Revelation

It came to me this morning. I don't know what it feels like to be absolutely sure. About someone.

Anyone. 

Perhaps not even myself.*

I have no previous experience in this regard. It's not in my frame of reference. No formative experiences of love and warmth,** no certainty of succour***. For me, all was discord, chaos, uncertainty, and loss. No fine whine here, just history. By the time love got to me,**** it was too late. I had retreated to my frosty fortress.

Alone.

Safe.

And even though I am beginning now to engage all sorts of new relationships in open and give and take ways, these spectres of my past taunt me, and I worry incessantly should the slightest hiccup occur in any given situation: that I have said something, done something, want something wrong. I am on tenterhooks in this new land of outreach, frozen, waiting sometimes seemingly forever, crouched at the bottom of the stairs in my pj's listening intently to the concerned (so I think) murmurs above, waiting for the axe to fall, not able to reach out and connect, because of course, I 'm not supposed to be there.

So I put on the old front, retreat once more, at least to the borders, secure in isolation, act like it doesn't matter, pretend that I'm ok, that everything is ok, business as usual.

Solitude, once a refuge, stretches on like a vast desert wasteland.

I am so fucking thirsty.

* though it's thought processes like this that make me think I am making some headway in this regard. I am actually starting to be able to observe myself. That's new, and intriguing.

** at least, not from mom and dad. They were too broken. We've all been broken.

*** Edna, one of my father's girlfriends back then, she did me good, I felt safe with her. She could have saved me. But that would be another life, and she was gone too soon.

**** And it knocked several times. My bad.