Saturday, January 1, 2011

IN THE NEW YEAR

YET ANOTHER PLUG

One of the You Tube channels I subscribe to that talks about relationship, PlanetAbiolaTV, recently did a video about the perils of loaning money to someone early in a relationship.  As she outlined the reasons it is a less than good idea, she used a phrase, 'slippery wicket', as a description for a possible exception to that rule.  You know, you start dating someone and two months into something promising they have car troubles at a crucial time, leading them to ask you if you would be able to help them out.  That was situation she gave as an example of a possible exception, as that was still a dicey proposition for someone going into the beginning of a relationship.

I left a comment that I have a personal saying, 'the ol' slippery wicket' that I use.  Mine is centered on the complications that arise after the conjugal fluid exchange in a flawed relationship, an exchange with someone who isn't clear on the concept of a 'hook up' or have 'that look' that despite which, you go and do something that you shouldn't have done.  A lot of times this misunderstanding occurs because of the difference in expectations between the two.  Abiola might agree with my use of a phrase I picked up from her... that expectations often leads'preplanned resentments' by the person who had their hopes of the lay down event being a springboard into their fantasy of the relationship.

Now my 'slippery wicket' has matured into a catch-all... one that is a notch below 'life's complexities', which I use to describe the entire idea of being a part of a relationship.  My wondering about my disappearing sex life (I know that I only need my fingers and thumbs to count my encounters for the PAST THREE YEARS) has to do with wondering about my finding myself in a bit of the ol' slippery wicket' and if by staying I would not one day be 'pondering life's complexities' once again, stuck dealing with someone who don't know themselves or who operate with an identity built on the person the wish that they were. 

When it comes to my being too hard on myself, I don't know if I am when it comes to dealing with the mixed results of my life.  What I do know is that it generally prepares me for the occasions when a person tries to hurt me.  Because I am honest with myself with even the worst that I am capable of, when someone insults me I have the tendency to see smug condemnation only one way.

THAT IS WHERE THE DESTROYER COMES IN

I don't think that my imperfections have left me irredeemable as a person or as a human being.  Forgiveness is something that is larger than any person and nothing that I look for from anyone.  The way that I see my less than good acts (because when it comes to 'qualities' I think I have a fine assortment of very good attributes to my character) as the consequence of the flaws that keeps all of us short of perfection.

The difference between these two iconoclastic principles represented by the two characters is that in Sonny, you have the frailties that come with the human condition.  As objective as we may strive to be (the link is to a short story I read as a wee bonnie lad, and I still have the original paperback collection that it came in, so great the impression it left on me that I carried with me ever since), there is always something to our existence that will draw us back into the fold, the emotional connection that runs through each and everyone of us and binds us as human beings.  And for some, that connection to that binding to the spiritual commune of humanity is stronger than in others.

The Destroyer on the other hand was simply doing his job.  He did not have the capacity to feel anything other than the urge to carry out his prime directive.  And maybe like another being who found himself in a less that desired situation, both Sonny and me were 'trapped in worlds we never made'. 

What has made me talk this taxing burden that I feel that I have carried was triggered by the passing of my darling brother.  Though I could not put my finger on it, I was certain that our sisters, even our Mother, were leeching from us something that was essential to our being.

I don't talk much about my darling brother.  As with other idioms that I hope carry the depth of affection I have for people, I let the 'darling' speak for how I think of him and the revocation of such things (my 'Army' and 'best' sister for instance) be representative of how I perceive the reality of those relationships.  Not to mention that it has been something I have been aware of since my teens... but for years had hoped wasn't so.  After all, it was in high school and while living in 48219 that I first began examining the strained relationships between black men and women, and the notions of the Black Matriarchal Complex and the Single Mother's Club emerged.  Folks who have been following my mess should be familiar with those concepts and that they are meant as a critique for their role in black society and if that is an overreach, then just in my house and particularly my adolescence.

...AND THEN THERE ARE JUST SOME THINGS THAT I'LL NEVER FORGET*

With most of the things that I put out here, this is subject matter that I have a difficult time expressing to people and I tend not to go into detail with people in the analog world (and I am such an analog guy... more on that another time).  It is the same with how I feel that I have 'changed' as a result of my injury and how I have decided to deal with those change.

It has been my observation that when I make a statement about something another person thinks is comparable... my headaches for instance, people tend to come with their own remedies and suggestions without first understanding that what they call 'a headache' has little to do with the conditions that led to my voicing my discomfort.  Same thing for other otherwise innocuous but discomforting conditions that I am subject to complain about.  Hell, when symptoms that something was going on, it was lil' Mook who first mentioned that I had problems doing things.  I don't embellish what I am coping with but still, for me to mention anything like my dizzyness or how it feel that a thought falls through a memory hole, is not something I want someone to say 'I understand, that happens to me, too.'  No, it doesn't and if they don't believe me, let me crack them with a few concussion-inducing punches and THEN they can tell me that 'Oh, I have an idea of what you are going through', as they attempt to navigate a flight of stairs or simply know the right suit of cards to play when their turn comes up.

Anywho...

I am still actually VERY upbeat.  Don't let the grim talk fool you.  Unless I am saying it to you face.  Then it is prolly for real!!

*taken from 'To The East, My Brother, To The East' by X-Clan!

1 comment:

Ken Riches said...

Glad you are still upbeat, I wish there was something more that could be done to help with your condition. I think you do an amazing job of maneuvering through the shadows and memory holes. Happy New Year to you.