Arlington Dancing with the Stars

This is old news, but finally figured out the direct post options, so here I am! I'm dancing with Ingrid Morroy who is the Arlington Commissioner of Revenue. This is a charity event in a knock off of the real "Dancing with the Stars" show. We're dancing an East Coast Swing - earlier in the evening IH and I danced a Waltz, although I don't have video of that.

The Bowl

 

XSFJ

Sitting outside of group - wish i could write more interesting things. Feeling nervous about going in because i haven't told them about the engagement being off. And i'm realizing that when i think about being present it's usually about where i am with the relationship. And what i really want to know is where i am with myself. Where is my emotion at this moment... I keep hoping that if i do some external activity or trip or thing that i'll be present. That if i keep moving i'll find it... Maybe that's the wrong way to go about it for me.

1/8/08 Dream II

AL an i are going to go canoeing - she's going to meet me at the launch point, which is an hour drive south down the potomac. I get there first, later in the day on saturday and do the paperwork for the rental. At first the guy rents me a single seater, but i remind him i have someone joining me. It's now two hours before the place closes (7pm) and AL still hasn't shown up yet. I call her, and she says that she's on her way. Even though she dosen't say it, i realize that she rented her own canoe at the put in place up river, an hour drive away, and she's trying to canoe down to meet me. There is no way she will make it in time, and also she's going to end up in the wilderness after dark by herself with no provisions on the river. I try calling her back, but she has either turned her phone off or is out of cell reception. It is clear that she won't be here in time to use our reservation for tonight, so i cancel with the guy to the deak. Even though i just made the rental, the cancelation fee is $119 (out of the $200 original rental). This sucks, but has to be done. I keep calling and caling and finally ge through and ask her what she's doing? She says that she was going to paddle the entire way down, in fact was going to paddle the entire length of the potomac. I tell her that it took me an hour to drive here, so there's no way she's canoeing here by tonight. She didn't realize that.

PART II

Now AL and i are driving somewhere, but she needs to ship some stuff, so we stop at a UPS store and she goes in but i wait in the car. It takes her forever it seems, and traffic is getting worse and worse. Finally i drive off, just to get some movement because i'm tired of sitting and waiting. I drive down the road a bit, and traffic is pretty bad, but i manage to cut across and go into a residential neighborhood. I drive though there and come to a pedestrian bridge that goes back to the downtown place where the UPS store is. I get on a bike and ride back to the store, and call her on my cell on the way. When i arrive she comes out and is clearly distraught. The clerk comes out and explains that while she had said the cost from the store would be $5.50, there is an 80 pound box that she wants to ship, which costs $4.40 per pound, which ment the total cost was very expensive, and AL either didn't have the money for that or didn't want to spend that much. I ask what's in the box - it'ss audition videos and head shots to send to hollywood for her dream of acting. I realize that she can't stop her dream just because of this - i say, what if i pay for the shipping, even though i don't know if i can afford the cost either.

on being present

i'm sooo not ready for marriage - i have this completely skewed picture of what i expect marriage to be like. somehow my mind is using marriage as a place to just stop working at being present - expecting the marriage relationship to externallly cause being present to happen to me or for me. like after i get maried i can just let go and not have to work at that part. and, believe it or not, being present is _alot_ of work for me. i think i slip away very easily and that it's hard for me and the people around me to tell when i'm mentally and emotionally left the building.

i have this mental image of marriage as a bubble over me - when i slip away, it's like i'm vaporizing into a mist, and the bubble of marriage contains me in one place at least. and i think maybe what i've been looking for is a "perfect enough" marriage that is tight enough that this bubble is small enough that even though i've still atomized, the bubble is holding me tight rnough that it at least appears that i'm still there. that's the image of the marriage taking over being present that i have. and cheryl and i did an exercise where ahe got her face right up infront of my face to simulate being in that tight bubble. i mean, she was inches away. and it was great for maybe 30 seconds - i couldn't help but be present - it was impossible to disconnect. but it was impossible to see anything else either - it was complete tunnel vision. and it felt awful after 30 seconds. just miserable - because i completely lost myself f there was no mental or emotional room to move.

so - this is where my mind is about what marriage is. and i'm sooooo not ready to be married in that place. until i can have a better image of what marriage is - or rather, until i can keep doing the work myself, i'm not ready to be married.

1/18/08 Dream

At an informal restaurant and there is a woman my age sitting with me. She has tanned skin so her eyes stand out on her face with their brightnress - they're really quite striking and stunning - she's really quite georgous. And i'm talking to her and she says that because her eyesa are so stand out, it makes it even harder to tell people that she has a problem where her contacts pop out all the time because her eyes are a little oblong, which makes it hard for contacts to stay attached. Because people see her eyes as so striking, it's hard to tell them that many times she can't see because the contacts have come out and they're expensive to keep replacing. I'm thinking - well, can't you just tell people that you have this difficulty? And she's saying - for example - they just fell out now.

Winter Color

 

Next steps

Time to check in - IH and I called off the engagement so that we can step back and make sure the roots of the relationship are good and to make another stab at being present and true to ourselves while in an intimate relationship. I also have closure work to finish left over from A & K that I thought was done, but isn't.

1/9/08 Dream

It's winter and i'm visiting my old boy scout camp, which it at the top of a mountain. there is snow on the ground, and the path up the mountain is pretty rough from the winter. there is a park ranger type person driving up the path in an old WWII jeep, and he's trucking through the ruts and pot holes. i get to the top of the mountain and there is a developed area at the top - there's a gift shop and a trail outfitters (lands end actually) up here, and a very nice view of the lakes off in the distance.

And then I'm watching some sort of commercial for condoms, except that it's pretty explicit in showing how they work. and then there is a follow up commercial showing what happens if you don't use condoms - it's a sped up process showing the woman getting pregnant, then giving birth, and then it's my child i'm watching being born, and then he's a toddler, and i'm giving him some of my water from my water bottle, and then he's a preteen all of a sudden, and i say - hey - when did you get so big? and he just looks at me and says, "i don't know", and then he walks away.

Dark night of the soul

There is a woman that i love - her name is IH. I love her perhaps more than i have truly loved another woman. I am compatible with her in many ways and on many levels. I love to do things with her, from movies to dancing to running to watching tv to visiting with family to being with animals. We have deep difficult conversations. And i am afraid that i am trapped in the past, unable to move forward because of this link i have to these two past women to whom i had made an unbreakable commitment, and was then left by myself inside of this now empty covenant. How dare they just walk away and leave me to figure it all out?

I feel more viscerally alone tonight than i have ever felt before.

1/8/08 Dream

I'm in the backyard of a house that i believe is my own. i have the key to the house in my hand - it's an odd looking key, not like a normal key. my sister is with me as is Baxter, and we go for a walk through the neighborhood. I look up the hill and see a new housing development just over the ridge - they're huge houses - bigger than mega mansions. one of them is being maneuvered into place - i guess they're built off site and trucked in. but the person driving this new one into place is not very good at his job, because he keeps lurching forward, with the house all swaying about on the truck.

so my sister and baxter and i wander off down the neighborhood. we walk through all sorts of streets, and eventually make our way up the hill to the new development of houses. i see the one house that was lurching along, still in the middle of the street. most of these houses are unfinished, and the one that has people living in it doesn't really look complete. there are people in there, but they're all hanging out in a room right by the front door - they haven't really gone inside. it's like they're living outside of their house - and i can see that the inside is cavernous. the unfinished houses all have these massive four car garages right in the middle of the house - most of the houses don't have their shell on, so i can see the framing and into the core of the house. and these garages take up so much space, leaving this huge empty cavern inside. i have to really scramble and crawl up an embankment to get up to this place, and am eventually driven off by a construction worker who says that i don't belong here.

my sister and baxter and i keep walking, and eventually come to an upscale hotel - we walk through it, and it's all modern and fashionable and very quiet. we get to the workout room and go inside. there are a few people here working out. my sister finds one of the machines and tries it out, but i see that there are windows here with shades on them, and pull the shades aside to see if i can see where i am. i've let go of baxter and have set my backpack down and unpacked it a bit. i don't really settle down into a workout though. finally the manager returns to the room and says that we can't stay here if we're not guests, and that we have to leave.

because i had started to unpack, i'm awkwardly carrying my stuff now. my sister and baxter and i are trying to find our way back home, but i just can't find our way - i have they key to the house, but i don't know where i live! i'm sure that when i see my house i'll know i'm home, but i don't even really know what it looks like. i have the feeling that i'm one or two streets over from where i want to be, but these neighborhoods are confusing and the streets don't seem to go where i think they should.

i eventually come to a really tight neighborhood and realize that as i walk further into the street, it's turning into a house. and as i wander through i'm finally in someones house. there is an older mother type figure in the house - she's pretty quiet. we get to talking and she says that she used to break dance. i ask her if she still knows how to do this, and she says yes. i'm excited - i say, well, could you teach me? and she says yes. i'm not holding onto baxter at this point, and i'm not sure where my sister has gone. baxter gets into one of the closets and is rooting around and i have to go pull him out. it's time to go but i'm still in the kitchen for a moment, and someone from the woman's family walks through, and i make a comment about her teaching me to break dance, and the woman give me a look like i wasn't supposed to tell anyone else about her past history of dancing, because it's her secret and she hasn't told anyone.

Struggle

I put enormous weight on wedding vows - when I make a vow, it's forever. I make that vow in front of my family and friends - the elements that make up my core. Being divorced has put me in a place where I'm struggling to reconcile my unbreakable vow with a situation where those vows are impossible to fulfill. How can I walk away from an unbreakable vow and still maintain my integrity?

Warm days / the good, the bad, and the ugly

Perhaps the way to get started again is to just get started again.


This will be a year of transitions, and I'm afraid I'm not starting it very well.

and now my mind works very hard to shut this conversation down.
all the other things in the world that are much more pressing or interesting push their way forward
isn't there paying work to do?
the floors are clean. can't do that again.
and the laundry's in the wash, so that's done
perhaps i'll look out the window for a while?
maybe my eyes will just glaze over and i'll get stuck

so much has happened, so much is happening - lots good, some bad, some sad.
My grandmother passed away before thanksgiving after struggling for a short time with lung/bone cancer. That's the bad.

oh boy, let's shut down then! that would be fun
don't let the eyes focus!
look - is that dust and hair on the desk? must brush it off then! that's what we'll do!

fuck off brain.

maybe i should put the shower curtain in the wash?

fuck off brain.

the dance studio i worked for fired me for not coming back to teach a 2 hour dance while i was in maine helping to take care of my grandmother. That's the ugly.

pick at my hands, stare out the window

yeah. ok.
i got engaged :) That's the good :)

That's all i can do for now.

Maine sunset