The D Spot

So today a person from my mother’s past called me looking for her number.
This is the man that my mother eventually left my father for. He showed up every few years during their marriage, trying to get my mother’s attention..and whatever else. Eventually he got it and then eventually after that, she walked out of the marriage. (and soon after, he walked too)

Now, I have always been kind of glad that the marriage failed for many reasons. Mostly because it allowed my father to find his true love, my stepmother, whom my sister and I completely adore and see as a mother. There are other reasons too…issues of my mother’s that I was glad she had to deal with outside the marriage instead of inside.
The greatest blessing of course, is that my mother left us with our dad. She didn’t go far…didn’t move across the country until several years after they split, and so we did have to have visits and whatnot. But we were effectively raised by our father. My sister and I will be eternally grateful for that.

My mom’s greatest act of selfishness (what mother leaves her kids?) actually turned out to be our greatest salvation.

So anyway…
This guy called. It is no surprise that his name is M…That name is one of significance in my life in several ways, and in several people.

I left a message with my mother to call me. But its the weekend. There will be much drinking and whatever at her house and she usually keeps her phone off. And I will be working so I might not actually touch base with her for several days.
I emailed him, and told him that I’d called her and would give her his contact info when she called me back.

Hmm

So now I look back and wonder…
What if he HADN’T ‘courted’ her thru her marriage? What if she HADN’T cheated on my dad and left….
where would I be?
Certainly not where I am now. I defintely would not have done many of the things I did that led to the chain reaction of having my son and the family that I now have.

My kids are my life, my loves and my heart.

I am pretty grateful that it all worked out like it did.
Which begs one to wonder…is it ever okay to cheat in your marriage?
Sure my mother’s infidelity caused great amounts of pain for us all. But I can look back over 25 years and see now that things are how they are because of her initial act of deceit. So does that make it right?
Are there ever times in a marriage or relationship its okay to cheat?

Troths have been plighted, rings exchanged…and now what? Is fidelity really forever?
Are there special circumstances? Is there ever a good enough situation where stepping out not the wrong thing to do?

I am sure people rationalize their infidelities in many ways.
“S/He doesn’t listen to me like you do.”
“S/He doesn’t want to have sex anymore.”
“S/He cheated on me first.”
“S/He and I dont have the special connection that you and I do.”
“You and I are special, our relationship transcends my marriage.”
“S/He doesn’t love me.”
“I don’t love him/her.”
“What s/he doesn’t know doesn’t count.”

Are any of these legitimate?

I am reading a book called “The Lost Girls” by Laurie Fox and it basically chronicles the lives of Wendy Darling, her daughter Jane, Jane’s daughter Margaret, and Margaret’s daughter Wendy. (Yes those Darlings, of Peter Pan fame). The story is told by Wendy the younger. I am particularly impressed by something Wendy says, when talking about her boyfriend:

The theme in the book (so far, I am only just on page 82) revolves around men and boys, and growing up and letting go of childhood notions. It explores Wendy’s attempt to separate herself from her deep love of Peter Pan, her sense of abandonment when he does not return for her to do his Spring cleaning, and her travails as she grows up with the shadowy memories of Neverland in her dreams.

I am particularly impressed with a statement Wendy makes about her boyfriend: “I was a girl with a boyfriend who would love her till the cows came home, but who was not coming home with the cows himself”

The book seems to touch a lot on unrequited love. Not the kind of love where you crush on someone and it’s gone, but the deep kind of love that you know is real and true…..and that you sense in the other person but the other person cannot return that love to you.
True and real, unrequited love.
The tragedy and the heartbreak is tempered with the giddiness of the ‘what if’ and the total mixed messages received from the object of affection.

Is it possible to be in love with someone who does not or can not (or simply will not) love you in return? Or loves you in a different way than you love him or her?
Is it love if its one sided?
And if you pine, moon, cry or whatever dramatic way you deal with it….is it still love? Or is it a crush?
Is it really possible to love someone so much, that even when they don’t love you back, you still wish them happiness? Don’t you want to just jump on their back as they walk away from you, and grab onto them, and hold them until they admit the same feelings for you? (Or at least until you’ve humiliated yourself enough to let them go?)
Or do you let them go and find happiness in your tears of goodbye?
And on that note…
do you ever forget the person you’ve truly loved? Do you hold a fondness for them? A sadness? Or does it just wither up and blow away, dust in the wind and all that? Are your long-term feelings tempered by the feelings they had for you?

I find that I can tell you
only
truth.
There are none of the usual
walls
or barriers.
I thrill to
your next question.
I feel open to you
and (unusual for me)
I am not scared to speak truth.
I welcome this chance for fearless honesty.
The only thing that truly scares me here
is the possibility that you
won’t ask.

My guides and I were talking today (more about them in a soon to follow post)
I am told that all things happen and all things are possible with love.
I am told that love is the driving force, the connection that binds us together as human and as spirit.
I am told that laughter, love and learning are the major goals.
I am told that if you love someone, now is the time to tell them and don’t hide behind human fears of rejection. Soul-to-soul is the message here. Spark to spark.
Share your light.
BE a light.
None of this is news to anyone. But its a message that needs to be reinforced now and then.
Lightworkers are stirring again. Remember what it was like after 9/11? We banded together for spiritual healing. We are being called again, soon. Not that there is going to be an attack or anything. Just some more changes are coming.
Can you feel it? Do you see it in dreams? Do you smell it in the air?

I might be just doing anything when I feel it. That sneaky crawl of goosebumps up the back of my neck to the crown of my head.
I turn quickly, expecting someone behind me, yet no one is there.
My heart speeds up, I get a clench in my stomach.
I feel it. I feel someone.
Where are you?
WHO are you?
Butterflies begin to dance in my stomach and my heart knocks in my chest.
I feel it again.
The caress of your thoughts.
The phone doesn’t ring.
There is no new email.
No one is at the front door.
Where are you?
You cannot be in my mind only
I cannot imagine this sudden
overwhelming
touch.
This
caress of thoughts.

You came to me in my dreams last night
my love
my life
my loss.
Held me thru the darkest hours
Your words a soothing balm
the fragments of thought but a memory now.
Your arms around my waist.
I swam in the sea of your eyes again,
Drowned blissfully in the waves of your love.
Brief though it was
it will have to sustain me;
Dark nights of the soul, and all that…
You lit up my dream and reminded me
of all in my life I lack…
my love
my life
my loss.

Today my thoughts turn again to that mysterious state of being, love.
I have a friend who recently ended a long-term relationship and we discussed the pitfalls of falling in love too early, and how easy it is to confuse those infatuated butterflies with the real-deal, true-blue love that everyone is searching for.
I started wondering if love is a constant state of being or if it can really come and go. Can you really ever stop loving someone, after having given your heart to them?
*
Isn’t there always some sort of connection that comes into being after two people, for whatever length of time, declare mutual love and affection to each other? And if they stop being a couple, do those feelings just vanish? Can they vanish? If those feelings vanish, then was it really love?
Is there a corner of the heart somewhere that is dedicated to the loves we have experienced, the arms that have surrounded us, the person that cherished us if only briefly?
*
There are certainly situations where love is withdrawn. Abuse, neglect, maltreatment….those types of situations will take what may have blossomed into love and tromp it down to dust.
But that is not what I am referring to in this post.
I am speaking of a relationship that is more or less ‘healthy.’
It could be romantic.
It could be familial.
It could be a friendship.
Does the love just end if the relationship ends?
*
My own experiences are that it doesn’t truly go away. How can it? Love is created and grows. It can’t just disappear. I hold a place for all those that I have loved, regardless of the endings.
*
What do you think? Does it die, does it fade, does it glow? Does love ever really go away?

Today my sister and I did something that neither of us wanted to do, but after it was done we felt really good.
I guess in a sense we grew up a little more.
The backstory is that our mother pissed us off about 2 months ago. And we told her (nicely) but therefore pissed HER off. And if anyone can hold onto a grudge, its our mother.
After 2 months of dealing with our mother’s passive-aggressiveness, my sister and I decided we needed to do something.
We consulted with one of our family sages, who advised just apologize and forget it. She has her feelings hurt, he told us. Tell her you’re sorry.
Hmm…
Well, neither of us are sorry that we told her what needed to be said. But we could, theorhetically, be sorry that she feels bad about it.
Ok, worked for us.
So we bought her a nice flowering plant and showed up at her work unannounced. She was in tears of happiness. Neither of us used the “S” word, but we did tell her we love her and she hugged us and cried a bit.
So it’s all good, I guess.
My sister didn’t want to do it at first, and I wasn’t looking forward to it either. I mean, after the iciness of the past two months, we certainly were not assured a warm welcome. But going to her work–a neutral place–was our best chance.
What it came down to was we made her feel good, and that made us feel good.
Then my sister and I went grocery shopping, and I locked the keys in the car…but that’s another story for another day.

How deep do you feel emotions? Do you think that you have any control over your emotions? Not control in terms of what you show to others, but control of what you truly, actually, deeply feel?
I have met people who have come across as so intense that their gaze almost hurts. I have met other people who are so shuttered that I have wondered if they have any emotion at all.
Maybe they are better at hiding things, or maybe they really feel little.
Me, I tend to be very reactive in my emotions. Its pretty evident in my writing.
I used to try to guard myself against being hurt by hiding and/or denying the feelings that made me feel uncomfortable. It was a defense mechanism I used during my parents’ divorce when I was a teenager and one that I still use to some degree with my mother.
But other than that, I tend to wear feeling out on my sleeve and in broad daylight. I can’t imagine hiding wonderful feelings of love or joy or happiness. However when I was younger, I was always scared to show positive emotion because I always just ‘knew’ that if I admitted to being happy or loving or whatever, something bad would happen.
I am glad that I have finally shed that destructive superstition.
My motto these days is to tell people how I feel when I feel positive towards someone. Does that make me emotionally intense, or just emotionally self-actualized? Some might claim obsessed, I suppose now I think about it. I make a habit of telling people that I appreciate them, or thanking people for helping me, or whatever positive thing I can think of. I like to brighten people’s days and I think that sharing a positive emotion is good for both parties involved.
And when someone hurts me, or I am angry, sad whatever…well, I am working on being able to verbalize those feelings. It’s hard though, isn’t it? I am going thru a time with my mother now where she is ‘punishing’ me and my sister because we nicely informed her to stop some behaviors that were unacceptable to us. That is the story of my life with my mother, so its not unexpected. But its also the reason why I am usually not very good at verbalizing the negatives.
So how do you react to others? How do you define your emotions-reactive? intense? well-hidden?
And how does your emotional response affect not only others, but you?
Do you think its healthy to deny emotions? Do you gulp them down in the name of keeping peace? Are you scared to tell someone that you care?

So yesterday as I was driving home from work, I was thinking about relationships…friendships and romantic relationships and how the two can cross over in so many ways. You can have platonic friendships, love affairs, physical affairs with love or not love, or the ever popular ‘friends with benefits’.
I figured the thoughts were just a product of a tired mind after a brutal 12h shift, but then when I came home, I saw Alanis Morisette was going to be a guest on Letterman, and I got that song in my head that has the phrase ‘friends with benefits.’ Then, to just add to the mystery, I was visiting a friend’s blog and saw I was linked there and one of the tags was ‘friends with benefits’.
Damn. I guess I need to explore the issue!
Fiirst off, I am so very married for so very long…the chances of me ever having another relationship like that is pretty slim. Strange things would have to happen I suppose.
But I did have a relationship like that once, when I was much younger. Probably too young to appreciate and analyze the dynamics of such a relationship but not so young that I didn’t get hurt in that relationship, over and over.
“But baby, we’re friends, right?” was a common phrase back then, usually as he was leaving or as he was booty-calling me. (this was a long time ago–do they still use the phrase booty call anyway?)
Now, at my ripe old age of not-quite-40, I can look back on that time as five years of confused teenager/young adult and leave it at that. But what about now, at my age…is a friends-with-benefits relationship even possible in an adult relationship?
I would have to say yes but with reservations.
Both parties would have to have some degree of feeling for each other or else it would become one person using the other person. They would need to treat each other with respect, and the relationship would need some boundaries.
(If I could have said, back then, “you need to stop calling me from your girlfriend’s house” I would have been happier, I think)
The main rule in life is “An’ it harm none, do what ye will.” So yes, its okay to have a relationship like that, but harming none includes yourself; can you handle it knowing that the relationship, while based on friendship, is going to have a physical aspect without the romantic love? Some people can separate their emotions like that, some can’t. Which type of person are you?
If you can manage the physical intimacy and manage the friendship, while maintaining a sense of respect for each other…then I say go for it. You only live once. All acts of love are Her worship, in any case.
Think before you jump into it, though. What if one person develops stronger feelings than the other? What then? Do you break it off if he/she claims to now be ‘in love’ with you? Or do you continue? What if the two of you fall in love with each other? What happens then? What if you fall in love with the other person, who then tells you that he/she does NOT share the same feelings or worse…is in love with someone else?
Could you handle it?