Chapter Three
Reaching for Flavor
God loves a story, let us be the heroes of our own. — Marc Gafni
o you think the world is ready for an Erma Bombeck of the divorce crowd? I suppose with five marriages under my belt I could apply for the position. After so much failure, surely I had collected sufficient feelings of inadequacy to be able to laugh at myself.
The word failure means, “lack of success, an unfavorable outcome of a venture.” I wonder if that is true of divorce in general, or maybe specifically as well. Universal laws exist which may be explained by the actions of cause and effect. We are accountable for our choices, and by accepting this responsibility, we own our behaviors and actions.
So what? If the marriage isn’t good, it isn’t good. It’s a failure.
In former times, a woman stayed in a bad marriage because it was her only means of survival. Today, however, woman is liberated. She now equally shares the burden of bringing home the bread and therefore is free to get a divorce and shoulder the full burden of bringing home the bread and the bacon. Often a good deal of her time is spent at the courthouse trying to get her ex-spouse to pay child support. The era of Superwoman is here.
Remember the line in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade when the villain, having chosen the wrong chalice from which to drink, dies horrendously . . . The knight matter-of-factly explains, “He chose poorly.”
How could I be so positive and Pollyannaish not to be bitter? After all those vicissitudes that ended up in Delete & Trash, how could I still long for romance?
If only I were unique and authentically eccentric. No matter how I tried to be unusual, I still ended up with the same lofty ideas about perfect partnerships in which each strengthened the other, learned from the other, was nourished by the other – and both equally loved hot tubbing naked – together.
Why did I still love the idea of exploration – all types and forms of it? Isn’t that what elevated the status quo beyond McDonalds and Burger King? Was I babbling, or what? Didn’t I know the difference between a good hamburger and a fast food one?
Unity; that’s what I was after. Unity that provided accessibility of communication that served as a new platform for creation and that could simultaneously sustain the status quo of day to day living. God help me, I was starved for a man.
Let’s try that again: if the dream exists for the format of a union, holds enough viable drive for its manifestation and can be guided with thought toward the best of survival for both parties, the ripple-effect should prove beneficial for each person, the couple, and all the peripheral life forces touching upon that couple’s relationship thereafter. We need not lose ourselves in statistics to become engaged in a partnership. Each individual brings unique qualities to the table and I strongly suspect that we women have not always been valued for the continuity, beauty, and structure that we supply, but more for that meat loaf, mashed potatoes and gravy, and of course home-baked apple pie, delivered shortly after he turns the handle on the front door. A la mode.
Of course, I have noted with some interest that in this struggle for feminist actualization, we may have lost some footing. “Just do it!” wears thin after awhile. Sole to sole, we need rubberizing and refurbishing at least once a month at the end of that period of “bitchiness.”
Maybe romance is only a figment of the women’s imagination and has nothing to do with men after all. Who are we, but roles? Professions, jobs, incomes and bra sizes. Do we not also possess souls, and do we not also think and feel like the persons we are supposed to be imitating? Do we not also have drive and overdrive like any good pickup truck?
Bottom line: what should we of the unwed set, do to initiate contact with someone who might be just the right complement to who we think we are?
I’m Allergic to Knives
The saga continued with this delightful gentleman to whom I’d been introduced by a friend and local editor, and perhaps I was the only one who wasn’t surprised that I was still virtually falling in love. A meaty broth base of streaming emails thickened with countless phone calls and the need to get a flat rate account for my phone service continued to whet my appetite.
Life was good; I was living on hope and continued to enjoy my fantasies of “the next step” which of course would have to end at the altar if it was ever going to satisfy my full list of requirements.
We seemed to share the same philosophies; he seemed to have all the right vital signs. He might even share the housework, I hummed as I pushed the vacuum cleaner over the carpets and waited for his next email.
Finally we got to the point where we dropped our defenses, bared our souls and dived headfirst into Fragile Ideas. The net result was a lovely friendship rooted in mutual trust and respect. All we needed was “real time” and moments of physical intimacy, which finally materialized. Ah, sweet bliss! Even the chemistry was there as I’d hoped; my soul was singing!
This time the flaw that surfaced took me completely by surprise. Apparently Mr. Right was looking for a cross between Angelina Jolie and Jennifer Lopez – what was I thinking? – that a man who had brains and vital organs intact would be different from a Neanderthal? I was hurt that what he really wanted was someone to drape over his arm and exhibit like a prize catch on some fishing expedition.
Who would have guessed that behind almost every Wall Street Journal is the latest Playboy?
Have you ever been told you would be the perfect partner in every way, with just a little plastic surgery, like on the face, breasts, waist and hips, and . . . well, all over?
How would that make you feel? And what was I thinking? That this specimen was going to be different from the rest? Of course. And actually I may have been right. Another problem beneath the layers of apparent shallowness had suddenly emerged and seemed to be more related to what was going on.
Commitment.
What better excuse could Mr. Right who was slowly turning into Mr. Never, come up with, that would be convincing enough to force me to back off because he was afraid to take the next step? How easy to insult me rather than face his own ineptitude!
Indeed, what better way to force a woman to back off than to tell she was, well, not ugly, but . . . well, not beautiful either.
Of course, it was painful to be told I didn’t look like his favorite movie star(s), but if I took this personally, it was my fault, not his.
It still hurt, and maybe for months longer than it should have . . . I had thought this was to be the “real thing.”
Although each of us slid to the point of forgiveness, this only released him to the next opportunity and left me feeling miserable. Casablanca’s script line of surrender, “We’ll always have Paris,” seemed appropriate for the closure.
Another quote comes to mind: “A gate only works if a corral comes with it.”
Next . . .
The man was charismatic to the hilt: street wise, strong and ex-military. Although I enjoyed the fantasy of the man-among-men with his go-it-alone attitude, it was more than that, I convinced myself. It was also the self-determination that seemed to come with the package that included service and some form of death or war-related regimentation.
That was not the determining factor, however. More important than honor within a group was the military man’s ability to handle his finances . . . not mine, his. I am well-equipped with the latest bookkeeping software that never seems to erase the minus signs and zeroes fast enough, mainly because too often in the past I have surrendered to loan requests delivered in compromised positions when saying no might ruin that lovely fictitious commitment.
This ex-Army Ranger may very well be the love of my life, I told myself hopefully. Even though he told me he wanted to keep traveling (did that also mean “keep shopping” as well?) – we actually met and liked each other.
Do you remember the role Jack Nicholson played in Something’s Gotta Give? If you do, the romantic stew that followed several months of this relationship will be flavored with even greater meaning.
Webster’s definition for the word “relationship” in terms of a verb (to relate) is “to actively desire and cherish.” Added to this is my Internet friend, Rebecca Brent’s definition of love as “more than a feeling; it is a promise.” (Enchanted Spirit e-zine)
In my quests for answers – and these always deal with who I am (or more accurately, who I choose to become) I have met the most charming, generous and delightful participants in this game called life. Marc Gafni, author of Soul Prints, talks about receiving soul prints from another. Gafni writes that biblical consciousness deals with the move from loneliness to loving, and that Kabalistic mystical knowledge regards the act of receiving as “the highest fulfillment of biblical vision.” We want to share ourselves with others and to have them reciprocate. The ultimate fulfillment is to find the right match with like hearts and souls. Yes!
The Bible was written long before Internet match sites were created, of course. And in former times, in fact, not so long ago, there was no such thing as a romantic match. It was all done by DNA, college degrees, bank accounts and which church or temple (or country club) you belonged to. Maybe it still is done that way and the romance part is just the virgin’s wedding night. “Surprise! The honeymoon’s over” . . . and so on.
This Man from New York, My ex-Army Ranger
His accent was Thick New York and he had all the makings of a delicious dish for any woman who is a connoisseur of culture. Add a dash of libertine spirit and it already seemed like an entrée fit for a queen.
It took courage to continue that oddly one-sided love, but then I told myself, did he not reflect that image of myself that I so longed to become? He had made his way to my door after reading some of my ideas on romance submitted to an Internet post. He was simply and openly curious. Forget the commitment with a man like this; clearly he could never be tied down by anyone. No judgment, no evaluation, just take him as he comes. Openly express myself and enjoy the interactive video stream of all that would follow.
Did he not understand and appreciate my sense of humor and perspective on life? Exuding warmth, animal magnetism, determination, additional animal magnetism, charm and yet more animal magnetism, he was just my type. Obviously his successes in life were closely linked to his high sex drive that spilled into all manner of conversation, gesture and body language. It was also exhibited in his diverse entrepreneurial endeavors. He was a comfortably wealthy man, or at least he professed to be.
The spark of danger I feel rippling from such a man is exactly that level and degree of virility that makes me believe the impossible. It is like a pheromone. Clearly a man of this ilk knows who he is and is enjoying every minute of that knowledge alone, as a bachelor. It had to be that way, or otherwise his partner might steal the limelight. What a shame. Seldom had I experienced such a high level of pure testosterone.
And yet, underneath all this bluff and gruff flowed a river of questions about his own reality and of course, the fear of opening up to another. What would be the consequences?
What is truth? What is illusion? Does anyone really know? Does anyone really even ask the question?
We women tend to give the benefit of the doubt to both truth and illusion, since it all comes out in the wash eventually, and we might as well enjoy it clean and firsthand without asking questions. Knowledge can be so practical and mean-spirited.
All that really matters is self-expansion, growth and new awareness produced through these exciting and different relationships, which are after all, nothing but new and different ways of looking at ourselves through the eyes of another.
Ultimately we must learn to trust our own “feelings”
and handle the consequences, however they’re doled out.
Herein lies the dilemma. If I am to be a “relationship” person and a romantic one at that, how am I to experience such encounters if I don’t allow myself the exuberance of Possibility? How am I to ignore my heart’s battle cry: just let me give of myself without barriers that are supposed to protect me from ultimate pain. Oh! It hurts with such exquisite agony!
By stopping short right before that important moment of consummation I felt I was wasting all that good material from that willing individual whose intention, after all, was to give it to me. Should I refuse such generosity and frustrate both of us?
It is this failure to have my own essence perceived and valued in such moments like these that causes the greatest conflict.
The montage of experience certainly had to have at least one New Yorker, so what did I have to lose? At least for awhile. Because just as I predicted, he soon moved on to another and then another . . . and then another! Far too scary to stop long enough and ask himself who he was, and far better – and easier – to let him be defined by yet another female encounter.
Almost predictably, six months later, he returned to try to rekindle the flame. But by then I had already bought a new computer, revamped my cathartic writings and deleted his files along with the other rejections.
Taking his courage in my hands, however, reluctantly I agreed after another year had passed with our on again/ farewell again relationship, to embark yet again on another version of the same pre-charted journey. Although I bought him a pair of slippers to take care of his cold feet, I should have known they wouldn’t suffice in this pre-charted journey across the tundra.
He had written his own operational manual and once it had been published, I suppose he felt he had to stick to the rules. Business is business, and every good entrepreneur knows if you stray across the boundaries laid out and carefully bullet-pointed, you run the risk of ruining the numbers and potential return on investment.
After we said good-bye to one another for the final time, I concluded it takes remarkable humility to accept the idea that each of us must be free to follow our own destiny, especially when all the threads of life’s vast multidimensional web touch so many others. Somehow, we must access the memories of connectedness to know and feel that we are not alone with all this pain of rejection and fear. Added to this necessity is awareness of that passionate heat that is experienced when we first recognize yet another candidate whose file must be transferred from the old computer that just crashed, to the new one that has not yet been fire-walled and secured against phishing and phashing.
I am reminded of the film, The Never Ending Story, in which Nothingness takes over and becomes reality.
Imagination and a desire to be “more than ever before” restored that realm of illusion as grandly as if still within the parameters of love. Energy, drama, action and self-expression can be used to create any union that pretends to be love. And so, it is truly we who must acknowledge our own worth and find ways to take part of that love on a grander level even than the heightened displays of emotional energy that were so exciting yet short lived.
Soulmates
The crux of love between soulmates is the act of sharing without reservation. Implicit in lust and love is exploration of unknown territory, with gusto.
A promise must blossom in order to be strong enough to weather all storms. We must grow to honor each other together and hold that special someone tightly within the confines of our thoughts at all times and especially during those moments of compressed joy when the objective is to automatically let loose and fly . . . This organ of destiny is the one goalpost to whom we can cling, the one landmark that is going to listen to our story with all its human frailties, until we are finished weeping and wailing. We tell ourselves over and over that this is the one part of ourselves that is going to deliver happiness whenever we need it.
The loved one I am currently describing is that chosen being who is dearest to my heart; he is the person with whom each of us feels we are truly “seen,” for it is this counterpart to ourselves that makes us feel like we are “home.” With this being we can truly be ourselves, or at least the one we acknowledge to be us over all the other versions. Or at least we can say this much: it is the one we feel most comfortable portraying to the world.
The scene unfolds in my mind’s eye, with all its melodrama. Veils of reality reflect my unobtrusive and seemingly passive nature in the mirror of this plane of existence. Underneath, however, a warrior rides the currents of the “here and now.” Unlike the presence seen by so many outsiders, I radiate confidence, strength, self-determinism, and a ferocious courage. Embodying the traits of the Dragon in Chinese Astrology, I long to share these hidden parts of me with a special love(r). I desire to shed the beliefs of this world and be just plain, me . . . freely able to offer love in its many formats.
Let the sun shine through the clouds of deception even if it’s already raining inside. Let my true identify be revealed and let it be massaged and cherished in the degree to which it craves to be exposed to that special “other.”
I can personally attest to the fact that passion raises one from the point of ineffectual essence to a new presence of heightened direction. One can easily find that hunger to savor those special activities that spring from the fountainhead of life. Perhaps personal revelations occur only when we undergo that trial of “separation” just before we allow ourselves to give in. Do we not realize by now that this is part of the ultimate experience?
Part of the loss is in the gain . . . followed by the shared silence afterward.
Henri Bergson wrote: “to change is to mature; to mature is to go on creating oneself endlessly.” If we apply this aphorism (which may or may not be true . . . I haven’t yet decided) to romance and let it operate from a perspective of love, we will discover that our problems and surprises can be handled with warmth, non-judgment and compassion.
Added to this is the comfort from Emmet Fox’s thoughts: “Fear is the absence of faith” (Power through Constructive Thinking). Unquestionably, it takes courage to risk and reach toward intimacy. Time and awareness also help.
Kahlil Gibran describes it best:
Love has no other desire but to fulfill itself . . . /But if in your fear you would seek only love’s peace and love’s pleasure, /Then it is better for you that you cover your nakedness and pass out of love’s threshing-floor, /Into the seasonless world where you shall laugh, /But not all of your laughter, /And weep, /But not all of your tears.
What is in store for me next? I have no idea except that it’s an adventure; a bit different this time because I am more aware of my connection to Universal Love and its laws. Am I still hopeful? Of course — even in the cold morning air. I feel, however, a bit more reserved these days, at least until tomorrow.
I did the usual whenever these feelings of normalcy overcome my usual adventuresome spirit: I have cleaned out the closets, rearranged furniture, and done some heavy-duty deep cleaning. I’m saying goodbye to something I felt was special. I’m not sure what that is yet, but it sounded good to write that down and read it over a few times myself as I share it simultaneously with you, my readers.
However, in conclusion, I do know this: Love and even the romantic quest of it will always have a special place in my heart. This means I will never try to be reasonable or acceptable to anyone except myself and in the process, always see the best in others at the same time I recognize and acknowledge blatant neuroses as well as a large number of dysfunctional personalities . . . believing without reservation that this universe always was and will be a reflection of our own expectations. And if a key exists for creating a semblance of the life we desire, our own reflection must be it. What the Bleep Do We Know!? seems like a perfect description of what I have just iterated in my own words.
All we can be is honest and accept ourselves as our own best soulmates. And if we cannot do that, we must settle for second-best, namely dishonesty with its veils of illusion. Don’t you just love those four-poster beds with their draped gauzes and curtains? They remind me of something out of A Thousand and One Nights. Which is of course, where the romance novel had its origins. Dear Scheherazade! How clever she was!
I am also working on being kind to myself, to be my own best partner in crime. After all, one cannot do anything corrupt to oneself without first laying out the plans and folding back the covers. So let it be said for all to hear: I’m ready, Universe, and ripe to once more begin my Quest!
And as I pull up to the Universe’s drive-in window and place my order (“Hold the onions”) I feel a bit like the gal in the joke who finds a bottle with a genie inside: “I’m not the 3-wish kind of genie . . . you only get one wish, so make it good . . .” OK. Deep breath. Here goes.
He will know himself. He will be warm and loving, strong but sensitive. He will have enough courage to be monogamous and won’t care if I run up all his credit cards. He will even be trained to put down the toilet seat.
Of course, I’m just joking. I’ve learned by now (haven’t I?) that romance is so much more than a list. Who would be so foolish to try to pin it down or pin down any man for that matter? One day I stumbled across an old book by Stella Terrill Mann, Change Your Life Through Love, which sums my new awareness. One might call it the Trinity for The Good Life, giving it a little religious flavor, if you will: “In order to manifest a powerful life, first you have to have the desire and then you have to act on the desire.” I might add that finally, you have to believe that the mess you’ve made in the process is truly yours.
In other words, own who and what you are, and pay the consequences. The love part is the underpinnings that will eventually be removed in order to reveal the essence in all its flesh and blood.
Thomas Mann says it even better:
But how are we to bring every desire, action, and belief under the law of good? First by establishing love as the highest law of our life . . .We create the conditions of our lives by our desires, actions, and beliefs. Our desire tells the creative force what it is we want it to do. Our prayer, or request by word, deed, and thought, sets the force into motion to produce that which we have desired. Our faith or belief is our mental acceptance of that which we have desired or ordered. When this has been done the law of creation has been complied with, and it is done unto us. . . . we must also learn to accept love. For love is the force which creates good. Its nature is to create more good than existed in the first place. Its purpose is to carry the beloved forever forward.
With the greater love, one is expanded into an understanding of life and the joy, which is ours by our decisions and willingness to act upon those in faith.
“There is no use trying,” said Alice; “one can’t believe impossible things.”
“I dare say you haven’t had much practice,” said the Queen. “When I was your age, I always did it for half an hour a day. Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.” — Lewis Carroll