I was having dinner with a friend tonight and noticed a young attractive waiter- sort of James Franco-esque, yet less aware of his swag. We exchanged some glances but my back was to him most of the time- I put my intention to ask him out to the side and just enjoyed dinner with my friend. We were having some serious girl talk- dealing with some real grown woman life stuff. She held up this crystal clear mirror for me to see something familiar that maybe I was not wanting to see this past week. It’s funny the ways we try to hide ourselves from ourselves.
As I was putting on my coat to leave, the waiter and I were having eyes, I was gathering my courage. I noticed he had a piece of paper taped to his shirt. When we walked past he and his colleagues having dinner at he bar, I leaned in to see what was written on it. He explained that he did not have pockets, so, he taped his list of items he had to retrieve from the basement to his shirt. What a cutie. We laughed, I looked at him and said ‘oh I thought maybe those were your care instructions’ which seemed at first to confuse him, then it seemed to fluster him- so I quickly decided to let it go, I couldn’t really read that signal and there were too many people around. Hot little thing though. I go there occasionally, maybe I will see him again.
Just before leaving, I learned about Gwyneth Paltrow and Chris Martin separating. So sad. Her blog post at GOOP is worth reading, if you have not yet read it. There is a brilliant discussion by Drs. Sadeghi & Sami about the increase in life expectancy relating to divorce rates, this fact being an important consideration as we think about what it means to be married or coupled and what goes wrong. Then there is even more insightful explanations of the evolution of insects and humans- that insects are too vulnerable with those exoskeletons, and that we are less vulnerable because of our flexibility and ability to absorb, change, recover. Laying down some serious truth about what happens in intimate relationships- how we essentially trigger in each other all that is wounded and unhealed- that intimacy and romance occur as our greatest spiritual teachers. Marianne Williamson talks about this in her book Enchanted Love, she refers to this triggering as hitting the wall of fire: you either walk through it to become something different- fire the element of transformation- or you turn away and turn cold, and this can be done together/intact or alone. I have long said that my most difficult break up was my greatest teacher; that I walked through that wall of fire alone- and while I would have preferred that transformation to have been possible without having to sacrifice that love- I understand now why it had to be that way. GOOP in general is worth reading, but this blog post about their sad, sad separation and “Conscious Uncoupling” will be historical- the site has already crashed from so much traffic. I would link it for you but I think you can only get it through email subscription…
Riding the subway home, a poem came through me. I feel it is for Gwyneth, for Chris, and all our broken little hearts.
The Butterfly Effect
The explosions at Fukushima on the eve
of the
Super Moon; everything felt crazy
All my inner firefighters lined up, sounding
alarms in the room we painted
Avocado Green
tall windows still covered in plastic
distorting and protecting us
from the freight-truths approaching, it
was not yet time.
Wiping the water from
Your sweet
Face
washing my way down Your
legs, anointing Your feet as
God has blessed me from this place
these moments the harmony of our
swan-song; Rain
against our window, the window to
Your room where I am standing, long,
in my black tights
angry curls sprung, snaking tracks
down the hot tears
on my
Face stunned and ashamed by
the ineffectiveness of my small imperfect
breasts to protect
my heart from this.
The puncture so loud and wet
my hearing popped, only the shrill hum of
passing through dimensions left.
But to You
I am just standing there speechless,
pathetic in my tights in
Your room under Your
dream catcher and my rosaries,
all the things I could have
said pooling silent pearls at my
fingertips
rolling like water from
my shaking empty
Hands.
3/25/14
xxx
no i do not love you 