Sat 4 Mar 2006
Sorry guys, I just had to put this out there for therapy.
I tread softly in knowledge’s shadow
The trouble with learning is we can’t unlearn
Aye, there’s the rub, isn’t it
I awake in its omnipresence
I choke on it when brushing my teeth
It collapses me throughout the day
Squeezes the air from my lungs in my shallow breaths
Pushes the tears out my eyes
Drains the productivity from my day
Reminds me constantly I am powerless
Steals the colors from around me
Kills the laughter from my past
Isolates me, then shakes me
Unthink me, it taunts daily
Get over me, Ignore me
And it’s too loud, and I’m too susceptible
But I can’t run, I certainly can’t walk
The hows and whys don’t matter
Maybe the way out is
Finding what does.
DARLINK!!
I awoke this morning with something to say to you and couldn’t work out whether or not I should. In moments of “internal rawness,” so much unintended baggage can get attached to the 2-dimentional words of an e-mail. I’ve decided to go ahead now, in view of your last couple of postings. Please put your “unintended baggage” filter on HIGH.
You mention “validation.” Yes, it feels lovely; even helps. But it is, in the end, a false prophet of whom you are well rid. Rather, what is wanted is the galvanized, FINAL conviction, the CERTITUDE, that 1) your causes (priorities) are just and 2) they are the criteria by which you wish to define yourself, once and for all time. When that is part of your internal superstructure, you will be able to sail your own course without doubt and without the need of fellow travelers (however much we may crave them). Much more to the point, you will be able to recognize from MUCH farther off those causes and/or people who would veer you off your course (or sink you altogether).
Are your causes just? I speak, of course, only from MY experience, but I more than believe so, as we seem to have so many in common. Should they define you? They already do: thus the constant conflict when you are “off course” and not sure whether it is YOUR course or another’s by which you should steer.
Decide on the justness of your causes; crown them, once decided upon, and that chronic crippler “DOUBT” will almost entirely disappear, and with it go FEAR, WASTE of self and time, and the many setbacks they produce. Incidentally and more to the IMMEDIATE point, it WILL almost instantly soothe, and possibly even reverse, the pain and damage of this apparent misadventure. It might even SALVAGE the situation, “if salvation there be.”
There’s no knowing, but there IS freedom from apprehension and fear by knowing absolutely who and what you are and BEING THAT.
That’ll be 25 cents, please! I know it used to be “2 cents,” but what with the cost of gasoline and the instability in the MIddle East, these things do happen!
love, me
I am so in awe of that Stevie. What great advice for a quarter. (I’d have paid more though).
You GO Stevie.
Okay, I admit, I first thought “Stevie Wonder Fan” is Stevie Wonder writing a half-joking self-serving statement. So with my super duper administrative powers, I looked it up. And wow, Stevie Wonder, you ACTUALLY have a legitimate fan.
I hesitate to define more than just a core few of my causes, because rigidity sets one up for fissures. There are certain causes that I have already defined and crowned and bathed in the glow of self-proclaimed justness, and those things I am damn proud of. The intolerance to being cheated on, for example. Integrity. But there are other things which, despite their varying weights and sizes, I have placed in the gray “compromisable” area. It may take a hell of an offer to make me move some of the larger items, but never say never. It is those things with which I have an internal struggle. The indecision comes from my difficulty in defining whether the payment for an item is worthy of the trading of that item. “I’ll give you a banana for your pearl necklace.” Hell no. Unless I were starving and unable to find my own food. So circumstances, the offered trade, are all variables.
Another difficulty lies in knowing you’ve been given a raw deal for a trade. Do I look at the offered payment and scoff and walk? Or do I remain and keep bargaining, trying to get through to the other person why this deal is unfair and hoping he makes a better or different offer? I have thus far refrained from giving a counter-offer, only going as far as “this isn’t good for me because of x, y and z.” A stubborn part of my nature feels that if I have to make a demand, then it’s a forced trade. I’d like to see what the other side is willing to offer first and I hope to work toward something that is acceptable to both sides. It’s when the other side stares at me irrately and refuses to work with me, or simply turns his back to me as tho waiting for me to come to his terms before he’d turn back around, that it hurts. There are things I may completely concede on, but I can’t get there (or rather, won’t get there) without a thorough examination of all the cards on the table as to this issue. I hate it when I lay out my cards and the other side lays out…the empty candy bar wrapper from a previous bargain with someone else.
[…] In loving memory and commemoration: Post #494 re watching Brokeback Mountain with him, and a dialogue in Comments with him. Post #521 re the ice cream he made at my commission. Post #525 in which he left nice comments. Post #580 in which he left nice comments. Post #583 in which he left nice comments. Post #584 re resolving an issue with Mr. W in which Steve left nice comments. Post #597 in which he loaned me the movie “Iris.” Post #599 in which I reviewed the movie “Iris.” He was disappointed in the way I didn’t enjoy Iris’s character the way he had worshipped her, altho he didn’t comment on this on the post. Post #623 with a brief summary of Georgie’s situation. […]