Words for those who won’t hear

Many of my friends are experiencing the loss of a dear friend, someone who found himself with no choice but to leave those who love him behind. I don’t know this person, I saw him once in a show and thought he was lovely. But I know those he left behind and I hear their pain and their sorrow and their desire to understand the un-understandable.

I’ve probably stepped on them too often in the last few days, wanting to reach out to them and help them find comfort because I love them and I know their pain. There’s so much I wanted to say to them and maybe I’ve said too much and should have kept my fingers shut and not snet the comments and thoughts I have, but I couldn’t help myself.

So this is for them, those who don’t read my blog, who probably don’t know it exists. This is what I want to say to them.

You couldn’t have stopped him. Even if you’d been in the room, outside the door, on the phone with him, you couldn’t have stopped him.

In that moment, there is nothing. I’ve been there. I’ve counted out the pills, trying to figure out if there were enough to actually do the job. In that moment, I’ve never been clearer about my intention in my life. To make it stop. All of it. The pain, the loneliness, the anger, all of it. I had no hands to dial a phone because they were busy figuring out if a half bottle of Tylenol, four very old Vicodin and a large bottle of vitamin C were enough. I had no mouth to call because it was getting ready to swallow anything I could find. I even debated about the drain cleaner under the cupboard but I knew I wouldn’t be able to swallow that because of the taste.

All I knew in that moment was the pain and the ache and the hurt and the nothingness I felt that my life had become. No one would miss me. No one would mourn me. Why would they? I mattered not at all.

And it wasn’t their fault. They loved me, they treated me with love, they reached out to me in love. But in that moment, on that razor’s edge, that love didn’t reach. That love couldn’t get through and make me stop. That love, though true and real, felt false and empty. Because I felt false and empty.

And what stopped me wasn’t love. It was anger. Anger at my then-husband. Anger at the fact that he probably would be angry that I’d made a mess and that I’d probably fail and then he’d be angry because I’d end up the hospital and he’d have to take care of me and the money and the bills and on and on and on. And I got angier as I thought about it. And what saved me was that anger. Fuck him was the thought that stopped me. I won’t let him take my life away. I won’t let his anger and his controlling and his own fear and pain heaped on me end my life. Fuck him. I wouldn’t let him take away my life.

I was lucky. I chose to stay here and fight for the life that I wanted. The one time in my life that my anger actually worked to keep me focused on moving forward. The one time I didn’t back down from that anger, I just let it rise.

But unfortunately that anger doesn’t save everybody. Not everybody has a clarifying, life-changing, life-affirming moment in the middle of their suicide attempt. Many just let it go, chose to leave the pain behind and not fight anymore.

My friends will never understand why he did it. Just as many of my friends probably don’t understand why I stood over the sink, a glass of whiskey of some sort in one hand, a handful of Tylenol in the other. I was loved. I was wanted. I was doing so well on so many things. But we can’t know what’s in someone’s mind. We can only do the best we can while they’re here to let them know that they are loved. If they choose not to hear that or not to feel that, there is nothing that can be done. Sometimes, the pit is just too deep and the pain is just too hard. And the choice is no longer a choice, it’s just what is there.

I hope my friends find some solace in their company with each other. I hope they remember their friend and the wonders he did bring to their lives. And I hope they can move past his choice and heal their own hurt and pain and just let their love find him, wherever he is, and give him some peace.

I refuse to call it a date.

So I caved to pressure and joined a not-to-be-named online dating website again. I’ve joined this one several times and always got the dregs of society “wooing” me. Let’s call it OKStupid. But I thought I’d give it one more shot. Why? I don’t know. Because I bought the hype of “my friend met her husband on there” or “I know 10 people who’ve met the love of their lives on there.” For free. So I caved.

One of the first profiles caught me immediately, which surprised me. Surely, he can’t be as smart and witty as his profile sounds. Kinda cute in a big guy next door kind of way, apparently my type now. He used full sentences and never used the term “hot” at all. He liked the same books I liked, same kind of movies with just enough difference that it intrigued me. He was a writer, like me.

I screwed up the courage and sent him a hopefully not desperate note saying I liked his profile and invited him to see mine and see if he thought we had anything in common. And he did. We sent notes back and forth a couple of times through the Stupid website. And I was moderately excited. He could spell. He used correct grammar. He was witty without being insulting and I thought, okay, maybe this could be someone I might possibly consider hanging out with.

He broached the idea of getting together almost immediately and I thought, why not? That’s why I signed up for this adventure. After a couple of failed attempts, we figured out a time and date. I liked that he was very prompt at returning emails and apologetic when he dropped the ball at one point due to out of town visitors.

But I refused to approach the coffee meeting as a date, because, to me, it wasn’t. A date is someone picks you up, pays for dinner and a movie, and then politely drops you at the door with perhaps a chaste kiss on the cheek. This was coffee at Starbucks in between meetings and work. Just a test to see if a date was a possibility.

So I sat at Starbucks, trying to pretend that I wasn’t a bit excited at the prospect of meeting someone who seemed to suited to me. I tried to pretend that I wasn’t scared of starting something new. The idea of dating and relating and all that stuff still scares the shit out of me. Learning all the new things about someone, trying, this time, to not be what I think he wants me to be and just be me, building something, yada, yada, yada.

I shouldn’t have worried so much.

He comes in. I look up. Okay, he’s kind of retro cool looking with fuzzy hair and a cap but not in a weird way, in a “wow, that could be kinda hip” way. Nice smile. Good handshake. Polite - waits for me to sit before he does. Hmmmmm….

Then it happened. I, in an effort to break the first meeting tension, said, “What’s this writing project you’re working on?”

Thirty-five minutes later, he stopped talking about himself long enough to ask me, “So, what about you? Where are you from?” I managed to get out, “Well, I was born in New York and raised in Canada, in Winnipeg, just above Fargo.” “Wow, really, my roommate’s wife is from Vancouver” and he was off again. For another 45 minutes. I tried to figure out how I could chew my arm off to get away from him. Not only did he talk, he talked like he’d just consumed about 85 cases of Red Bull. Rapid fire, no breaths, no chance to stick my foot in the conversation.

I did try to insert a comment here and there but after about 30 minutes, I gave up. This man was not interested in hearing about me. He wanted someone to listen to him. Listen to his complete lack of anything. He tried to talk about directing, which he’d only done for one semester in college. But as the conversation progressed, he was deemed more and more brilliant at his modern approach to Shakespeare, which includes cutting the shit out of his plays to make them “work better.” Because, apparently, no one else has been able to update Shakespeare to modern times quite the way he has.

And his exploits as a tour manager were legend, at least in his mind.

Then he started talking about writing but I had stopped listening about 15 minutes earlier. His mouth kept moving and there were a torrent of words spilling out but I just didn’t give a fuck anymore.

On top of that, we walked over to a hot dog place so he could grab a bite before his meeting. What did he order? A kielbasa buried in onions and peppers, onion rings and deep fried jalapeno. Which he ate with open-mouthed enthusiasm across from me, while barely taking a break to bite into the mass of dog and onion. Great first meeting food.

Finally, after the fourth time I checked my phone for the time, he asked what time it was. Oh, damn, he had to get to his meeting. I practically ran out the door.

Then I didn’t know what to say. Lose my email? It was nice listening to you for the last 90 minutes. I said something stupid like I guess we’ll run into each other. But he didn’t say, let’s do this again or anything so I thought maybe he didn’t think we connected either and I’d never hear from him again.

Oh, and I forgot the best part. When we met at Starbucks, he pulled out a bag with cookies in it that he had baked for his office. Yes, he cooks, another reason I thought he might be cool. But then he takes a few of these out and lays them in front of me and says, I brought some extra for you. I kind of smiled but it felt weird. He didn’t know if I had any food issues - which I don’t, but still - and although it should have been sweet, it felt sort of weird and creepy.

I tossed the cookies when I got home.

Just as I figured I’d never hear from him again, I get an email. He had a great time (of course he did) and we should do it again.

I wanted to email back, if I want to listen to a monologue, I’ll rent “Swimming to Cambodia.” I struggled back and forth about how to respond. Don’t email me again because I don’t want that torture again. Gosh, my schedule has gotten very, very busy and I’m not sure I’ll be available but let me know.

I finally thought about what Anna has told me about the guys she’s met on OKStupid. They don’t call or email again and she wastes time wondering if it’s her, if they didn’t connect, what was going on.

So I screwed up my courage and I sent him an email that said, you seem to be a guy who appreciates honesty, I don’t think we had a connection and I’m not interested in having lunch with you again. Best of luck on things.

Cruel, maybe, but at least he won’t wonder why I’m not returning his emails.

I’m waiting for the shoe to drop and a tirade to come back. It hasn’t yet, which may mean he’s accepted my response. Or he’s writing and rewriting the fuck you email he’s going to send. Either way, I don’t care.

I came home and immediately canceled my account on OKStupid. I just don’t have the time or the energy to waste on these kind of meetings. They piss me off, they make me angry and it’s time I can’t get back. I’d rather meet someone in person through friends in a non-expectation-filled event and find out if he’s someone I’d want to date. I can’t sit through coffee after coffee, wondering how to get out, wondering why I did this.

Maybe that means I’ll be alone for a lot longer but, really, for me, I’d rather be alone than be annoyed over and over again.

So save me your stories about finding the love of your life. You lucked out. I’m going to try to make my own luck.

Or I’ll be that crazy artist lady down the street who dressed wacky and everyone calls an eccentric. I think I’d rather do that.

Choosing to fail

There is one thing everyone in my family is good at that I don’t want to be good at. Being angry.

My mother had a Ph.D. in it. My sister has at least a Masters. My dad is the strong, silent type. My brother is somewhere in between.

Anger comes easily to me. It’s the fail-safe. When I don’t know what to be, I get angry. Because I know it. Because it’s familiar. Because it’s always been there, waiting patiently until I found it. Comfortable. Simple.

Anger made it easy for me to blame everyone else. Made it easy for me to say, well, of course I didn’t do my best, I was very angry because -- insert excuse here. Of course I couldn’t finish this, I was very angry because -- insert excuse here. It excused me from accepting responsibility. It excused me from facing the truth in a lot of situations. It excused me from facing the harder emotions - hurt, sadness, fear, among others. Anger felt like power because it’s, well, angry. It felt like motion. It felt like feeling something.

But it was a lie. Anger just made me more angry because I couldn’t get to what was underneath. It made it easy to hide but not easy to really see what was going on.

I spent a lot of time in anger over the past couple of years. Anger at my ex. Anger at my last theater company and a wide variety of people therein. Anger at my parents, at my life, at the world, at the president (well, maybe that was justified). I was getting really good at being angry. After all, I learned from the best.

But in working hard to step away from the anger, starting with making some sort of peace with my ex, I have found joy again. I have found a whole bunch of emotions that have been waiting patiently on the sidelines, waving, hoping I’ll see them and invite them in. Good emotions like joy and pleasure and delight and excitement. Even some scary emotions like vulnerability, fear and uncertainty. Without spending so much energy on being angry, it leaves me free to feel and experience things without dark glasses on, with true, clear eyes.

It was clear tonight when I ran into the brother of a former friend, who was one of the casualties of a catastrophic situation right around this time last year. There was no win. There was no good way for this situation to end. Many people got involved, many people got hurt because there was plenty of anger to go around, me included. No one was able to step back and look at this situation clearly, including me. That doesn’t mean I would change what I did one iota. But I think we were all so lost in anger and lost in pain that we all handled every moment of it badly. Maybe we were all justified in our pain and our anger. But it left everything decimated in its wake, destroying friendships, destroying relationships, and destroying trust.

In talking to this brother tonight, I realized that I am no longer angry. Hopefully, after a year, one can let anger go. I’ve never been very good at that. I like to hang on to anger like an anchor, something to guide me on how to feel in the future about things that have happened in the past.

But I found myself saying, honestly, it was a cluster-fuck and there was no good way out of it. I found myself not wanting to engage in, “oh, yeah, well, they suck” conversation, which I would have relished a year ago. I just said, “too bad, I know they will probably say bad things but whatever. It was ugly and it was messy and it was bad all the way around. I miss your brother, I really liked him a lot and I’m sorry he got lost along the way. I know he has to support his girlfriend and I understand that.” And left it at that. We joked a lot about how this would be our one and only meeting because after he got their side of the story tomorrow, he would never be able to speak to me again. A year ago, I wouldn’t have been able to make fun of a situation like this. I would have been devastated and angry and not able to see that the hurt and anger on their side was just as real as mine.

What does this all mean? I don’t know. Maybe it means I’m growing and finally realizing that anger has its place but not in every single moment of my life. Anger doesn’t accomplish much when it’s used pointlessly. Anger just begets anger. And then we all end up standing around, pointing fingers, screaming, instead of trying to really see what’s going on and trying to solve the truth of the moment.

I’m choosing to fail at being angry. I’m choosing to find another way to handle things. I’m choosing to leave my family’s legacy behind and embrace the Eastern part of our heritage and maybe find a more spiritual and Buddha-like way of dealing with hurt and pain and challenges. That doesn’t mean I won’t blow my stack occasionally. After all, I’m not Buddha and it’s hard to change almost 47 years of conditioning. But maybe I can make baby steps this year, choosing to embrace joy and release anger. Choosing to let go and move forward instead of dwell in the nastiness. Choosing to live instead of choosing to let parts of me die.

Choosing to fail at anger. That will be my success this year.

Anger, denial, etc., etc., acceptance.

I spent a good part of last year angry. Very, very angry. I guess it was bound to come.

I was angry at my ex, for reasons I could not even explain. But just his presence made me pissed off and wanting to smash his head in. Not a pleasant feeling.

The theater I was working at was pissing me off - and still pisses me off, if you get me started - but I really let it get under my skin and I made it very, very personal, which made me very, very angry.

Seems that everyone who crossed my path in the last six months of the year made me angry.

And I was angry that it seemed that everyone else could be angry and petty and ridiculous, except me, of course. And that made me even angier.

As 2008 came to a close, I realized I didn’t really like the person I was becoming. And that’s because I was becoming my mother. Everything was everybody else’s fault. No one understood me or cared about me. Everyone was against me. No one listened to me. No one cared.

I could see myself sitting alone in my living room, lights off, on my third glass of wine (which I will only count as my second and deny anything after that), flipping endless through the channels, looking for something to distract me from my lethargy and pathetic, empty, soulless life.

Now, I love my mom but she’s just one glass of wine from an alcoholic and probably should be on at least two different antidepressants. And I don’t want to be her.

I want 2009 to be the year of acceptance. Accepting my life as it is, in a very Taoist way. Not standing around, watching my life pass me by, but looking at what’s in front of me and making the absolute most out of it. Accepting the people around me for their foibles and their flaws as well as learning that it’s okay to not accept bullshit from people. Stand my ground without making it deeply personal and taking it to heart.

Accepting my talents without fear or shame or feeling the need to poo-poo that these talents exist. Accepting the praise without hiding.

Accepting that I am imperfect and that I don’t need to manipulate myself to meet others’ expectations. That doesn’t mean I get to stumble around and smash toes and feelings and everything else. It just means that I accept that there are things I could change and need to look at but it doesn’t mean that every little thing in me has to change. Accept criticism and do with it what I may, which means occasionally deciding not to apply it.

Accepting also means letting go. Letting go of the clowns in my head and renting out their space. Letting go of the pieces of my heart that have scattered to the wind and accept that they’re not coming back.

Letting go of trying to change things that just simply can’t be changed. I’m alone. That’s it. I’m not going to be forever (please, God, please) but I’m alone now. Letting go of needing to find someone to make me feel whole. The two men I let try to make me feel whole just left me shattered and broken. I need to accept that I need to make myself feel whole and let go of the notion that someone else can do that for me.

And just breathe into my life, embrace what is joyful and beautiful, acknowledge what is difficult and ugly, and pick up my feet and put one in front of the other and just keep moving through my life.

Accepting that I have to let go to finally find the life I want.