Whatever

With the emphasis on the 'what' and a slight roll of the eyes.  

I said it often when I was a teenager.  I still think it.  Feel it.  It is a way of distancing.  Of numbing.  Of pretending I didn't want more.  Want the world to be a little closer to how I'd imagined it.  

I think of Van Jones. 

 

His earnest idealism inspires me.  His calling people on their "This may not work out very well--you're not fooling nobody."  (it's about 19 minutes, 30 seconds in.)  "Your heart was broken not just this year.  Your heart was broken a long time ago.  ... Love harder."

How did he keep that as the people he thought he could believe in let him down so badly?  He says he threw himself a big pity party, but then he clearly got over it and got back in touch with that part of him that could be hurt.

'Whatever'  keeps idealism at bay.  I use it with politicians.  I said often "I'm sure Obama will break my heart. He's a politician" or "This may not work out very well."  I didn't expect it quite as badly as it came, but I prepared for it with that psychic 'whatever.'  (Except when he gave his Cairo speech or his Philly speech on race, when I really thought me was something amazing.)  But he broke my heart.  It is hard to see how I can hope for someone more than Obama, and also hard to see how I could ever have thought he could make the country better and stay true to his rhetoric.

Do I weep?  Or do I say "whatever."  I don't have Van Jones' strength when it comes to politics.  Or his privilege.  

I go back and forth when I think of Bobby. Sometimes I'm aware of how much I liked him.  How much we connected.  And then I'm aware of where I wish he had behaved differently. Maybe if we hadn't made out for hours in the rain, if he hadn't played with my clit and told me to think of him when I played with myself and tell him when I did.... But I don't want to be mad at him and then a giant, psychic "whatever" comes through.  I should have thought "this may not work out very well" from the beginning.  But I wouldn't be fooling anyone.

Van Jones says to "love harder" and I don't have Van Jones' strength when it comes to love either.  I feel like if I love any harder, my heart will break harder, and I don't know how to pick up the pieces any more. And yet, I keep throwing myself pity parties, hoping to come though with the strength and finally meet someone who has the strength to have done his own work and be ready to meet me.