Impoor Thoughts

In which our Hero sits in frayed robes atop a wicker throne

I can’t even remember how I got there, but I found myself thinking of someday taking my lady to present her to my grandmother. I thought about stammering introductions in a language I know not well, and about trying to handle the duties of translation as my grandmother met her. (I think my grandmother would approve.) It made me think of family prayers there, and adding someone new to the order of things, and the amused shuffle as people sorted themselves out.

It made me think of that house, as much a family member as the occupants. It made me think of the stones of the kitchen, worn smooth by generations. It made me think of the ruddy gravel and my grandmother sweeping. It made me think of the cow playing ninja.

It made me feel strangely shy, unexpectedly naked. What if she doesn’t like it? What if she doesn’t see the magic and only sees the old old house. What if she’s miserable so far from the world? (What if it’s different again and I prepare her wrong?)

It makes me shy again because then I think about having her here, in my house, and I’m suddenly conscious of how old this house is, how much work it could use. I’m conscious of the carpets I’ve been lobbying to change for hardwood, and the walls that could use paint. I feel strangely threadbare, and I would so much rather impress her.

It’s in my head. She thinks so and even I think so. Some of it is just general unhappiness about my living arrangements and differences in philosophy between me and my parents. I really just have to trust her to make a decision about me on the strength of me. I think see sees at least some of the strength of me, which helps. But the trust thing is my trump card. In all my anxieties and all my stresses, this has been the key so far, stop fretting and trust her, and she has always made that the right choice.

It’s a little strange for me. Being open and having faith that she’ll see what’s important is insanely obvious, and most of the time it’s really easy because I’m a pretty mellow guy to begin with and she is really straightforward about telling me what’s going on with her. And yet sometimes, she’ll say something, and I have to fight down the need to answer, to defend myself. Because if I can just focus on what she’s actually said instead of what I’m reacting to, it’s clear that she wasn’t attacking, so the defence response is all wrong anyway.

I think of it as the need to be right. The best response to “I need to concentrate on something for a few minutes, can I have quiet?” is really, “Yes.” And yet sometimes instead of yes, the crazy boils up and I find myself reacting to “Stop being so distracting/noisy.” It isn’t what she said. It isn’t implied in the conversation around it. It isn’t in the context. It’s just a request for a few minutes of quiet, but I’m reacting, and I want to explain why I was doing whatever I was doing, and I want it clear that my actions were reasonable and rational and…. I can’t figure out why that happens.

Trying to rationalize the pattern as emotional baggage doesn’t work. Maybe it’s a little bit baggage, but in those past relationships, snark was very clearly snark (though even then focusing on what was actually said probably would have helped to moderate things). It’s not just relationship stuff. The same impulse happens in meetings, it happens in conversations. Hell, I’m a know-it-all. (I try not to talk too much because I don’t want to be *that guy.*) Being right is a frequent problem, and winning happens more than being right. It’s always been this way, as a consultant, and also as a student pounding a table in our lounge, convincing the people who actually understood what we were supposed to be doing that their assumptions made no sense and that mine were much more reasonable. (You’d think either they or I would have learned over time…)

But with Nocturne, it’s so much easier for me to kind of check my reaction for any stress and then ask myself, okay, am I stressed for a reason? Because with Nocturne, on those occasions, the answer is so often “No, there is no reason to be stressed.”

I sometimes feel a little wistful about “Why couldn’t we have met sooner?” Except then I think about this difference in how I am with her, compared to how I’ve been in the past, and I don’t know that I would have been able to be the way I am now. I would have understood that my reaction wasn’t rational, but I’m not sure I’d have been able to react better. Like it took me this long to get good enough at being me to be with her. Which maybe is a tiny bit of benediction for the volume of stupidity that it took to get this far but…

She makes it easy. I don’t know how, but she makes it easy. It isn’t me making intellectual decisions and weighing my options to respond before picking one for the situation. It’s deep down, close to the fight-or-flight bits of the brain because that reflex isn’t getting triggered, or isn’t getting to act. As I recall there’s a 30-90 second period where the fight-or-flight chemistry can really take the right of way but it doesn’t take me 30-90 seconds to reach peace. Like I said, whatever is going on is deep down stuff.

She makes it so easy for me to spend time with her, and enjoy her company, and support her. And then, inexplicably, she’s all pleased and occasionally impressed by my care when the magic is all hers.