Wishing for Closure

So, I wrote John an e-mail. Very simple:

I hope you are doing OK and life is finding some semblance of normal.
I know you got hit really hard.

I think we both realize that we wanted different things from each
other. I've tried to move on without involving you, but I seem to be
stuck. If you have any sense of what happened, why, I would appreciate
closure.

I think it is a good e-mail, but after I got a major panic attack. But here's the bizarre thing: I didn't send it. I hit "save draft" so think about sending it, and it gave me a panic attack.

I want closure, for lots of things. I want happy closure for my dad--a clean bill of health that says "you will be well--what we were worried about is not going to happen; you will be well." I want to see Cheney and Bush and Rove and John Yoo and Judge Bybee in jail. Closure. Tying up the loose ends.

But I keep yearning for closure with John in a way that feels like it is keeping me from moving fully forward. Wanting my dad to be well, that feels totally normal. My aching for closure with John, it feels neurotic. One step away from Glenn Close in Fatal Attraction. I know that my behavior, outside of this blog and what I've inflicted on my girlfriends, has been somewhat normal (I may have sent a few too many e-mails at the end, but he was having a rough time and several of my friends, whom I trusted, thought I owed him more than I sent, although they've all since taken to roundly criticizing him, which I hate because it means I end up defending him, when I'm too hurt to want to take his side), but my feelings have not been normal.

I wish he would e-mail and say "It's not me; it's you. I'm sorry--you deserve bettered, but I know it could never be with me." Or even "Hey--look--you were right. I just wasn't attracted to you. And, again, you were right--I hoped I would be, because it would have been nice to be with someone a little less crazy for once, but I wasn't attracted to you. And when I realized that something elusive was missing, I should have told you instead of just disappearing. But I figured it would hurt you to confirm the insecurities that I knew you had. I didn't want to be the one to tell you that you are right--you aren't lovable, at least not to me, and I figured you'd take that to mean you aren't lovable at all" Or something. Whatever it was. Something to put a period on the end of the sentence.


The things is, I loved him. And I still do, a little. I seem to be incapable of just getting pissed off, putting an easy label on it and moving on. I'm excellent at doing that people I've never cared about, but once I've cared about someone, I always see the good as well as the bad and the extenuating circumstances.


Back in college, I took a little, cheap, non-greyhound bus, overnight, to a large city that a friend lived about an hour from. The bus stop wasn't the greyhound one, but when I had given her the address, she hadn't written it down, thinking she knew where the bus stop was. This was long before ubiquitous cell phones defined our communication, and my friend was 5 hours late. 5 hours. I was frustrated, and when she arrived, I started to take her head off, until I realized, she'd spend the last 5 and a half hours driving around looking for me. She was nearly frantic and she also felt bad, and I had just made it worse by not thinking through her side before I let my temper get the better of me. I can still see her face, her car, the 3 super-big-gulps she'd drunk in her dazed attempt to find me. And somehow, I learned that lesson too well--I instinctively come up with extenuating circumstances that explain someone else's behavior. I almost never judge people I love. I have no problem immediately judging Republican politicians. But maybe if I could be even minorly capable of judging. Of judging John. Intellectually, I think he treated me badly. Emotionally, I can't believe that he would hurt me like that, unless he had a good reason, even as my intellect laughs at the justification. None of which brings me closer to my search for closure. And I've sort of accepted that he won't help with that. I expect it will take me falling for another guy to get over him, and I fear that not being over him will prevent any other guy from being in the vicinity.

The Bitchy Swan

A minister for the church I used to attend died, and I went to the funeral yesterday. There were some people there I haven't seen for 10 years, and most I hadn't seen for a couple. With a few exceptions, most of the women had become mothers and had gained an average of maybe 40 pounds each and they had gotten definitely middle aged. We were a young congregation. At the same time, they had warm, open, joyous faces with a sense of groundness and wisdom. People, for the most part, that I would go out of my way to spend time with. Lovely people.

People were so sweet to me. I was at least a decade younger than most of them, and one of the guys came up and said "you were the baby of the group, and you've grown up SO beautifully! Look at you!" And everyone said how good I looked, and I knew it was true, compared to how I looked then.

But it felt hollow. I had lost about 40 pounds since I saw these people regularly. And I was the only person, in a room of about 100, who wore make-up. (Oddly enough, I was one of the only people wearing black, but that wasn't for fashion--I always thought you wore black to a funeral, but a lot of people were wearing red and pink--it made me feel like my black was weirdly fashionable instead of appropriately somber.) Anyway, I would not go out of my way to get to know me. Maybe once I got to know me, I'd think I was OK under the mascara, eye-liner and little black dress, but my initial reaction of me wouldn't be someone I'd want to get to know. And I think 10 years ago, I probably would have been more likely to want to get to know me.

Maybe not--my youthful enthusiasm had a tendency to talk to much, but too excited, too intense, not always leave room for the other person. Very rarely it still does, but less and less because I don't let her out to play anymore. I know that that side annoyed even John, who in some ways knew me better than anyone, and so if John didn't like her, no one would.

But there is a loss even there--I'm less spontaneous, less open. More reserved.

I think I'm turning more into what men are interested in. Or supposedly interested in. My original title for this blog was going to be "The Ugly Duckling," and even my parents would say "yeah--you were, but you aren't any more." The problem is, I don't really love whom I'm becoming. I feel fake. And I'm scared that even if this new persona does the trick, and I meet someone I like, who is also interested in me, will I be able to accept that? Will I test him to prove what I'm really like? Want him to see the tough chick who can build her own bookshelves and change her own oil? I like being a girly girl about a third of the time. But what if I get trapped as a girly girl? "The little, helpless woman." The good news is, I'd never be cute enough to be a trophy wife, and I'm true enough to myself that I can't be with someone I don't like; I'd change both those if I could, but they will also protect me a great deal.

It was just so shocking to look across this room of lovely warm people and realize I wouldn't classify me with them. They had an openness, an authenticity. Most of them were wearing Birkenstocks. Comfortable in their own skin, laid back. And there was me, trying to be aware of my posture. How funny that I never fit in growing up because I was too much in the laid-back, Birkenstocks category, and now I don't fit in with the people I like more because I'm too accepting of the mainstream.

My Heart Bleeds for Iran

A young girl in Iran writes:

I will participate in the demonstrations tomorrow. Maybe they will turn violent. Maybe I will be one of the people who is going to get killed. I'm listening to all my favorite music. I even want to dance to a few songs. I always wanted to have very narrow eyebrows. Yes, maybe I will go to the salon before I go tomorrow! There are a few great movie scenes that I also have to see. I should drop by the library, too. It's worth to read the poems of Forough and Shamloo again. All family pictures have to be reviewed, too. I have to call my friends as well to say goodbye. All I have are two bookshelves which I told my family who should receive them. I'm two units away from getting my bachelors degree but who cares about that. My mind is very chaotic. I wrote these random sentences for the next generation so they know we were not just emotional and under peer pressure. So they know that we did everything we could to create a better future for them. So they know that our ancestors urrendered to Arabs and Mongols but did not surrender to despotism. This note is dedicated to tomorrow's children... (translated at http://niacblog.wordpress.com/2009/06/19/live-blogging-fridays-events-in-iran/)

I feel so helpless, and yet a sense of great solidarity. This young lady knows what she faces tomorrow. I wish I could protect her, support her, something. I read the blogs vociferously. I open YouTube videos, more than I have time to watch, in all these windows at once. Hoping, against hope that the ayatollahs will see that millions of people are watching, know the world is watching, and not do this horrible thing they do.

And my life seems so trivial in comparison. My dad has moved in with me. I'm taking good care of him. I've been obnoxious enough (and his condition is serious enough) that things keep getting pushed up. I'm scared for him. There may be microscopic cancer in his lungs already. I watch from afar, unable to do anything constructive. As I download YouTube videos for Iran, which I know is a meaningless gesture, I make pots of tea and salads and organic brown rice and lentils for my dad, which is another meaningless gesture. I can no longer stop the possible cancer in my dad's lungs than I can stop the possible massacre in Iraq tomorrow. Tomorrow is the day for Iran. 6 months will decide for my dad. Maybe my heart is breaking for Iran so it doesn't break quite so much for my dad. I feel helpless on all fronts.

Daddy's Girl

There's this huge shift happening under my feet. I'm still dad's girl, but now, I'm the grown up. I'm the one deciding where to go for treatment, and since one of the top 6 cancer centers is miles from me, he's moving in with me. And I'm buying stuff he needs--I'm helping financially support my parents for the first time in my life.

My parents came to me yesterday and asked me to be the sort of mastermind behind this--plan everything, keep track of everything. I'm talking with the doctors, making appointments, keeping track of what we need. We now have project manager software on-line with to-do lists for everyone. I brainstorm stuff that would be useful, so everyone has something they can do when they want it so they are contributing when they need something to fill the void.

I'm scared. Really scared. And I'm totally hiding it.

The only information I can find on prognosis says 40%, but that was published in 1992, so I know things have to have gotten much better since then. Elizabeth Edwards. Elizabeth Edwards. Elizabeth Edwards, I keep telling myself and my parents. I didn't even tell my parents the 40% number until someone else did. 17 year old data, based on 27 years old medical procedures (10 year survival rates) doesn't feel relevant. But I was glad someone else did, because they were just going to go to their home-town place which doesn't even have someone who knows this stuff.

And here's the trivial thing. I'm sposed to have a date tonight. I haven't cancelled. There's nothing I can do in that three-hour chunk. Why now? But, what do I do? Do I tell him and fall into one of the "what not to do"s on the list of things gals shouldn't do? Do I not tell him, and basically, in my opinion, lie? I like this guy--the first one I've liked in a while (aside from the +15 who was just too old for me), but the timing is off.

Am I saying the timing is off because I don't want to let John go completely? I still miss John. As crazy as that is. Or am I sabotaging this because I like emotionally unavailable men? I mean, the timing really seems off. But I'll probably go, and be open, and see how he responds. Can't say, "my dad is moving in with me for the summer for chemo and surgery" is a great pick-up line. My gut feeling is that, all things considered, someone would want to get to know me before I drop that little bombshell. I value openness and authenticity, but I think it can be too much, too soon. But this is such a huge part of my mental landscape at the moment that to not share would be, in essence, to lie.

The C word...

It is amazing how quickly life can lurch from the trivial obsessions that cloud my judgement to the important, and what seemed so urgent only days ago now seems trite.

This morning, when I woke up, the worst news I could imagine came through. I knew my dad hadn't been feeling way, but it seemed something weird--I hadn't taken it seriously. And then they woke me up (they're 3 hours ahead of me) and delivered the c-word.

Cancer.

I wasn't even awake--it came through the sort of half awake, not sure what's going on, no clarity.
How can all that be contained in those 6 little letters. And perhaps worse to come--we'll know tomorrow. I always thought cancer was the worst news you could get. If it is metastasized....

And I'm the strong one. My mother is trying to be strong for me dad when she's with him, and then I'm there for her whenever my dad needs a break. And they're all the way across the country.

My dad cried on the phone with me. The only other time I remember my dad crying is when John Lennon was killed. My grandma died a year ago--how can my dad be facing this now?

And for me--I want to drop everything and run over and be with them.

And yet, my mind runs back to the trivial--I have this incredible guilt that I haven't given him a grandchild. I always thought my brother would because he was open about wanting a family, and he's incredibly good looking, but he breaks up with women when they become less perfect. He seems to be beginning to identify the pattern and maybe address it, but so far, my father has no possibilities of having a grand added to his name. It seems the least I could do, especially since I think I want to anyway. And if I do it in 10 years and he is gone--he wanted a grandchild so much--WANTS--I can't believe I just used past-tense--anyway he wants a grandchild more than just about anything. But really, there was no one I could have done that with. But if only I had been softer, thinner, less opinionated, more feminine, all the things my dad wanted me to be... Now he'd say I'm just fine the way I am, he wouldn't change me at all. But if I could only have been the things he thought, I expect he'd have grandkids by now. Not that I can live my life that way, not that I should even think that, but all the same.

I've been wearing make-up every single day since John disappeared. At first it was because it kept me from bursting into tears in public. Somehow the feel of the make-up on my face, which I've always hated, reminded me, distanced me, it actually became a mask that also seemed to protect me. Once I stopped wanting to burst into tears, I've kept it up, figuring if I want men to approach me, maybe I should give visual cues that I want men to approach me. Maybe all the stuff women do, that I've always thought of as trite and superficial, and annoying and stupid--maybe they are the human species cues that the individual member of the species is interested in mating. Today, my mascara ran down my face. And that was OK. Someone was very kind to me at work, asked what was wrong. And while I always eschew any public displays of emotion, I send something along the lines of "sorry--my dad has cancer, and I found out a couple of hours ago, but it just hit me" and the visual cue of the running mascara, as silly as it seemed, she was far kinder to me than I think she would have been otherwise, or maybe I was more vulnerable. I don't know.

I want to be able to do something, to help in some way other than having some flowers and a couple of books sent to him (first time I've ever used amazon's overnight shipping!)--something. I feel so helpless and so alone. I clutch my cats closer to me in bed tonight--they, of course, have claws. I wish I could do something other than wait and hope that I don't hear the m-word tomorrow.