It's a funny thing,
perception, so wildly varied, opposing even, depending on the person
perceiving, his or her mood, or the people, experience, or stress in
one's life. All those factors change what we think we see.
Take me, for
example - please! Ha ha. Little joke there, based on that tired old
humour that says a wife is a pain in the ass. Not humourous at all. I
mean, if you don't like your wife, buddy, then get the f--- out of
her life, and give her some peace, not to mention the opportunity to
be with someone who appreciates her. What's that? It's just a joke?
Yah, you guys are so funny, as you screw around, and dribble around
the toilet. As you slaver over degrading porn.
Whoops! Got
distracted by rampant attitudes, which are so hard to ignore, because
they lessen the quality of the mind, heart, and soul of us all,
affecting, and infecting us with spiritual pollution, just as
chemical plants, car exhaust, and cigarette smokers pollute the air
we have no choice but to breathe. Unthinking men, but greed and
unkindness of the many weakens us too; I'll try to stay on track.
It's strange I
should sound anti-male; I'm not at all. Why, some of my best
friends.....
In fact I know a lot
of wonderful men: intelligent, kind, and thoughtful, and able to make
me laugh in a good way. But I get angry at the garbage that comes out
of the ones who are not like that. So many of them are in positions
of power. I'm veering again. It's strange I should sound anti-male
because the whole purpose of this little essay was to talk about
perception, and how knocked a-kilter my own has become since no
longer having a 'significant-other' male in my life.
It ain't easy, I'll
give myself that. A relationship of a decade and more, - now, that is
significant, and can account for a good deal of your time, energy,
and the need to have and express love and affection. I find that
lately, and this is aggravated by having dropped out of two
professions that would put me in contact with others, and am now
working in very solitary fashion with music and writing, that, living
singly, I talk to myself a lot. Recently, I have taken to doing it
outside too, cursing bad weather or drivers on the streets, or simply
having a nice conversation with moi. I figure everybody else is
blathering details of their lives, unaware of the whole world, so
I'll just look like one of them, headphones hidden. I can even laugh
out loud at my own jokes as I go.
In general,
however, I'm alone too much, and without the particular companionship
that I had, and the common kind that most others have in their daily
lives. So I wander in my house, keeping myself busy, talking, and
working, but occasionally stopped by a glance at myself in the
mirror. I have to say, I'm not inspired by me. Oh, I know I "clean
up real good", as they say, but it's the general offering I make
to myself that is less than stellar. And one day I realized that I
needed to be looking at myself in his mirror, as I did in the past,
which is to say, the pull-down mirror on the sun visor of his car, as
we went somewhere, and I was in the passenger seat. For some reason,
I was always surprised at my image in that mirror. I always seemed to
look great; not only attractive, but young too; and happy. It was
such an unexpected treat every time.
I guess what I'm
saying is that somehow his feelings for me created an environment in
which I liked myself, that someone loving you really does affect how
you feel and therefore how you perceive. Love actually works. Duh.
It helps and improves. Double duh. Maybe I'm double-"o"
stoopid when it comes to love. Maybe that's why I am alone, even want
to be alone, and ugly. Maybe I absorbed a lot of the misogyny as I
grew up; the insistence that women were less and not deserving of
being equal. I have always angrily rejected that lie intellectually,
but emotionally, maybe it stuck somewhere.
What a dilemma.
Where do I buy a mirror that works like the one in his car? Should I
just make a vroom vroom sound every time I look in my own mirrors?
How do I keep reminding myself that even though we had some lovely
times, love seldom lasts forever; even though I wanted to move on,
and am content and busy and have friends, and even though I consider
my life to be privileged and good... I am simply missing him, and
love. How do I remember that love is still there? Love that makes the
world go 'round - that creates the world I want - that drives me
somewhere instead of just into crazyland - that can surround me even
when I'm rambling and echoing back my own drivel.
You know?
Here's to friends....
Here's to friends....
