i am not bulletproof

preface to this blog entry:

due to the number of people checking in to make sure i'm okay, i actually am quite okay, as is az. we've been navigating tough territory as he slooowly moves toward a new relationship {with someone i would love to see him with}, but in a way that the resolution comes quickly to each of my moments of being overwhelmed by panic/grief/hopelessness {that essentially are due to my belief that i am worthless to him if someone else has value}. while my anxiety has been coming up on a daily basis, it has been met head on by the two of us to understand, and resolve them in the moment. for the most part {i can think of two exceptions} i haven't gone to sleep anything less than peaceful and secure in our mutual love and admiration even as it's evolving and changing. which is a really good thing.

...................

i wish i could write to you about what the past two weeks have been for me. pick apart and put to words everything that's happened and construct some sort of through line. a moral of the story. a happy ending. but i can't. not just yet.

and i wish i had recorded the hour long conversation i had with one of my oldest friends today as i cried in the bathtub and took her through each gritty, honest, and heartbroken detail of these weeks. but i didn't, so i have to rely on the simple sound bites that stand out in my memory. you don't have to know the answers, nathania. you don't have to know...you are strong...you have such amazing clarity on everything that's happening...and, perhaps most importantly: your life's work is to find out how to take all this compassion you have and learn to turn it inward.

i want to write it all out because i need to hold on to both stories for my own good, to remember all the strength and life i have discovered in myself during this time and the strength and life she spoke to and affirmed in me saying exactly the right things {not one word was astray} sometimes non-stop for minutes on end. it was the perfect conversation that could only happen with someone who has known me and loved me for that long.

but i can't tonight. it's late. i am tired. and this has been a solid few weeks of downright dirty self examination of my own worth. or rather, of my own belief in my lack of worth, and how that rears itself again and again in relationships between lovers and partners, and friends even. and, not excluding the most recent relationship that's coming to its close.

i would like to give you all the golden details of this man's honesty and courage, to see the right things and do them and to speak into my worth. repeatedly. as many times as i need to be reminded of it. and i want to present the parallels to the last ex i wrote here about, and how differently i get to live out a similar situation merely by being partnered with someone who truly cares and knows how exactly to handle that care and apologize for any mishandlings in the process.

but tonight, all i can manage are hazy vignettes indicating the larger story. i am worn. my heart is less heavy now than all day today, but i've cried more days than i haven't recently and i would like to lay the weight down tonight. so for now, here are some photos i took of him, my dear dear friend and lover of a year and a half. and one of the bravest and most honorable people i have ever met.

if only, darling, i could be in love with you,
and if only you could be in love with me.

it should also be noted that as i started taking photos of him tonight, radiohead's bulletproof started playing on my computer {set to shuffle}. as i am currently taking a little break from their music, i would normally walk over and hit skip, but it was just a little too perfect to ignore. here are the lyrics {and you can listen to it here}:

limb by limb and tooth by tooth
tearing up inside of me
every day every hour
i wish that i was bullet proof

wax me
mould me
heat the pins and stab them in
you have turned me into this
just wish that it was bullet proof

so pay the money and take a shot
leadfill the hole in me
i could burst a million bubbles
all surrogate and bullet proof

and bullet proof
and bullet proof
and bullet proof