Blessings In Disguise

It's so easy to offend someone. No. No. People are easily offended. That's exactly right. My fault is this incessant desire to be normal, to please, to play the game. But, you don't have to play games with the people you love and trust. No. No. You don't have to play games with the people who truly love and trust you. 

You're free to be exactly who you are. You don't feel a wall going up. Because this wall subconsciously goes up when you're not entirely comfortable. You can tell yourself you'll try harder, harder to be...comfortable. How stupid is that? Why not trust and observe that this wall going up is what needs to happen for you to realize some folks are not good for you?

I'm rattled when I open the door to certain family members. For years, I do fine. Then they reach out and I'm sucked right back to a time I do not miss or have any kind of nostalgia for. It doesn't matter that twenty years have passed. They are not 'my' people. I experience the same feelings of isolation and rejection as I did before. It dawns on me like a ton of bricks over the head that I do not need them. It's not that I don't belong. It's that they do not belong with me.

"Oh yesterday came suddenly..." I long for yesterday, too, but not in the way you might think. There's nothing I would change except for one thing. If I could go back to my younger self, I'd tell her to keep her head up high. To let people be. Let them talk. And to never ever throw her pearls before swine. 

While I've always gotten along with everyone, it never meant I wanted to walk their path. I'm a lone wolf. It can get lonely but I wouldn't want it any other way. Inviting certain people into your life just because they're blood, is not a good reason to keep them there. Drama follows some people as though their lives depended on it. This drama, inadvertently, becomes my plague. I can't have that. It's poison to my inner sanctity. So, stay away! And lucky for me, it doesn't take much to keep these little rascals at bay, either. I thank my angels for these little blessings in disguise. 

No One To Be

I love moments like these, when you have no where to go and no one to be. I can take off my masks - employee, wife, sister, cousin, friend, consumer - and the everything is okay one, too.

People grasp for moments like these. And, here I am. I recognize them. I am them. They are me. I'm sighing and I know why. If I examine this moment too much, I'll lose the magic of it. Is this what they mean by a perfect moment? Because I'm living it right now.

And just like that, it's gone. I'm still here but not all of me. Parts are at home thinking about this evening...a moment that hasn't arrived, that I haven't walked towards except in my mind, and this moment does not yet exist.

I want to come back here again and feel the whole of myself. In this moment, I encapsulate all things and these things encapsulate me. Do you know the drugs people have to take to have an experience like this?

Through the right approach, I want for nothing. I love this feeling that's rooted from deep within. I love how only I can get there. I love how I can access it anytime I wish to. I love how nothing or no one can destroy it. It's mine. It belongs to me. It's my ticket out of here. Or rather, out of there...

Because here, in this place, in my castle...I don't want to leave or part from it. It's so beautiful. The textures and colours, oh my. And the way the light shines through the curtains? You can't fathom such beauty. 

It wells me up as I sit on a chair no one makes anymore, in a dress I'll never wear even if I was invited to the most glamorous of events. But here, right here, I can feel the material against my skin. I love how I feel in it. The length touches the floor. My hair is black and braided in Targaryen style.

I know what they say about needing people. But, I don't need anyone here. You can't need anything or anyone when you're experiencing a perfect moment...

...unless your perfect moment requires an other?

7 of Swords - 10 of Swords - Magician

He failed to take a chance. He failed to act. Instead, he tippy toed out, like a thief in the night...

There's something so dishonorable about this combination. Why am I always so right about certain things and so wrong about others? I called it from the beginning. Some people are all talk. The way the ego oozes with self-importance and self-flattery turns me off to such an extent, anything that might redeem such person thereafter, is rendered useless.

I operate on a spiritual level. That's where all my work is done. I set things up to see...to see what I might mean to the other. Maybe it's unfair. I don't think so. You can't outwit the gut, instinct or intuition. People show me I'm exactly where I'm supposed to be. 

If you live an unexamined life, you have no place in my world. And if you puff up your feathers over some perceived slight, you're a waste of my time, too. The lack of depth from which people live their lives, guised as some kind of meaningful existence when anything and everything they do, is rooted in superficiality, is a blatant and total disregard for all that is real and true in this world and beyond it.

So, go love your children and tell yourself, you're doing your part. Let me give you a hint - loving your children doesn't count. It is your duty! Loving them well? That's a different story...

He thinks he's the only one who's been hard done by. That he's the only one who knows how to be vengeful. That he's some god you should bow down to. He's an idiot like the rest of them.

That's the thing about actions...or a lack thereof...they will always speak louder than words.

Tiny Wounds

You can't feel great about yourself. I've been trying to put my finger on what bothered me so much about our brief interaction. 

I should have just sat there amused and surprised to see you in my neck of the woods as you crossed the street. Why am I always so sincere? Then again, why shouldn't I be someone I am? 

I realized I'm just that woman from the building. Endless chats about this or that with you still puts me in the "stranger" category. Let alone, acquaintance.

You looked nervous. I wondered when you were going to open your arms to give me a hug in your usual way. You never did. I felt a wall go up...though it could have been mine, too.

And you crossed the street, like your life depended on it. I should congratulate you for being such a loyal worker. I mean, why would you make time for me? Well, on the streets of Toronto, anyway? 

I would have made my way back sooner but my pride was stronger than any desire I might have had to speak with you in the safe zone.

I heard your voice but went back outside and around to avoid an encounter. You know I'm a woman of integrity. I chase no one. And desperation is not becoming...

I had a feeling you waited as long as you could. But, to me, you had already been too late. There's no way I was going to show my face.

A birdie told me you mentioned you'd seen me and that I had called out your name. Yeah, I know you waited as long as you could. I know you figured you weren't going to see me again that afternoon. And as far as you know, I thought it was your last day on our premises.

Now I understand what bothered me so much. It was a stench of ego and arrogance. It was ever so subtle but there, nonetheless. It came off as some kind of "dick rule". Who has time for nonsense like that?

Not me.

Lust For Love

You can't wait to get out of here. You can't stop telling me how much you hate coming back to this place. Doesn't it occur to you that might hurt me? Bruise me? I guess you really love it when I stroke your ego. That's all it ever was. Just you passing time getting your ego stroked. 

I didn't mean to inflate it. I was just being nice. And you were just being a guy doing what guys do best. You just want to know whether you've still got it. Yes, you've still got it. And, so do I.

Do you know the wisdom I can cultivate from the scraps you give? You have no idea. Emily was right. They were all right. You're just a little man who isn't interested in paying the price. Or, living an examined life. And since I'm worth more than all the gold in this world, I can see why or how you can't pay.

Plus, I was never for sale and you were only passing through. It's too bad you haven't managed to put your foot where your mouth is. That was my first and the only clue I needed that it's all been about you. 

How was it so easy for others I've known to jump ship when things got rough? All in the name of love? Unless it was never love to begin with...That you created children together only to leave the other for a shinier toy? For better or for worse? You couldn't have possibly understood the significance of that line. Because it's only ever about you and your happiness. Why would I insert myself in such a shallow arrangement?!

I was an idiot for being kind in my usual sweet way. It's okay, baby. Stay with your woman and your offspring. We both know you're just a guy among guys in a dirty world. And I'll still be worth more than all the gold in this world.

The Terror Of The Situation

I need something more than this. I need a way out. I woke up realizing I've been working for a cult with people who are just in it for the money. I can't stand the hypocrisy. The inflated egos. I know what brainwash looks like. There's a fine line between a Robbins seminar and pseudo-science approaches to health and well-being disguised as evidence-based. Just thinking about the way people throw their arms up in the air in so called bliss whether in church, an office or a spiritual retreat...is all bull-shit. It's just some wannabe leader trying to make a living by attracting people who want to be lead. But why these fuckers have to go so big, is beyond me. They must be greedy little bastards with god complexes. There's no other explanation. All of it cloaked in altruism. And when you take a closer look, you see how no one's home. You sense the blackness of their existence. How they're just running on auto-pilot...and that my dear friends, is the root of all evils. Going through the motions leading to death. The problem is that you're already dead! You're the walking dead believing you think for yourself, believing the choices you make are your own. But, they're not. Your lucky break - if you get one - occurs when you actually wake up to this horror. Let's hope it isn't too late...

The Quiet Lady

I realize how much I love being alone, despite being a city girl. Sure, there are times I prefer the company of a friend. But, most days, I'm perfectly fine to go to a cafe and dream up ways to live more quietly.

People think that silence is the absence of noise or sound. That's true to a point. I enjoy hearing the chirp and song of birds while a plane passes through. Or, the buzzing of cars and motorcycles. All of these things make up the sound that is my life. And in it all, I find quiet places and pockets, like doors, that open themselves up and invite me in. 

Maybe it was the comfort of music that helped me retain information during school exams. I couldn't study without music or a persistent and consistent cacophany of sound around me. 

Of course, I often imagine waking up by the water. But, it's in the city. Not, up north somewhere far away from all that's familiar to me here. 

I was mugged in my city...not because living in the city is a bad place to live. Where there are more people, there is a greater chance of crime, statistically and logically, speaking. But the thought of getting mugged in the suburbs? Where silence is a shadow in the dark? No thanks.

People haven't learned how to cultivate silence. They think they need to go somewhere to get it, to find it. It's always right here. Where ever you go, there you are. Forget FOMO. "We're all bozos on this bus."

I miss those motorcycle rides on the back of Rakesh's bike. And then listening to, "I'm A Dinosaur," by King Crimson. I want to reach that peak of fearlessness again without the shock of misfortune as an entryway...