Limbo Rock
ike it or not, there is a song by that name from long ago and I steal it for the subject of this email for reasons that almost certainly have nothing to do with the song except for a line or two, perhaps, with some stretching, but the point of this letter is to ask this simple question.
How would you feel if I wrote you a letter every day?
See I am a writer by nature and I write daily in several places in several ways. I write to friends long gone, I write to a friend of almost 20 years who never looked me in the eye because we've never met (I probably share more with her than with anybody) and I write to myself most of all, every day, unless I get too tired and decided to skip it and that is seldom a good thing for me.
Writing is my way of thinking, of releasing creativity, of simply playing in my head (I have so much fun I seldom feel alone unless I am deliberately focusing on feeling alone), and so much more. Writing is my therapy.
Writing is also my way of leaving something behind in this world.
That seemed so important to me once.
Writing is also one of my favorite ways of communicating. There was a time when writing was the most free I could ever feel, my mind and heart and every bit of me was so connected and released without any inhibition or second thoughts because I was so securely confident that I truly meant no harm so I could trust myself to express myself in words as openly and honestly and completely as the words would allow.
Words can be such a feeble folly for communication, and yet, words can be magical when they fall together just right to express something that someone else understands so deeply, a peace transcends both people sharing the words and time, space, distance, everything disappears and all tat is left is understanding.
Something readers and writers can find more easily than those who do not ready or write much, but anyone can get there because we all communicate in words.
Maybe the attraction I feel for your mind is you are so not a word person. For whatever reason, you choose not to find the words in your own mind to express yourself. Almost the opposite of me - your mind is a puzzle and I am, whether you know it or not, an insatiably curious child who loves puzzles and challenges the world to stump me, to give me a puzzle I can not solve. The world gave me your mind (are we laughing?... I hope so, but I am also serious).
I sense you may be saying (or on the verge of saying) "leave me alone!" and if I am not way off, I hope that doesn't scare you - I hope you are laughing.
If you really want me to give you space, I will stop writing, calling, texting, and completely go silent until you ask me to communicate again. You may think I can't do that, but I can and have many times - I just need to believe that is truly what you really want and not just a convenience or test or challenge.
Anyway, you control our communication because my doors are wide open, my walls are virtually non-existent (at least for you as you've rarely come close to them), and my heart loves you as family because I adopted you as family so you call the shots. As all the others I've adopted have throughout this life have.
Precious has needed me to pay her phone bill for more than ten years in spite of her doing everything she can to be independent, so I have even when I got close to zero balance in terms of money. It is her birthday gift spread out over twelve months. She asks for nothing else and we occasionally get together to catch up because we want to.
Minnie asked for much more and I had to draw a line with her because no one ever taught her to stop asking and after a few years she stopped asking, but she still calls me dad and wishes me a happy father's day each year.
Others have simply chosen to stop sharing and I accept that.
You have not chosen your place in my family just yet (so I choose for now), maybe because you have not chosen who you are for yourself just yet. Most people never do, in case you feel age has anything to do with it. Age has nothing to do with defining self.
Defining self is the first step to getting it together in this life.
Another segue, this time back to the start of this letter. The only person who receives almost daily letters from me is J on the west coast, the friend I mentioned above who I met through blogging, I think, at least fifteen years ago.
Time is almost irrelevant in correspondence sometimes.
Some days she gets just a few words, some days many. She does not respond with nearly as many words most of the time, but she appreciates them and responds to them and that way better than no response. She appreciates me keeping in touch on such a regular basis. I matter. That inspires me to continue writing which is, as I noted above, very good for me.
Most people do not (appreciate my babbling, especially not when it's frequently). That is why I blog, again almost daily. I dream of finding another (or others) like me who loves sharing written words as much as I do, but I live in reality where I can indulge my love of writing even when no one is around because in that reality I can imagine someone somewhere someday will appreciate the words I put out on the web almost every day.
Even if that is posthumously.
I write to myself first, to my dream of a soulmate second, to the real people I've known I think about every day third, to people I think of less often fourth, to almost anyone or the world in general after that. Some days I write on all those levels to many people at once. Some days I just write to myself. When I post the words in a blog, it could be for myself with at least a tough of hope someone (somewhere someday) will find them and enjoy them and/or appreciate them and/or maybe even love them.
There are not a lot of people I think about every day (or almost every day). You and J are the two I think about most because you two are my closest family, by my choice. I don't write to you every day though.
I think that is primarily because I don't know how you would feel about it if I did.
So many people do not seem to understand a writer and even more people do not seem to understand chosen family.
That is why so many misunderstood our closeness and assumed wrongly that we were a couple in romantic a relationship sense - because most people do not understand the concept of chosen family. If we told people we were actually brother and sister that would satisfy their need to categorize us and the "couple" idea would have gone out the window. People need to put things in the boxes they know.
I am not even sure you really understand chosen family as well as I'd like you to and that might be why you are uncomfortable with the closeness you sometimes felt. I am sorry if I made (or make) you feel uncomfortable, ever.
Just as most people do not have any experience or understanding or "box" for chosen family and therefore just don't get it and must substitute something else to feel comfortable, I do not have any experience or understanding or "box" for biological family. I feel just as uncomfortable among what everyone calls "family" as most people might feel when I adopt them.
I wonder if this makes any sense to you.
I wonder if this makes any sense to anyone outside of my head (laughing at myself now).
There must be someone who was adopted who created this sort of understanding.
My door is open :)
So maybe the subject comes into place as I bring this letter to some sort of closure (there is no end to my babbling, only pauses). I live in a limbo compared to just about everyone else in the world . A relationship limbo. I do not know how to act around people because everyone is my family and anyone who chooses, our of necessity or desire, to get close to me is adopted and that bond is scary for everyone I've ever met because they don't have a mental "box" to put it in.
Some stick around for the money, some for some other reason, almost no one sticks around just because they love me - and no one actually (so far) has opened that "box" - that understanding - that experience I call chosen family.
Limbo is my natural experience when it comes to human relationships.
Just as "family" is the natural experience for almost everyone else.
Everyone is welcome in my family because the only "bond" is choice.
My limbo rocks. :)
I hope you did not mind my rambling on this much. If you were ok with me writing to you every day I would likely not write this much very often. This many words takes a lot of time and comfort and focus and being in the right place inside and I have little time for focus and many distractions and minimal comfort to remember where this right place is in my head most days (I laugh at that phrasing... words are so amusing to me, even when they may seem to paint me in a less than ideal or less than positive light). I never wanted to be perfect, I just want to be securely honestly completely me and accepted and understood and known and loved.
I'm not so different from everybody else after all, aye? :)
I would love for you to tell me what you think of the thoughts in this letter. Does it describe the me you know? Do you know me in this depth?
If you do not want me to write to you daily, I may just start a new blog called Letters To E and write to you there because the trust I feel for you is a wonderful feeling that opens my mind to a secure, comfortable, happy place where honesty and clarity seem easy to find. I may do it even if you do want a letter almost every day cuz I love saving my babbling and I do that for J in Letters to J.
You choose :)
I'm going to smile myself to sleep soon - thank you for letting me adopt you and showing me your heart over the last decade or so. Now if I could only find my way into your mind (running away are you? - laughing as you do, I hope).
Ah, nobody understand the mind of a writer (laughing at myself) :)
Fiction is so much easier to swallow, I suppose.
Wandering off the babble to myself now.
Hug (your kind) and smiles :)
honest love,
me
PS... enjoy the typos, they are proof of trust.
Comments
Post a Comment