Four In The Morning
October 6th, 2008
It is the dark of night, four in the morning, and the whole house is quiet. My husband is asleep somewhere across from me, too far away to see but still close enough to sense and hear him shifting in his sleep. Keiyou isn’t faraway either, this is early for her to be in bed but it’s been a long day and she’s dozing lightly somewhere to my right, just barely visible by the only light- my laptop as I click and clack away at the keys.
As I have said- it is the dark of night. Not a soul stirs in this house aside from me and even the kitties are silent in this reverent moment given over to the shadows. It’s so dark, I can’t even see my fingers, only instinct and memory leads me from one end of my keyboard to the other as I feel the muse, and perhaps something more, taking hold of the pen that is my soul.
My thoughts are a quiet and slow churning hurricane, I’m worried they might swallow me whole and where they might lead… only I seem to know but only I don’t. Perhaps it is a frightening place and so my mind keeps it from me as it has well been trained to do. Perhaps it is a place too far from understanding, so different from my current mental stance that I won’t quite be able to grasp the concept until I’m there. Either way, I’m worried.
Something has changed.
I’m no longer sure that it’s me.
In fact-
I fear a part of me, a terrible, terrible part, has survived through all the transformations.
Something in me trembles at this thought. I know far too well what I once was and the damage I can do but I have loved ones now and this alone scares me more than any other fear and considering how long ‘that’ list is…
I fear for them and for myself because of them.
Will I be a good enough wife for my husband? I know I’m good enough on the surface- he loves me and I him and no matter where the rest of this paragraph goes nothing will change our love and even if I were a horrid wife he would still cherish me like no other, a fact I still find myself reeling in day after day. Beneath the surface though- am I good enough for him? My tarnished soul, spotty and yellowed with forced age and my traitorous mind always leading me astray down paths of doubt and self disgust. To love another when I have so little love for myself… I know well my past and I have a fairly solid grip on the present but as I look back and forth I can see no thing I’ve done to deserve his love.
He is precious to me and no words can even catch the tip of that topic, even as I say it within my skull I find my throat tightening with the telltale signs of emotions I never used to have. I know, in the core of my being, it’s my tarnished soul he loves, the pieces of me that has survived through the rumble to come to him with broken wings but I don’t know how to tell him how much I love him. Those three little words are so base. So simple. I say them as much as I can and I do anything I can for him, he’s always in my thoughts but I don’t know how to… I wish I could literally give my heart to him- to place it in his hands so he can feel what I feel for him.
Then there is my friend, my ever precious Keiyou, she’s such a sweet girl but she doesn’t seem to know the glimmer in her own soul. She shine’s fiercely and boldly but life has taught her to hide that shine beneath adverted eyes and a quiet tone. To her, as my husband, I would give the world. I try every chance I get.
She is in a precarious state, on the precipice of awakening and seeing herself as she truly is. I remember vividly my own personal experience with that state and I want to give her all the help I had because I remember how good it felt to finally be me and smile without guilt in the act but at the same time I worry for her. On this delicate path she treads I fear I will say or do the wrong thing, her and I are alike after all and I know she remembers well what others say and tends to take their words to heart whether she knows better or not. By nature, I am not always a good person. I have a very mean streak and living so close to her now, I fear she might see it, or hear it, or come across me on a bad day and feel my wrath. I think I would hate myself if that happened. I’m no good at keeping people close, the darker half of my soul tends to push away without my consent from time to time and though I have it under wraps… I fear I won’t be a good enough guide for my dear friend on her path.
Some may think that perhaps it is not my place to try and guide her, or any other, but I suppose you’d have to be in my shoes as the saying goes. I know my place, I’ve known it since we met that she needed a friend and I need her likewise. I’ve never had another friend like her and I want her to be able to feel that same freedom I felt so long ago and fought so long and hard to reclaim. Like her sketch books, I know she would do something beautiful with it. :)
I fear for these two people.
They are precious gems, more needed than air, and more supporting than the tallest and oldest of oaks. They are my family, the only people I have who know me like no other may know me and for that-
I also fear them.
I wonder if they know, though I will never ask, unless they stumble upon these words, that if something were to happen- If I were to lose them that I would lose my world. My husband most of all but Keiyou too. Were I to lose one of them something in me would shatter.
Even now, as I sit in the place I wondrously call my home with people who love me and I know no force but fate will move me from here I feel like I am lost in the tides, a feeling that has followed me all my life and stemming from one move to another. Meeting new people and leaving them again as we trakked across the country in hopes of escape. Even my mother, I only knew her for a short time before fate forced me to move on. Life happens after all.
I feel like I’m stuck in an ocean and without my two precious people I’m worried I’ll be swept away and lose myself down in the dank dark places of existence. I fear so much and I know it’s justifiable. I remember my life in moments of instability how one can lose everything, have it practically ripped away, in a matter of mere seconds.
I’m not sure I’d survive that a second time.
I’m not certain I’m good enough for the people I love. I know they’d never leave me but if I were to do something to hurt them… it would be worse than anything. I am capable of being a terrible person, I’m unreliable, I have a habit of lying from time to time and not always in the simple little white way but a blacker more deceptive manner- half the time without realizing it.
I feel I am standing on a point, like any moment without knowing it I could fall one way or the other and hurt those I love. I fear doing something that will cause them to be torn from me as has happened with a family of mine before. The reverberations of the memory alone are enough to make me shudder with dread.
Last time, all it took was a single choice- to sign a piece of paper or not and I knew it was wrong but I was weak and I let myself be talked into it. That’s still no excuse, I tried to convince myself it would be alright, that I had a better purpose for what I did but as I look into the core of my soul I know better. I was bad and for it the universe took away so much. It seems silly I should lose so much over so little but then again- if I were running the barter system I suppose my life of then would have been as priceless as my life of now is and nothing- not even fate will dare to change my heart on that matter.
Sighing heavily, I can sense this post coming to a close, the something of before draining from me for but a moment but the effect still lingering. I haven’t released these worries, merely clarified them and they will forever be there. All I can do is remember that I am loved and that I love- I love with all my heart and soul and extensions of myself that one can’t even begin to comprehend. I will remember this and so be it I remember this I know I will stay upon the tip of that point. I know my own words will keep me standing tall so I can be there for those I love as they have always been there for me.
It is the dark of night, I have naught but my laptop to illuminate my journey from one end of this post to the other. Outside this darkness though, this natural dark brought on by the sleeping sun and the moon dancing in the sky, I look inwards to the darkness that has harmed me in the past. The tarnished parts of my soul so cherished by others. I look at this darkness and though I am afraid of what I might do with it- I am not afraid of it.
Never.
Why?
Because, it is the dark of soul, and I have naught but those I love to illuminate my journey from one end of the abyss to the other but their lights shine so brightly before me that I know I can make my way through anything with their help and that from them, my own light might learn to shine a little little more in return so I might someday be able to show them just how I feel and be everything I need to be for them.
Thank you.
PS: This is post number 200.
I dont know what to say other than you and i are very alike. and i love you as well. i may not be as close as your hubby or kei, but i do love you. and say the word and i’ll be there.
*smiles gingerly* I love you too, dearie. :) You know I’d give anything to help you as well, right?
I know. Just as I’d give anything and everything to help you. You’re one of my sisters, Spirit. Weather you like it or not XD. You are loved. When things get to be like this and you dont know what you’re feeling, remember that there is a little random fae out there that’s smiling because you’ve helped her.
:) Good good, and thank you. Lolz, of course I like it! Twee-hehehe, I know, dearie, and though it may not seem like it please remember this is actually a happy post. It’s just one of my deeper thoughts kind of posts.
if you love and trust him (which you do), and he loves and trusts you (which he does), then you simply have to believe in each other, and know that neither of you would do anything to intentionally harm the other. just because there was a darkness before doesn’t mean there has to be a darkness now or in the future. but don’t just wander blindly hoping; these things take effort, time, patience, love, compassion, talking and active listening to work, and to work well. if someone you love and trust believes you are good enough for them, show that trust and love you feel for them, but show it to you. as in, even if you can’t believe in yourself in some moments, believe enough in their believing of you until you step out the other side back into the light. :-D
as for worry, it’s so easy to say, but… don’t do it. ;-) simply don’t. it only ever encourages more, breeds more, creates and infects more. and it never does anything to help. seriously. basically, with anything you find yourself worrying about, immediately ask yourself if it’s something you can change. if you can, then change it. if you can’t, then let it go until you can. the rest will just simply short circuit your brain.
as for darkness in general, if we didn’t have any, i don’t think we would appreciate the light so much. it keeps us alive and trying for better, for ourselves and others. i used to embrace my darker impulses because i didn’t feel worthy of anything good. then i still felt the same about myself, but believed that others deserved better than my darkness, so i either had to keep everything to myself or share with others but not be so dark. now i use my darker twists when i need to, when it helps a little, but these are few and far between as i’m learning more and more each day that a little light is still far, far stronger than a wealth of dark.
:-D
Very true and yes, that is much easier to say than do but you’re right. So very right and I know it in my head but the brain is a traitorous organ with hidden agendas set to self destruct but I will try… no, take that back as the Taoist in me, I will more than try. I. Will. Stop. Worrying. Maybe not this moment but the more I keep at it the more I’ll get better. :)
Very true! I find myself saying that so often via appreciating the light and it’s a common concept in my writing. I just need to remember it even harder in moments like these. :D Muchly agreed and thank you. I say these things so often myself but saying them to one’s self doesn’t always do the trick. Sometimes we need to hear it from a good friend too. Thank you.