Strength v. Weakness
I’m still trying to get Sabrina out alive. Her roots have grown deep between a pipe and the side of my house. I think this might be where the expression between a Rock and a Hard Place came in.
I saw my neighbor again on the street. “You really must do something about it he warned.” We were walking down the street - and now with everyone in masks and gloves I stare deep into peoples eyes trying to find their soul inside and I didn’t recognize him. He stopped as our steps got closer.
“It’s amazing,” he said, “you really don’t recognize people in these things.” Who is that masked man?
He pulls at his mask and I see the side of his cheek. I never noticed how dark his eyes were. My smile has always been my best feature- wide - and open and free. I pull my mask for 2 seconds so I can flash a smile.
He advises me how I do a cutting and grow a tree from her. I’m not a green thumb. I worry I’ll kill the cutting. He says you must pour acid on her roots and just take a cutting and start something new. It’s what any expert will tell you. I think about this as a metaphor and try to decide how I feel about it.
I call Deborah. “Help. Can you save my tree?” She says she will ask her husband. “Don’t worry Toma. We will save it.” She promises to ask Ciucci and I hope he can help.
In the meantime I will research how to do a cutting.
But I don’t want a new tree - I want my tree.
I’m stubborn. I always have been. It’s not my best trait.
I often say emotions are on lines. Stubborn is on the line of determined and that’s the positive side of then line that serves me. But the risk of stubborn is it can make me stomp my feet like a little girl in a candy store.
I want that sucker. Then I barter. I negotiate. I plead. I beg. If I do this then can get what I want? - I’ve definitely stopped talking about my tree and the topic has become much more personal. Love. - I don’t accept I can’t have that sucker. I am trying to learn in the famous words of Kenny Rogers “know when to hold them, know when to walk away, and know when to run.”
In general I am relentless.
And I need to figure out when it serves me to be.
Relentless means I also persevere. I don’t lay down and die when I want to. I get back up. I don’t take no for an answer. It makes me resilient. That’s a good thing. It’s served me well in life. But has it hurt me? Maybe - and again I’m not talking about my tree anymore- maybe the “unspoken No” is an answer I need to learn to recognize and accept. But first I have to see it in order to accept it. God give me eyes to see. And then once seeing - my word I need to learn - Acceptance?
I’m good at compromise. I was raised to compromise. It made me an agreeable little girl and it’s helped me navigate my way around the world as an adult.
But does compromise hurt me?
Barbara says I need the pain to learn.
I say I’m over love. And pain. And relationships that no longer serve me. She says I need the pain to grow. But Maybe I’m better off alone. Quarantine has taught me I’m okay alone.
Last night was the first truly normal thing I did since we’ve been released from quarantine and yet it wasn’t normal at all. I forgot to get dressed. The door bell rang. I looked in the mirror. MC Hammer pants. White tennis shoes. And a 10 year old once white now gray ribbed sweater from The Gap. The diva is departing by the moment. I answered the door. Atleast I had red lipstick on but I laughed... when would have ever entertained this way? I looked like I had been gardening. I hadn’t.
Barbara came to dinner. We were cautious. She sat far across the table. She washed carefully when she entered my house - we never hugged. I gathered the table cloth and put it straight into the washer when she left- the dishes straight into the dishwasher. But we laughed and we talked about men and relationships long into the night.
It was girl talk. Real girl talk. She told how someone had treated her shitty and how in spite of him not treating her with respect she still wants him and I said thank you for telling me this story. As a woman we are sometimes too embarrassed to say when a man treats us like shit- and we accept being treated like shit- because we want them in our life. We want what we want like a child stamping our feet. Girlfriends often don’t tell each other the ugly stories. Yes we tell of love and joy, maybe even hot sex, as well as pain and hurt and betrayal but we don’t tell the whole truth. Those moments when we feel shame. I deserve more than this.
I respect her ability to tell the truth non judgmental on herself.
We don’t tell of those moment when we accept less than we deserve from a man because we want whatever love they will give us. Compromise doesn’t make them love us more. In fact it makes them love us less. If we think we are worthy of being treated like shit they believe us.
This is what I’m learning.
I’m learning to let go of love. Barbara says “let go of love but don’t let go of learning.” We discuss settling - that’s the real issue - settling doesn’t serve me. And my parents raised me to compromise. “Don’t be a jerk Toma.” You’re a jerk if you don’t compromise. But in love can comprise mean settling?
Settling. Now there’s a word that winds it roots deep like Sabrina into the space between a pipe and the side of my house. I have this narrative in my head. This lie I believe. If I don’t settle for something less than what I want then I will be alone. But wait... if I settle anyway- aren’t I just as alone?
Settling is the lie I tell myself. I tell myself that settling for something that’s half of what I want is being realistic. It’s compromise.
But what’s my pattern of success? Should I treat my love life like my professional life? I am focused in work. I know exactly what I want. But I am also fluid. I recognize success comes in many ways. I compromise in work surely but I never settle. In work my head is clear. In love it’s cloudy.
These words - their meaning - crawl like from my head and float around the room- wings on letters.
I close my eyes and do some light work. The white light from our father in heaven comes through my crown and washes through me. When it reaches my toes, my toes sprout roots and tiny buds curl around my ankles as the white light of heaven connects me Mother Earth. I am growing roots.
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