No Undo, No Do Overs

No Undo, No Do Overs

2024/02/18

Life is not like a software program, it also is not a game.  There is no Undo button, and Do Overs.

I have fought my way through andropause, the midlife crisis.  I am now on the downhill slope, the inevitability of mortality squarely in front of me.  They say you should not have any regrets.  I cannot help feeling that I do have one major regret, though I also know I do not.

On one hand, I regret leaving her.  I have returned to my former self.  Life is calmer.  I understand I need space to recharge my social batteries.  I now know what it would take to live with someone and keep peace with her, and myself.  I have not found a companion, perhaps because everyone is gauged against my ex, but mostly because my introversion makes meeting people extremely difficult.  The chance that another Elizabeth, full of cheer and exuberance, will plunk herself down beside me is very unlikely.  Lightening does strike more than once in the same place but only at the highest points, not in the lowest valleys.

I regret that I let go of that love.  I have learned what we had was indeed love, the way we all think it should be.  Feelings so deep they cling to you with an unshakeable static.

On the other hand, in a frightfully human and dissonant way, I also do not regret leaving her.  I left for the right reason.  I have calmed down, my hormones settled and my former self lives anew, but I am still not the right person for her.  I am still that cowboy in jeans who enjoys box lunches, and she is still that princess in flowing gowns who enjoys high tea.

Some would argue, ‘Learn new things.  Take a chance.  Go get you some.’  Though I must recognize, it has been many years.  While I have surfed the rough waters of my own self, she has also climbed her own mountain.  My love for her has not faded, but what of her love?  Though she has sent small kindnesses my way, she has every right to be bitter.  If not bitter, totally void.  Early on, she asked me to respect boundaries, which I have.  That is why Santa is a bit secret.  I have learned that many people survive breakups by executing clean cuts – no hatred, no malice; the other person simply becomes all but nonexistent.

It would be rude and inappropriate for me to ‘take a chance’, as I respect the boundaries, and I am still the wrong person for her.  But I will never let go of the love.

What does it mean when, behind all the vignettes my mind created last night, were the lyrics;

“There's a light

Over at the Frankenstein place

There's a light

Burning in the fireplace

There's a light, a light

In the darkness of everybody's life”

?

I Wonder

(2024/02/14)

We did not fight or argue,

Though we drifted apart.

It has been years,

And on this Valentine’s Day,

And every day,

I wonder why.

It All Went Wrong

Originally Written May 11, 2013, edited in 2024, never posted (until now 02/13/2024)

In a dream, I walk into the gym to begin teaching.  The room is not as it really is, but is a dream-spun training room.  The floor banks from the entrance down to the far right corner.  The students are scattered about.  I have difficulty getting them to pair up and get ready for training.

Several older grapplers are near the entrance of the room, playing with the timer, until they finally make it malfunction completely.  One of them had tried to set it to do 100 minute rounds.  I try to explain that the clock doesn’t allow it, besides, who would want to work multiple rounds longer than an hour and a half?  As we all gather around the timer in an attempt to fix it, one of the larger grapplers puts me in a poor headlock, eventually tying up his own hand within his gi so that he cannot release me, while he also cannot set the lock.  Though not threatened, I cannot get free, nor could the grappler free himself from his own grip.  Eventually I slip out of his trap, and continue to try and instruct the unruly class.

A student, with his girlfriend partner, uses the focus mitts improperly, holding them as well as striking them.  In effect, he feeds himself for his own kicks, which he executes toward his partner – a very dreamlike distortion that is physically impossible but seems normal within the dream.  I chastise him, pointing out that the feeder does not strike, the striker does not feed.  I then proceed to show the class the next combination to work.

I select a student with whom I am familiar.  I have her use the larger Thai pads and feed for me as I demonstrate a kick sequence.  As I began to throw my kick, she backs up, slipping magically through the wall, forcing me to stop mid kick.  With the partner gone, there is no way to demonstrate the sequence.  The class, which seems to be about five groups of two or three people each, becomes even more unruly.

In frustration, and feeling class time is nearly done, I begin to exit the classroom.  I pass by several folding chairs near the entry way, chairs that had not been there earlier.  As I pass the chairs, which at first appeared empty, I realize they do have people in them, and one of them is upset I had not noticed her, though I really had not noticed the people there at all.  I decide I need to return to the room and formally close the class and apologize for having not provided a good training period.

As I turn around to reenter the room and address the class, there she is in one of the chairs.  She turns to look at me, and I lose all words.  I stammer, trying to apologize to the few students for the clumsy nature of the class, but I cannot focus or form words completely as I became more and more aware that she is right there looking at me.

I turn to leave and she gets up.  We both met up in the entry hallway.  She has with her a small child, six or eight years old, who is proud to announce that he had just gotten his middle name.  I have the sense the child is a nephew of some kind.  As the three of us walk out to a main room, I congratulate the boy on his new name, and then he turns and simply evaporates.  It is only then I get a full and clear look at her.

She looks as she did decades ago when we first met.  Her hair a bit longer then it had been in our last years.  She is wearing a very familiar heavy blue sweater, black open weave shawl, black shin length skirt, black transparent hose, and black shoes with two inch heels.  A very common outfit for her, one I have seen her in many times.  The sight of her and that outfit creates a sense of continuity, of past, of familiarity.

She moves to a well-padded sofa that does not have arms.  She sits down on it, and says, “I think I have a Valentine somewhere.”  She has several small gift wrapped packages, each in a metallic paper, one yellow, one blue, one green, one red, and so on.  She begins carefully opening a bit of the wrapping to look inside, searching for a suitable Valentine offering from her store of emergency gifts.

I beg her, “Please don’t.  Don’t.”  I cross in front of the sofa and sit beside her.  As I sit down, she turns and sort of curls up, her head against the back of the sofa, facing downward, as she brings her knees up on the seat.  I sit against one of her knees, my back lightly resting beside her head.  I keep repeating, “Don’t.  Please don’t.”

In my dream, I fight back tears.  I feel a bawl growing in me.  My dream moves from dream to half-dream.  I am neither awake nor asleep.  In my real self, I can feel the tightening of my chest.  My throat is clamped in the grip of holding back a cry, my breathing small gulping inhales as I avoid exhaling, knowing that a long expire will result in an uncontrollable burst.  My eyes feel heavy, full, warm, and wet, my closed lids holding back what would be a torrent of tears.

As I rise from dream toward waking, I realize I am physically experiencing the feelings in my dream, and holding back its sorrow.  Moments of effort remove the rhythmic pumping of my breath, and allow the tears to dry, and the hammer in my chest to cease.  I wake.

It all went wrong.

It Happened Again

Originally Written and Posted June 28, 2012, edited in 2024

It happened again.

Time heals all wounds, they say . . .

I have grown more comfortable in my own skin then I have felt for a very long time.  With comfort comes a certain beige banality. Hermitage has a homogeneity.  I would not say that it lacks stimulation, but the emotions are soft.  The highs aren’t so high, the lows not so low, and there are very few turns in the road.  It isn’t bad really.  It is serviceable, comfortable, and safe.  I rather like it that way, but it does come at a cost.  Yin and Yang eternally strapped to the seesaw.

It happened again.  Like most nights, when I laid down last night, I sent out my thoughts.  There is no god, but there is an energy and I send my thoughts out into it.  I wish Alex well, and Dad, and Kim.  I think of Mom.  And I think of Elizabeth.  I hope that she is well and all right, and happy. Like most nights, my mind worked, drifting from thought to thought, examining an issue here, and reflecting on a resolution there.  And then the blackness absorbed me.

Being a night-owl hops your life around the clock.  During the mid-morning hours, when most are starting to feel the weight of the day, I usually still lie prone.  Often this is when the dreams are deepest. This morning was no exception.  It started simply.  I was unpacking something, a tiny trinket – a small teapot and high-heeled shoe on a miniature platform, all porcelain and white and pure, and all no bigger than two thumbs.  It made me think.  “Had I missed something?”

I rushed into the middle room of my hermit’s hole, where I opened a file cabinet drawer.  I found an old yearbook, with signatures and pictures.  It was hers.  “Oh my, I will have to get this back to her.” Then a pair of fur edged gloves, and several floppy, fabric, flowered purses.  And then books – books upon books upon books, filling the drawer as if it were a gateway to a larger dimension.  “Oh my.”  I clutched a colorful clutch and held it to my cheek, and began to weep.  “I’m sorry.  I am so very sorry.”

Suddenly I woke with the sorrow heavy, the concern real. Were there really things I had accidentally spirited away?  No.  Then I remembered.  I know every nick and knack in my recluse’s realm; there are no beautiful bags or boxes of books that should not be here. It was a dream, full of deep emotions not felt during the steady pace of my waking life.

They say time heals all wounds.  But these are not wounds, and I will keep them safe.

I Can't. I Know.

Originally Written and Posted on 1/12/2013, edited in 2024

Last night, as I fell through consciousness and floated toward dreamland, I found myself in a community.  The collection of homes and small buildings quickly morphed into a single, large communal dwelling.  I was in one of two primary living rooms within that dwelling.  There was a nameless, tall, thin, Nubian woman in the room with me.  She approached me seductively, leaning in for a kiss. As she did, several other people entered the room.  I gently backed away, saying, “I can’t.”

Then my eye caught a man.  He was also tall and thin, his skin a smooth mocha color, his hair short.  I was fascinated with his eyes. He was one of those African Americans with light color eyes that are always stunning.  I asked him what color his eyes were.  I could not tell if they were blue, grey, or green.  He said, “They’re blue.”  Slowly, like a fine film camera move, my vision floated in toward one of his eyes.  My view grew closer and close until all I could see was the iris itself.  It was beyond blue, a sort of soft pastel rainbow that shifted and flowed.  I was fascinated by it and asked, “How do you get that color?”  He replied softly, “Rainbow drops.”  Suddenly, but not in a shocking way, I realized he was preparing to kiss me.  At that moment, I heard some crying and bawling behind me.  I backed away and said, “I can’t.”

I turned to see what was going on.  Laying on a sofa was my last ex, Elizabeth.  Sitting beside her was a woman whom I recognized as a friend of hers, but I do not know the woman in real life, the knowledge of friendship tied strictly to the dream.  The friend had a large pillow over Elizabeth’s face and upper body, almost completely concealing her, but not smothering.  Only the maker of dreams knows how I knew it was Elizabeth.  She was crying and beating her hands against the sofa in a childlike temper tantrum.  The friend was using the pillow to keep her contained as she tried to soothe Elizabeth with calming words.  I got up and went over to Elizabeth, the pillow still covering her face and upper body.  I gently took her hand and she quieted down almost immediately, like a child who had just gotten a boo-boo kissed.

The dream swerved and I was in my private space in the distant back of the massive communal dwelling.  It was time for sleep, and within my dream, I dreamt.  In my dream within a dream, I wondered why I could not kiss the man.  I realized that, while I enjoy a close connection with males, a connection that I do not have, I am not gay, and I do not want that form of connection.  Then within my dream’s dream, I wondered why I could not kiss the woman.  My inner dream revealed to me that I couldn’t share physical contact without certain feelings and words.  My dreamed dream mulled over the idea that I can carry out the acts, but I cannot perform.  I cannot enjoy without the words and feelings.  I can’t.

As my dreamer’s dream focused on these questions, my dream dreaming self was awoken by a loud commotion.  In the top-layer dream, I sprang up and began running from my place of exile in the far back corners, out through the hallways, maneuvering toward the main areas of the large communal maze.  Bouncing off walls in a frantic dash, I fought my way into one of the living areas.  In the adjoining living room – more of a foyer – was Elizabeth.  She put down some luggage and began to cross the floor, entering the living room I was in.  I sat on the sofa, shaken and concerned, asking, “Are you all right?”  She said, “Yes.” I wailed, “Oh thank god,” and I began to weep.  My tears were a mixture of joy in her safety, and sadness at my loss.

She was suddenly in front of me, sitting on the floor.  As my tears flowed, I held her hand, kissing and caressing her fingers.  She has a small mole at the base of her left thumb, and while some see such a thing as a distortion, to me it is a sign of her uniqueness, and I kissed it gently.  She kept saying softly, almost weeping herself, “I am sorry. I can’t.”  I said sadly, “I know.”

My real life self was startled awake.  So deep and intense was the dream, I did not perceive the nearby train as it ran past, it feeling more like the opening roar of the apocalypse.  When my living mind finally recognized the normal event, I became aware of the dream and refreshed it in my mind, wanting to hold onto it, making a mental point that I must jot down notes when the intended beginning of my day arrived.  In that mental refreshing, I drifted off again.

I was outside.  The day was cloud covered and dreary.  Everything was lit well enough to see, but there were no shadows, that sagging grey feeling was all around me.  I recognized the area as a part of the university campus that I often traveled through years ago, but that recognition was twisted and dream woven.  It was both outside and inside, open, but not fully.  It was the campus, but also a commonly visited movie theater.  It was today, but it was another day, and yet another day.  It was all these things at once.

Elizabeth and I passed by each other, walking in opposite directions. Time and time again we passed.  My feelings were heavy and deep with sadness.  I fought back tears.  With each passing, one of us would say, “I can’t,” and the other would respond, “I know.”  Each taking turn with the negative greeting, and the other taking turn with the acknowledgment.

Then we both entered a movie theater, but it was not like any theater I have seen, as there was no screen.  We both looked for a seat not knowing the other was doing the same.  We took seats only to realize we were sitting near each other.  Elizabeth looked at me, and with great sadness said, “I can’t.”  I replied equally sadly, “I know.”

Her friend from the dream within a dream appeared, and Elizabeth’s sorrow turned to joy as the two clasp hands.  I felt her joy and was happy for her.  Again, Elizabeth said to me, though this time with a touch of comfort, “I can’t.”  I smiled at her and said with understanding, “I know.”  The three of us left the theater and entered an area that resembled the corridor of a large mall.  The friend, who I knew only in the dream itself, began to lead us all to a secluded spot. There was an unspoken understanding that the three of us would unite in a blood-brother style ceremony, with Elizabeth at the center. I woke.  The dreams connected together, their feelings and focus so crisp and sharp they seemed more like reality.