A Night of Wild Emotions

Last night, I became depressed about my response to a red coat and purple-dyed bangs.  I felt like the loser of a hundred things.  Walking into a room, full of people, lights, and voices of talk, I brought the twilight.  To be very accurate, I brought the twilight zone.  It is the oddness of the difference, and on this day, I knew I was different.  I am accepting of difference, like a lot of people, but, also like a lot of people, I abhor rudeness, mean-ness, and just general, all-around attempts to put people in their place.  Everyone is born free, and everyone deserves equal opportunity.  So, on a day facing East, I became an outsider of my own making.  Just to keep the verbiage to a minimum, the issue that became the making of my depression was a momentary mean-ness I had for a fellow human being.  So, the euphemism is that I called her a lesbian–a dyke.  Like “niggard,” dyke is a loaded word.  To a more daring person, this becomes a challenge to prove the mettle of the word.  What is the accuracy; when facing the person, and when calling them something derogatory, in front of their face and in front of the world, is everything accurate and in the place it should be?

So, because I was mean… to be very accurate, because I purposely chose someone of a size who could not defend herself against my use of a derogatory word, I publicly humiliated myself–for not being myself… for not being the leader and the leading example.  So, last night, I lost.  My voice carries, so, I am sure the world (everyone in the room) heard the resounding crack of the fissure in the floor we were standing on.  The fissure has now become a wide chasm of limitless depth, much like an abyss.  We are standing on either side, not knowing what to do now.  We stare warily at each other, and, at the others who have gathered around, either to spectate or to become a player, a supporter.

I have hopes for a good ending.  Even if these are people we will have fleeting connection to, or some real tenuous relationship with.  It is good to have a phone book filled with acquaintances rather than a Facebook of hundreds.  I am imagining what this “good ending” will be.  Will it be about making amends, where things are patched?  But, which is obvious, the patch is just unsightly… ugly…  glaring.  The poor emotional responses live on this case, where the hurt feelings continue in life unabated.  Or, is a “good ending” more?  …  Something closer to “making amends” rather than just “patching” and “repairing?”  Can I offer an olive branch, as a sign of hope for a wellness?  That we, me and the person I so offended, can feel free to live on.

So, these are the two endings that are possible, given the fact that as a human being, I cannot, no matter how much I may think, that I can find ways of proving the points that the differences between human beings makes us, or, myself, better than other types of human beings.  I can probably cite multiple examples of those people who earn more money, or, are more creative, or, have easier times finding things, or, those, who, like the ads say, are just plain luckier–all the time.

These are just types of people.  And, I have had friends from even more different places than these four, roughly-drawn examples of places people come from.  I usually am very good with people, as socially, I’ve been gifted with word-power.  So, usually, I get along.  So, just “losing it” last night, I have confused myself.  I have worried about it all day, and now, I am rushing to type out this, my apology, as I do not like the feeling of guilt.  It is as if I have the devil’s blood coursing through my veins, and, unlike human blood, it burns.  It burns its way through my body, and my thought is of the wrong and the guilt.

So, I am publicly telling, and saying, to the person I wronged, “I am sorry.  Please accept my apology, as it is sincere and comes from a place of knowledge and experience.”  I may be very educated and capable of many things, but, still, I have those moments, those momentary mean thoughts swirling in a mess.

Old Flames

One of the strangest things happened to me back at the beginning of September.  I was at work in that big, massive place full of cogs like myself, when, walking through the main lobby (which I do, but not really), I thought I saw my high school sweetheart amongst a group of other suits, possibly on a tour of the cog establishment.

Obviously, he was very busy, and I did not interrupt.  I am not sure that he saw me, as I only had the quickest glimpse.  I spent the rest of the day, enamored and focused on thinking about this past fling.

That evening, back at home, I started to Google his name, as I knew it.  (Just to reveal the embarrassing… I have Googled myself, in an attempt to see if I could access everything about me from the Google.)  In any case, I found very little.  There was a long list of people who had the same name, and just glancing at the photo or the title and the location, I easily ignored more than half the list.  What I did find out from my snooping, is that he has become quite successful.  A nice title, a nice suit and haircut, and probably earning more than one hundred thousand a year.

I had feelings that I did not feel since then, suddenly come to memory.  The sight I remembered that he looked like.  It is strange to me that I did not develop a distaste for the situation.  I guess that the both of us have not moved very far from where we started.  We still live in the same city–in a good neighborhood–and we both have families we are raising.  (I cheated and read a few posts on the Facebook page.)

We both have done well, in my estimation.  We were part of a tight-knit group at school, and we are now all with degrees from the Professional Schools.  And the funny thing, all of us have lost tough with each other. Is high school a big place?  Have we moved ourselves into smaller existences?  Is this how life always happens?

If I hadn’t seen him in such a dislocated place, a place so different than what we knew of each other to be like, I would’ve just dismissed it, disregarded it.  I would’ve left it till the next day at school, between classes, to talk to him, or drop him a note.  Now, all the  thoughts that came flying through my mind was, “Could I afford to carry on a relationship based on a past, fleeting, fling?”  Unfortunately, I was left in the place where I had no answer.

I do feel uneasy, now, at work.  Thinking that I will meet him again.  Depending on the circumstances, I have thought to myself, that I may just ignore him.  The situation?  So, that we don’t have to do that “Dance with the Devil by the moonlight.”  It is funny, with old boyfriends and even just quickie flings, that there is much more ill ease than falling in love.  Even, now, at least ten years later.

So, I now wander the halls of our “Cog Establishment” with apprehension, for the next little while at least, as what I gues to be the project that might employ someone like him.  I have run the gamut from ignoring him completely, to being best friends at work.  Apparently, we both have exceeded each other’s appraisal of the other, otherwise we’d be married with children.  Sometimes, in daydreams, I imagine that we could celebrate fifty and seventy-five year marriage anniversaries, if we did, in fact, marry each other as high school sweethearts.

Just once, since September, I contemplated in a real way, about including him in my list of friends and family that I send Christmas Cards to.  But, in a real way, as well, I thought it would just look like a political move.  Meaning that I could not see any redemptive, non-calculating reason for this action.  So, just as quickly, I crossed that thought out of my mind as well.

Now, I am thinking we a have a situation, without presence.  There is a life born out of this “encounter” that goes beyond the present… we do not have contact, and yet we have existence inside our new aquarium.  I am wondering if everything is the same with him.

I have thought…. more, again…  That if we truly do not make contact with each other, that my one new year’s resolution will be to cross out his name and think no more about it at all.  We all seem to have those problems…  Problems of dangling friends.  Those “holder’s-on” that are politically useful, but, really, just suck life and time out of everyone.  I am hoping not to enter into a second “dangle-on” situation.

The useful thing that has come out of seeing something old in a new place, is that I have gone through my memory box (Year Book included) and relived, and then purged, those ideas, thoughts, sights, and smells, from encroaching on the useful and livable parts of my life.  I have strengthened the ties that I have withe the things that I have now, and I have said, “Goodbye,” after the time I should have said it.  I am probably quite complacent with myself now, but it is justified.

And so, I wish everyone that I will not see in December, a “Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!”