"i hate to be where she is not, when she is not. and yet i am always going, and she cannot follow."
A thought: I probably shouldn't have dove back into Livejournal-Land, with what may have seemed a misleading ferocity. Which isn't to say that I won't be posting here - more that I shouldn't (can't) be as precise, just now, about hours or days.
(I shouldn't say "tomorrow" carelessly, when tomorrow can still be such a slippery concept for me. And when I'm still learning to live with it; to get my own ten fingers around the breadth of it, without blaming myself.)
Especially since one of the main things that I realized in my absence, and am unwinding into a clear explanation over these recent entries: Is just how much online energy I'd rather dedicate to the tangible. The crinkle and fold, the sudden magic of handwritten mail. The pitch and throw of voices on phone-lines. And whenever possible; the skin, touch and smell of actual, three-dimensional life. Lingering over coffee (tea for me) until the store's hours wind down. Feeling the beats of live music beneath my feet; the energy of a thousand dancing people leaning into and around me. Curling into a two-person cocoon for peaceful, whispering hours.
So again, it's not that I won't be posting - more that I want (need) to focus on the non-online ways in which I keep in touch. I may spend my entire life grappling with, trying to fully reconcile, the fact that my body doesn't have the robust and boundless energy of my head and heart - but that doesn't mean I don't know it's true, on a basic level.
I also want be in a place where Livejournal feels more like the safe space it is, and less like some obligation I've worked up in my head. Which is to say: A place where, if I don't post for a few days - or even a few months - I don't feel uncomfortably obligated, and other people don't worry so much. And where, threading back to the points about postal stamps and coffee cups - it's not as easy to lose touch. **As for times when I potentially don't post for months at once: If I'm in treatment or the hospital, I hope to be able to let you know. With specific people, I've been working out specific plans; ties and binds and details to keep their worry radar down; hopefully I can do that here, in some larger sense.
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The reason that I haven't posted my own address and phone numbers yet, as planned, is an exhausting and Stranger Than Fiction story. Which, essentially, adds up to a potentially dangerous person I thought I'd shaken, who recently gave me a very clear reminder of their presence. I'm okay - covering my bases - and thinking maybe I'll post different parts of my contact information in different filtered entries.
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A Few Bulletins To You & You &...:
Jessica: I have to laugh and sigh alike, at the continual tangling of our lives' specifics and suddens. I'm sorry we've been playing Hit And Miss for so long, and I'm sorry if you worried this time. We'll plan something coherent soon, and mellow enough for us both. (It was so lovely - so soothing - hearing your voice, even for a few moments.)
Heather: How was your L.L.M.D. appointment? I've been wondering and hoping for you. (My own appointment was pushed forward a few weeks. Long story, tiring details. Part of me is incredibly frustrated that I wasn't able to make it, but part of me is able to piece all the details together in my head, and see the bigger picture.)
Angel: An answering machine-full of my words will definitely never be enough to contain my heart, let alone the stumbling and breathless sentences I try to fit in before being cut off. I went to bed early last night; I'll try you again today or tomorrow.
Lisa, Jac, Tessa (the first three to post responses to my Mail/List Game): Tell me, pretty-please, 5 things - at total random, scattered as you wish - that you adore. Or that pull at you in the shape of fascination, obsession, curiousity. As broad as authors, animals, colors; as specific as a single detail of Autumn, or an obscure culture that fascinates you. (I meant to ask this in the first place, to aid and abet in my package-making - and although I already have ideas merging into something substantial for each of you, I thought I'd go ahead now.)
EVERYONE!!: If you know me at all, you know that I'm a complete bookworm, bibliophile, it goes on. I love gathering lists of my friends' favorite books - scratched on napkins over dinner, saved from old letters. I do a slightly insane amount of reading, and there's always something I'm hungry to pore over, but I'm working on some new lists for myself right now. Whether 1 or 50, if you have time, could you dash down the names of some of your favorite books? Oh, and -
Especially funny books, right now. Intelligent, wacky, witty books that make you laugh out loud. Don't hold back from recommending the more serious, the deeply poetic, the psychological studies - the kinds of books my shelves tend to hold in majority - but please. Also funny and fantastical.
And as a specific aside, if you have a favorite Jamaica Kincaid book - might I ask, which is it?
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Ours is essentially a tragic age, so we refuse to take it tragically. The cataclysm has happened, we are among the ruins, we start to build up new little habitats, to have new little hopes. It is rather hard work: there is now no smooth road into the future: but we go round, or scramble over the obstacles. We've got to live, no matter how many skies have fallen.
(( d.h. lawrence ))