We're coming home again
Sometimes platonic love is easy to confuse with romantic love. I do it all the time. Sometimes being somewhere you don't live can unbalance you just enough to make the mistake. Alcohol adds confusion to the mix. Being really far away from home and hopelessly hammered is a recipe for fucking your head up. Guess what I did this last week.
Somebody get me out of here
I've been known to get contemplative after "one of those evenings" where I once again showed incredibly poor judgement, and was surrounded by great people who served as my enablers (e.g. kept buying me alcohol). Throw in a drunk Russian with a knife who wants to fight your Serbian friend, a New York police officer, approximately four Long Island Iced Teas, and the apparently suicidal impulse of wandering off on your own morbidly hammered in a town you don't know and which tends to be a bit crime ridden, and if you got nothing else you've got a great story for the ride home.
You taught me how to live
Then you think back on what happened before you crossed the threshold of good judgement: The part of the evening where you clearly remember what you said and what was said by others. The part where somebody who is absolutely amazing but doesn't know it tells you things you've heard before. Not things about your self-destructive tendencies, but things about how you let others hurt you.
The innocent can never last
You realize that you've given up something crucial about yourself that you never needed to. You're denying who you are because it's inconvenient for someone else. And finally the words strike home because you're hearing it from somebody who is living it. There's no ulterior motive, just someone who can't possibly imagine living the way you are.
The rage and love, the story of my life
Somewhere in this whole confusing mess you make a connection with someone who is a kindred spirit. Someone more like you than anyone else you know, but more than that. Someone who actually is the way you like to think you are, but you're not. This connection confuses you at first. You think you're having feelings you shouldn't be, but then you realize that you're wrong. Somebody just became your inspiration. Somebody who will never know of their importance to you just gave you a spiritual smack upside the head.
She's an extraordinary girl in an ordinary world
So many little things begin to fall into place. Your destination suddenly becomes clear, like you've been walking a road for years and just suddenly realized where you've been heading all this time. Now that you know where you're going, only one thing remains unclear: how to get there.
Wake me up when September ends
You had a source of pain, one nobody knows about but you and the source of your pain. That one dirty secret you've never told anybody. Suddenly it no longer matters. You think you might have even confessed it to your new guardian angel in a drunken stupor. It doesn't matter because she doesn't remember either (at least that's what she told you).
Sometimes I wish someone out there will find me, 'til then I'll walk alone
Sometimes, in order to be true to yourself you have to face fears that can be paralyzing. Fears that have shaped your life until now. Fears that have brought you to a place you never wanted to be. Now you're in a pit and need to find the exit. Maybe somebody out there will lend a helping hand, maybe you've got to go through this all by yourself. I'll have to tell you how it played out when it does.
Nobody likes you everyone left you they're all out without you having fun
Then you sit in an airport in New York with a few friends. You sit and trade drunk stories like high school kids. You've undergone something profound, and nobody here will understand it. You throw a bone their way and tell a drunk story or two, but slowly the realization dawns on you: You're on your own. You can't share what's happening in your head with people who don't have a common frame of reference, and you don't know anybody who does. Suddenly that line from Star Trek IV makes more sense. You feel a bit more alone than you did before.
I don't care if you don't care
I'm a different person than I was at the beginning of the week. It wasn't New York, it was this one amazing person who will never know what she did for me (or would it be to me?). A whole new adventure has opened up before me, I think I'm going to call it life.
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Restored Comments
314159 said:
Cowboy,
She is an extraordinary woman. She's helped me more than anyone (even her) will ever know as well. I wish logic didn't dictate that it would never work between her and I. Logic sucks. But, I think I will keep my delusion.
With the weight of the hell hole we work in, I didn't know something else was troubling you so badly. You do know that if anyone at that place we toil is a brother it is you. Think of me as a brother who isn't at family reunions to mock whatever is troubling you. If you ever need to talk, seriously talk, I am always available. But I will also understand if you choose to return your new guardian angel for advice.
The Cowboy said:
Dude, I appreciate that, but there's a reason I never confided this in anybody. On the other hand, toss a few Pan Galactic Gargle Blasters down my throat and I'll apparently spill my guts about fucking anything.
I remember my brain wandering off for a bit, probably running back off to the pub for a nightcap, when it got back, it found my mouth just running off about the whole fuckin' mess. "WHAT... THE... FUCKIN'... HELL... ARE... YOU... DOING?!?!" it said to my mouth. "Oh, hey there," said my mouth. "I was just talking about you know what. You don't mind, do you?" My brain attempted to beat the living shit out of my mouth at that point. It came out something like "daarrr... so where are we anyway?" My brain and my mouth are now mortal enemies. Quite frankly my mouth had it coming. He just kept drinking the alcohol despite the fact that it was causing so much damage to brain. I think they'll get over it.
The good news is that she apparently doesn't remember any of this. Things like this are exactly why alcohol is banned by so many major religions.
- Celes - said:
Hey Taoco,
Sorry to hear the life has become complicated, but you know... life... it happens. And even if this whole thing seemed like a big mistake, some beautiful things come out of it at least.
Great post.
Everyone needs to get hit in a head with a gold brick every now and again. But, I'm sorry that it hurt.
Know that more people know than you know. You can't find out until you reach out. It's horribly terrifying, painful, and yet wonderfully amazing.
But don't get me wrong. It's nice and cozy being safely aloof.
The Cowboy said:
Hey Celes, thanks.
Just to be clear on a couple of things, my little secret that I don't talk about has been officially rendered moot. It's no longer a source of pain. That's what she did for me (that's a good thing). I don't talk about it because, quite honestly, there's nothing about this story that makes me look good. We probably all have at least one story (or three) like that.
She's given me direction and a focus as well, and that's why the other crap no longer matters. I know this post came off kind of dark, but what's happened is really a good thing. It might get a bit uncomfortable along the way, but it'll all be good in the end. What happens from here on out is fair game, and will probably show up here as well. This blog just might get interesting....
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