we don’t know the meaning of fear
There are moments in my life where I don’t have the right person to talk to, or anyone to talk to, but I need to tell someone. I need to write things out. Tonight is one of those nights.
I had an amazing day. The morning was a little rocky. Actually I’ve had an amazing 36 hours, outside this morning. Last night friends came over – Feather, Nathan and Gina. We had dinner and drinks at my parent’s house, complete with a fire built by Nathan. We were able to spend some time catching up and enjoying each other’s company. I find myself with a number of guy friends I’ve known for nearly or more than a decade. At my age, it means I really got to see these men grow from boys to young men to full men in their own right. And they are some amazing men. Nathan was once a bit immature – more so than was usually called for. But he’s shaped up and found direction and focus in his life. He knows what he wants and he’s really going for it. But amidst all that, which I could care less about really, he’s generous and kind and considerate. I don’t mean please and thank you. I mean, serving the pizza, collecting the plates when we were all done, building the fire, keeping us safe at the bar. Its little things, but its so incredibly clear that he is no longer just a boy, but a man. I suppose I’m no longer just a girl either. But it makes me so happy to see the amazing person he is, and it makes me feel so incredibly lucky to have a friend like him in my life. I adore him, I really do. He helped make the evening just wonderful. This morning was rocky because it didn’t go how I wanted it to. I didn’t get up as early as I wanted to, which kind of threw the rest of the day off by about an hour. Not the end of the world, but still not exactly what I wanted. But I got to the eye doctor, got the new contacts sorted and caught the train down to the Bronx.
Yes, really, the Bronx. I was meeting Manny for dinner, but it worked out for me to go down earlier and make a stop in the Bronx to see Mike. Yes, I realize how insane that was. But these are the men in my life. I don’t require they all spend time together, but I get to see them individually if I want. So Mike.
I don’t know how to explain Mike and I. We are going on nearly 8 years of knowing each other. We dated, we screwed, we fought, he really hurt me, we got past it. I suppose in a way it was mostly a typical relationship. Except it wasn’t. Mike is one of the very few people in the world that I feel safe with. I don’t mean just safe from muggers on the street. I mean safe from anything that might hurt me. Something changed the past two years or so and I now know how much he cares. I know he would never willingly hurt me. But its not just that. I’m not some version of me, or some side of me with him. I’m… me. A more complete version of me than with anyone else. And somehow that encompasses Megan and Manny. Yes – Megan and Manny have known me longer and in many senses know me better. But Mike… He’s always seen me for exactly who I am. And he’s never tried to fix me. His response, a long time ago when I pointed out that he’s never tried to fix me, was immediate but not forced. "You’re not broken."
I don’t fault my parents. I don’t fault Manny. I don’t fault the doctors or the prescriptions. I needed all those people and all those things. But they approached it as a problem, a broken part, that needed to be fixed. When you have that many people doing that, you start to feel broken. And I did. But he never once saw me that way. I was me, not perfect and full of flaws. But not broken.
Its different. I can’t help it. Mike is the real reason I went back to school. Okay – maybe not the REAL reason, but the driving, encouraging reason behind my going back to college and really in a way my Great Michigan Adventure. He’s always made me feel sexy and powerful and safe and… comfortable.
The past few times he and I have spent time together, we’ve both commented on how we have this intimacy, which is physical but its so so so much more than that. There is a safeness, a comfortableness, an openness that we don’t share with anyone else.
As we sat in his kitchen, I realized how much I’ve missed feeling ‘safe’ like that. I have absolutely no one like that in Michigan. I have no one like Megan or Manny or my parents or Nathan. I’m always on alert. I always have my guard up. I’m always only a portion of who I really am.
I’ve been searching for a way to get my facade to come down. I’ve been trying to find a way to remove the mask that somehow got surgically implanted on my face, but I didn’t know how to do it. Until I was sitting in his kitchen, and I realized it was gone. And later it was even more apparent that I was me for the first time in a long time.
Mike never saw me as anything other than who I am. No one has ever looked at me like that. There’s a little part of me that wonders if he could be it. I’m not sure. And everyone says when you know, you know. But there’s that little voice that can’t help wonder. We are so comfortable with each other, so safe… I didn’t want to leave his arms when it was time to get up and get dressed. He didn’t either. We both wanted to hold onto that moment, that safeness for as long as we could. Because there is a good chance it will be another year before either of us feels that safe again.
No sleep today
Cant even rest when the suns down
No time, there’s not enough
And nobody’s watchin me now
When we were children we’d play
Out in the streets just dipped in fate
When we were children we’d say
That we don’t the meaning of
Fear, fear, fear,
Fear, fear, fear
We dont know the meaning of..
When we were children we’d play
Out in the streets just dipped in fate
When we were children we’d say
That we don’t the meaning of
Fear, fear, fear,
Fear, fear, fear
We don’t know the meaning of..
Wish I
Didn’t know the meaning of…
Fear ~ OneRepublic