the "you gotta suck it up and be strong" school of thought and me of the "...it's a sorry bastard indeed who never allows himself to care enough to lose a bit of himself in a "We" or "Us" relationship. No resolutions were had, many words were exchanged.
Now you have to understand that I postulate that there is a difference between "need" and being "needy". If you are NEEDY that means you cannot survive without the aid of someone else, either tangibly or physically. If you NEED someone though, that means that you know who you are and what you want, that when you find the right person you are wise enough to know that if you let go of just a little of yourself that the benefits you reap will be worth it. It is like a chemical reaction that yields more energy that it requires, the combination of two hearts, two spirits, two people becomes an "us" that is greater than the sum of its parts.
In the same way that I believe that people from Canada never actually hear themselves say "EH?" I believe that people who have an established bond like that are pretty much unaware of it. They take it for granted and don't recognize, or allow themselves to recognize, that other people want what they already have so badly that they will go to amazingly extreme lengths to get it. They are oblivious to the fact that something so simple in their own lives could be so valuable to someone who doesn't have it.Add to this that everyone loves to make decisions for other people. They are like that because if they spend their time assessing other peoples shortcoming they won't actually have to deal with their own.
I'm sorry but given those stricture I have to say that as much as I love those friends their perceptions are as valid as a Priest's views on sex.
One foot in front of the other. Tick Tock, tick Tock. I am learning who I, in fact, am by living my life alone. I am learning not to define myself by the judgment of others, or upon other people's presence (or absence) from my life. At the same time though I have been alone long enough, even when I wasn't "alone", to know when something comes along that makes me better and brings me that much closer to the person I want to be.
That thing might be my work, or a hobby. It might be a place or ritual. Then again it might be part and parcel of having a certain person in my life, the nitro to my glycerin. The presence of THAT person in my life, in whatever capacity, make me just a little stronger, just a little taller, just a little happier. Their presence makes the days brighter and the burdens lighter. Their presence makes me just that much closer to the man I want to be.
What kind of fool would not NEED that in their life?
posted by Martin "Bucky" Cameron at
8:04 AM
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