Last night, B and I were, of course, espousing upon our thoughts of LOVE. She's returned to San Diego living after a year away and a lifetime of change. Naturally, we found our friendship softening into the waters of time. Towards the end of our evening together, I shared that, perhaps, more than anything, LOVE is trusting that this moment now - this relationship and however it is unfolding - is exactly what is needed in order to pave the way for whatever is to come next. Thereby, letting go of any expectations for what is to arrive and simply honoring the process. It's easy to write and to intellectualize about, yet embodying this is where the challenge in growth lay.
Together, B and I share similar experiences with that most primal of relationships - the mother and daughter bond. Neither of us reflect our mother's values and it can create turmoil and tension between us. Since I've been staying at my parent's house, I have been consistently rubbing up against my mother's triggers, especially as they pertain to things. "You just don't care about things!" she'll accuse me of and, she's right, I don't.
I recall my travails with more indigenous peoples and how, in some locales, one, large family will share a singular, earthen pot that sits directly on a licking flame, day after day and night after night, preparing heaping plates full of corn meal, or rice, or whatever the local diet calls for. Upon these dirt floors, there is always room for more mouths to feed. Meanwhile, pleasure is derived from all of the scrapes, nicks and dents in the cooking utensil, for they are physical representations that mark the hand of time as well as the success of survival.
For me, personally, this is all that gives "things" meaning - the stories that surround them. So, this story is about the case of the missing earring. In my current Facebook profile photo, I'm wearing a pair of cowrie shell earrings that M purchased for me early on in our relationship. Sometimes, I think it's unfair that I refer to only him as my "ex." Sure, it is a truth - he'll always be my family because our four-year long relationship has forever marked my life. Heck, he taught me how to be a better person. It wasn't a fun lesson to learn, that's for freakin' sure, yet who I am today has so much to do with my deep intimacy with him. I am eternally grateful.
He saw both guys I had very brief flings with both before and after him and he loves to chide me about them today. "Geez, Cara!" he'll laugh. And, what can I say, but that sometimes we have to make unsavory choices in order to recognize either a path we've been missing out on or as a way out of a journey that no longer serves our highest good. I just shrug my shoulders and join in on the laughter. What else is there to do?
What he hasn't seen - and what the missing earring has - are the two loves that I have also danced with over the time frame of the past few years. I never mention them directly because there are a lot of stories that remain tucked neatly within the pages of my private journal. Though, as they and I both know, when I am bitten, my heart tends to pour forth copious amounts of poetry. Nonetheless, how to define a LOVE that isn't conventional in terms of labels or long lasting in the sense of deep intimacy? I don't know. And, there's another image that I wish to share here. It was taken of me last weekend while holding the infant son of high school classmates.
The baby boy's father showered me with abundant attention for years back in the early 90s. At the time, I was stuck in a place of such deep hurting all I could do was to receive his "anonymous" love selfishly but I could offer little to nothing in return. Yet, his pure affection was a balm for my weary soul and, to this day, I remain loyally grateful to his sweetness. Offering his son just a wee bit of attention was the way that I could, finally, reciprocate all that he had once given me. So, I trust that, even though the LOVE I offer will not always be reciprocated in the way that I wish it will be, those who receive it might just bee as loyal to me decades on down the road.
