Well, I have passed the half-mark of this series of 42 entries following Xavier De Maistre's A Journey around My Room and for the past couple of days I haven't been to the reservoir and to see EliðiRr, my dragon. There were conversations among beautiful colleagues about endings and reminiscing about who we cannot let go of. We were talking** about clients [THAT client we don't seem to be able to put down and archive...] but to me, another face came up.
There was an evening when I got home and little did I know that the relationship ended before I took that last step in. I was involved in the creation and fully excluded from its dissolution. In total shock, I kept on repeating "... but I have dinner read..." to an empty room.
Someone, the Other Half, was gone. Took everything away and emptied his space like he never existed. But I had dinner ready... That void and silence were so heavy, filling every pore of my skin.
For the past decade, albeit in other [brief] relationships, part of me was still "having dinner ready". There is still anger, frustration, and shame for not having noticed; need to explain, need to justify, need to understand. To show how much work I had done. How many dishes I washed, cooked, prepped. How many dinners... Here is the realisation that this unfinished business keeps creeping up every time something is not right. In my head, if it rains too much, if it's too cold, if I can't afford to fly to Italy for an impromptu visit, if my back aches, if I haven't slept enough, if my car lets me down, if a friend cancels at the last minute... "but I have dinner ready!" I can hear myself feeling, or: I am having an argument in my head with him and why he left me and how I did not feel happy and how things could have been different and you know the gist: yada yada yada. In my heart, over a decade ago, he helped me, he rescued me, he gave me everything I thought I needed, he showed me a land I didn't know, and he shared time, food, experience, and love. He taught me, he molded me to his liking. He substituted himself, no!... he settled himself as Rescuer Grand Chief of Control & Master of Everything & The One I Could Not Live Without. Then I turned into a chore and he slipped away, cowardly, without saying anything but for patronising and blaming arrogantly and showing up at times just to wave a hand. My Rescuer turned into my Ugly Version of the Sheriff of Nottingham, the Perpetrator. That wild card I could take out any time, at my leisure, and wave under anyone's nose. I need to have someone telling me I was Right. I was Right and he was so fucking wrong. And then give me a nice pat on the back, a golden star and tell me how good I have been and how proud they are of all my achievements.
I have been a very good girl, well done me!
So, who have I been studying for? Who have I been writing for? Who am I writing this for? Who am I wearing makeup for? Who am I paying my mortgage on time for?
By recognising this Perpetrator - Rescuer dance in front of my eyes, I have to admit my viewpoint as a Victim, the One Whining, the Blubbering Mess, the One Complaining, the One who still needs Dad to fasten her ski boots while in tears, the One who looks for a hand to grab onto, the One who at times is so petrified... This is the One who questions why clients leave without explanations, why dinners are ready for no one, why people reject me, why dad and mum drink and leave me in the dark. Why does it feel that people always leave? The One always looking, searching: for an answer, explanation, a reason. The shadow version of the archetype of a Seeker.
This morning I woke up and I felt that my hands and skin and face and hair... all was sticky. Like if I were dipped into resin, into glue. Filaments, as a spiderweb, turned me into a stuck puppet. Frozen in time, surviving with the perception that I was moving, while in reality, I have been adhering here, barely breathing, with a dinner that now has turned mouldy and rotten.
I am clingy, alchemically, physically and metaphorically. I feel gluey, tacky, sticky. I feel that anything I touch sticks to me. I collect mementoes and memories. I seem to remember everything, every single infinitesimal detail. I carry all this with me by moving so slowly that I feel always behind. I cling. I am clingy.
The question is: what can I do now, with all of this?
What can I do?
What can I?
I.
Today I will clean the kitchen.
onwards + upwards > out + about
mx
* you might want to check Games People Play by E Berne HERE: not one of the easiest books, but it's a classic and a good starting point.
** Community of Practice meetings : on HERE organised & facilitated by Samantha Crapnell MACPP, MNCPS (Accred), MBACP, CIPD & Training for Counsellors, Darwen, Lancashire.
________________________
Date : 29 + 30 OCT 2023
Duration : 2 beautiful days out
Steps: ---
Location : Lytham
Weather : windy and rainy
T : just felt cold
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Deep, honest and thought provoking. Thank you for sharing.