Make no mistake, it is hard to be alone after thirteen years of marriage, even if it is an empty, one-sided one.
I'm not looking for A Man to magically appear in my life and fix everything for me - support me, raise my children for me, or to be my sole anything. No one else is responsible for fixing my life. It's up to me to decide what - if anything - needs fixing. My reality, my existence, is valid enough for me and is my responsibility.
That doesn't mean that I go through life alone, a self-sufficient island. God knows I've stubbornly tried. I pull myself up by the bootstraps and struggle along by myself, afraid to make another mistake and trust another person who might hurt me, but I know that this isn't the way. We could not have been placed upon this earth with all these people for nothing. And so I reach out a little every day, and I do so fully knowing that it's going to hurt. I am responsible for how I respond to the pain.
Therefore, I'm only bearing my soul to people who also take responsibility for their own lives, and who share my sense of personal integrity and sense of belonging to a whole. People who won't pick me apart and minutely examine the pieces for flaws, but rather will accept me as a whole, and then further as a part of a Whole.
What I am most missing in my life right now is intimacy.
I don't mean sexual intimacy, although I do sometimes confuse that with what I want.
What I really want is to be truly close to another person - for moral support over financial support, for complimenting or enhancing my life over fixing it or completing it.
I'm looking for mutual respect.
I want people in my life who are patient enough to wait and see what I mean or find out where I'm coming from instead of judging me without trying to understand. I work hard to offer that same courtesy.
I'd like it if the people I'm investing myself in took the time and had the interest to figure me out and appreciate me. I'm just vain enough to state that I am worth the effort. I'm just empathetic enough to feel that others are worth my time as well.
I like to surround myself with people who are positive forces in my life and in their immediate surroundings. They energize me.
I love creative people who realize that The Box is an illusion, so they're already thinking outside it.
A sense of humor is tantamount.
I value intelligence highly. Intelligence is a really attractive trait for me, but without empathy or compassion it is worthless. I love people who are "heart-smart" just the same.
It would be wonderful if the people I have a relationship with were all safe-houses where I -we- could encourage one another to try new things and be open to what life has to offer without fear of getting crushed or sabotaged.
It's true that I think of these things because I haven't always had them. It's true that I'm standing back and trying to redefine how I look at people - men in particular. I cannot assume that all men are bent on using me and then breaking me when I'm no longer useful to them. For awhile I kept my distance, observing all the people I met as if they were characters in a play. I analyzed their motives and watched their characters develop, all the while keeping up my own end of the illusion while still keeping my core self well hidden. Now I find myself needing to draw closer again, to experience the people I meet as they really are instead of how they appear. I cut past as much of the bullshit as possible and know them for what is both good and bad, and I don't judge them for any of it because I know myself. I am trying to see everyone as beautifully flawed as I am myself. I am hoping they will see that which is beautiful in me.
If all my relationships were like this, I would never feel alone or insecure. There would be nothing that I could not do for myself or for others.
These are high standards. I've felt the sting of not meeting them myself, and seen more than one relationship die as the other party turned tail and ran from the responsibility of sustaining the effort.
I refuse to take that as a sign that I'm mistaken in looking for the best in others, or expecting the best from them. I know it's hard to reach out and to be vulnerable. I have to fight my urge to isolate myself every day. As Emmerson wrote, it takes courage to be yourself when everyone else is trying to make you into somebody else.
"You'll die alone," said a guy at the factory. He meant because I only see my children on the weekends, and that's when most men are available for dates. He also meant because I wouldn't settle for someone - such as himself - who merely wanted someone to sleep with and to make his meals for him. Probably housework as well. I feel trapped among disadvantaged people who don't know any other life and assume that I should lie down and accept it as my lot in life as well.
I refuse to live by anyone else's standards.
I refuse to fret about whether or not I will die alone or unappreciated.
If any of my relationships meet the ideals I am striving toward, I will never be alone. I am not alone because I have redefined what it is to be intimate.
Call this my Declaration of Interdependence.
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