There are moments that sneak up on us. We are never really sure just how they came about…the cause. It just happens. We have epiphanies. These moments that come to us in quiet segments. We find a kernel of thought percolating in our brains. And it brews into a full fledged thought. This has happened to me in the last day or so.
I will say that it really isn’t based on actions of the last few days. It really was the accumulation of realizations. It was seeing things a little clearer than I had. I had allowed myself to take a act of passion and make it the end all, be all. And amazing as it is, it’s not that. It’s not all I want. And it’s not about physical acts. It’s actually far removed from that. It’s more about an understanding. It’s about the complete faith that you are as important to someone as they are to you.
I have struggled with this for weeks. I thought it came to a head a week or so ago. I was wrong. It came to a head last night. I discovered that I was placed in the background in a situation that I should be out front. Taking cooking (my passion) into account, we tend to put the main course on the front burner. The reason is that it is the most important part of the meal. The salad can be limp as long as the entrée is still amazing. So, the backburner is left for vegetables or soup. Those things that are important when we want them to be, but if they are left out of the meal because they burn or become too much trouble, it’s really no sweat. I am not saying that I am not important to her. I am not the vegetable of the meal. But, there are times that I have felt that way. And that is what is needed to be cleared up before we can move forward together or apart.
I don’t belong on the backburner. Not for anyone. No matter how I feel about them. No matter how they feel about me. I am better than this. I am worth more than this.
It’s a difficult position to find yourself in. To have these things make you think that you are less than. To have the thought that you deserve to be in this position. It’s wrong. But, because we desire that which puts us here, we try very hard to ignore the pain. The problem is that the pain is never going to let you go. It’s going to find that quiet moment, when you are feeling lonely and it’s going to attack you. It’s going to beat on you until you can’t take anymore.
And I just can’t take it anymore.
So, I have put my foot down. I have asked for a resolution. I have demanded an answer that isn’t “I don’t know.” And, that is the worst sentence I have heard in a while. I just can’t hear it anymore. So, I have demanded something else. Bad or good. Happy or sad. I need another answer. Not just for having a chance to find a way to move on if I need to, but to just know why. I need to know that. I need to understand it.
What has made this situation so intolerable is the fact that it feels like it reinforces the voices in my head that tell me that I am not worth the chance to be happy. I am not worth the attention of anyone. That voice, belonging to one person, has been in my head for over a year. There have been moments when it has faded to a whisper. And there are other moments, like now…when it’s screaming it’s heart out. I don’t like it. I have tried so hard to get rid of it. I know the only way for it to disappear. I know what it would take. But, up to this point, it has been asking too much.
What I wanted…what I needed…was completeness. A cementing of understanding of what things were. A coming to terms with just what we were becoming. The issue has been that I have seen further than she. I have been able to see the greatness in the chance we could take. I know two things to be true. One, I have never felt this way about anyone in my life. Two, I would do anything for her. Anything to make her happy. Even step aside.
I was finally asked what I wanted. What I needed. My response? For this person to be 100% behind what we were becoming or to let me go. That’s it. That is all I need. No more, no less. For weeks, I have believed that this was too much to ask for. I believed that by asking for this, I would shred what little there was to make this a reality. So, I didn’t dare. I didn’t want it to end. I still don’t want it to end. I cherish this. I am enamored of this. But, it has to grow. It has to become. Or it’s just not real. And I can’t live with what is not real. I have done that for way too long. I have struggled to make sense of all that has happened. I was concerned that any attention I had received was out of pity. I hate pity. I hate it with a passion. I don’t mind compassion. That is a gift. Pity is feeling sorry for…and I just can’t have that. Less than. Pity is buried in less than. I am not less than. I need no pity.
So, here I sit. Waiting for the response. It won’t be a long wait. I have set a timetable. That may have been wrong. But, it just came to me. You see, when it did, I didn’t think there was a chance in hell of any further discussions on this situation taking place. I thought we were done. I had made it clear that I wasn’t happy with the way things were and I received silence. And I understand that. I understand it completely. But, I also knew that if I was going to hear anything, it would be when some events were finished. So, I patiently waited. And in the moment of hedging, I made a demand. And I set a timetable. And when I did, I was scared. I thought I had pushed too much. Demanded too much too quickly. And then I realized the time that had passed. I realized all the words that had been said. I realized all the simple acts of love that had been expressed. And I knew that I had not made a mistake. I had not done anything I shouldn’t have.
If there is a lesson to be learned here, it is this. There are people and situations in our lives that we should do everything in our power to fight for. That we should try as hard as possible to do everything we can to make them the best parts of our lives. But, what can happen in those moments is that we forget to fight for ourselves. We lose ourselves in what we desire…what we feel we need. And in doing that, we treat ourselves as less than. We give ourselves the “I don’t know”s. We should never do it. We hope we never will. But, we do. Because our emotions and our hearts run away with us. But, when push comes to shove…when all is said and done…we are left with ourselves. Always with ourselves. And we need to remember that how we handle things in our lives, the way we project ourselves…will wear on us for a very long time after the situations have past. We owe it to ourselves to keep ourselves safely aware of what is real. To do otherwise, is a sin of the heart. A sin of the soul.
We are never less than.
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