Pockets of Air

In the second episode of Season 15 of Grey's Anatomy, Meredith talks about why it is scary AF to find yourself attracted to someone. She described the feeling as being akin to being introduced to air (for the first time) and you being afraid it will get taken away. I actually felt my breath leave me for a few seconds when she said that because WHOAH...I have felt all of that.

Falling for someone is scary. You may lay all your cards on the table and try to have control over the whole thing but you never truly know if this person will catch your fall. Rejection is such a hard pill to swallow and as much as it's lovely to have someone take your breath away, it's not so ideal when it is like you can't function without the pockets of air that their presence in your life brings.

I'll naturally always think of music when I need a way to make things make sense. Two songs came to mind as I watched that episode: "Jordin Sparks featuring Chris Brown - No Air" and "Ottis Redding - Try A Little Tenderness".  I'm not entirely sure that "losing you is like living in a world with no air" is anyway to live but it seems to almost always happen. I'm not sure why it is that when we attach ourselves to another person, we want to give up on our individuality so much that we need them to breathe...live...exist. That without them, nothing makes sense.

I like how Ottis seems to think that if you try to just love someone with a little tenderness; love them softly, flaws and all that you may just get this love thing right. Understand someone and allow them to understand you. That with a little tenderness, we may just be open to the notion that we can be ourselves and not the version of ourselves we think we should be, judging by our dating history and what we think an ideal realtionship should be like and how we should mould ourselves into the roles that give us that ideal. The weariness and fear to fall again comes from having had more errors in the trials of love than anyone deserves. We become so vulnerable and sometimes guarded because of the hurt we've experienced in the past. But then you meet someone and you feel the lightheadedness again and you have to battle with yourself once again with thoughts of whether this is worth the troubles of it ending with you struggling for air should it fall apart. Unlike the other three elements, you can't see air. This is probably what makes it difficult to process when the person that once romantically took your breath away is also the person that looks likely to have caused our brains to go without oxygen for too long and we start being irrational.

It is vital that we keep as much of our individuality as possible when entering into a relationship. I believe that that is where the most important pockets of air reside. The ones that will help you realise that people we get romantic with should be life partners and not life support machines.

Kryptonite

There are people you will come across in your life that'll make it damn near impossible to forget or let them go. There's this chemistry that you have where eventually, when you do try to move from them (for whatever reason), they become your weak spot. So if life worked like it does in Mafia movies...and you got locked in a room with two big guys staring you down with the boss' skivvy blowing smoke into your face...and you get this "I got nothing to lose" look because well, you figure life's been shit anyway and has never given you a break...and then the damn skivvy mentions that they know where your Kryptonite is and they know what s/he's been up to...? Look, everything you thought you knew about yourself and where you stand, would fall like a house of cards. Everything.

Kryptonite is terrible. Don't believe me? Ask Superman. The strongest man on make-believe earth is crippled by the mere presence of Kryptonite. In the real world, we've experienced Kryptonite in the form of: "is there anyone who believes that this man and this woman should not wed? Speak now or forever hold your peace." And then someone just walks in and you see that "oh fuck!" look on the bride's face because her Kryptonite, the man she thought she was over but had never left her mind over the years, is finally ready to want to build a life with her. She'd been happy all this time, don't even try to doubt that...but that wasn't the kind of happiness - the Kryptonite happiness - that feels as plain and simple as there is only one way for a jig-saw puzzle to be put together...the kind of happiness that feels effortless and without weight. The kind you'd probabaly need to go to rehab for if you really wanted to get it out of your system.

The situation is tricky. Where you can't even run in any which direction because everything you go through, you want it to be with said Kryptonite. It could take decades for ya'll to meet again and it will feel like just yesterday that y'all were last together. All those feelings enshroud you and whatever it is you thought you were focusing on in your life, becomes but a blur because the one thing that was able to flip your world upside down, waltzed back into a life you were content with living for however long forever was promised by God.

There. Is. No. Cure. For. Kryptonite.

Forever and Ever

We cannot go through life with the notion that just because our parents failed, then we’re genetically disposed to that very failure. I refuse to believe this about marriage.

I don’t believe in divorce. I’ve said this for as long as I can remember and each time I say it, I truly believe that one cannot stand before a priest and make a promise to God and go back on it some years later just because the going got elephant-skin tough while your skin wrinkled. I also believe that we are inclined to sway in the direction of that which is familiar to us because it’s a safer route. The unknown when coupled with self-doubt is too daunting a task for the average lost soul to want to wander into. So of course we're more likely to surrender our futures to a past that's more familiar.
 

Personally, I have only two examples of happy marriages. Two. I have lived for 30 years and can only yield two relationships that still fuel the spark of belief within me, of a beautiful institute that I want to one day be a part of. There could’ve been none and I’d probably still believe that two insane human beings can decide to build a life together, supporting each other, and still remain individuals. It’s so important to me that I remain my own person outside of the union. I want someone crazy enough to want to sit with me on a stoep when we’re in our 70s and 80s and still have conversations about music; politics; our annoyingly precious grandkids and our ungrateful children before we go and see which sex positions we could attempt without having to call for help to get out of them.

A lot gets in the way of achieving these happily ever afters and I’m not sure that a death threat to my beau will be sufficient to keep him from straying and betraying me. I’m not entirely sure that the same threat can keep ME from straying and betraying him either but I’d like to think that we can try to dumb down the noise enough to always hear our hearts as they beat for each other.

I cannot go through any more of this life not believing that I can have a happily ever after. I deserve it. I hope I’m with the man who believes this too.

First Borns

My cousin insists that over 80% of the guys that are suitable for us to date, have kids. I can't agree with this, but I understand the frustration in her exaggerations.
Our grandmother was one who fell short of insisting that we give her great-grandkids before she passed away...none of us did. Doesn't help that she thought one of my boyfriends was a gangster cos every time he'd come pick me up, he'd be driving one of four cars (one was his, the other three belonged to his parents and sister. He didn't wanna come in the same car cos he didn't want people to "mark" him RE: hijacks. I didn't explain this to my gran.)

Which brings me to my mom. Now, I've only ever brought two guys home. The first doesn't really count cos well, he lives two seconds from my gran's house and everybody at home knew him; we dated for five years. The second, was a guy I was with long enough for my mom to put a face to because she had had to make several calls to when she couldn't get hold of me [if I was not home, chances were that I was with him]. We had made plans to think about having kids this year, actually. That relationship ended a year ago, unfortunately.

My lifestyle doesn't allow me to even think of entertaining having kids right now. I don't like "hooking up" with guys. I'm a relationship kinda girl. I fall too easily and too hard when I'm with a guy so in order to avert a potential disaster, I spend all my time on the road or on my phone (dodging guys who seem to wanna hookup to pass the time). So you see, babies are not really a part of my short-term plans because of this. However, I DO tend to get broody and have on many occasions mapped out a way I would balance motherhood with my love for the open road and impromptu crazy YOLO (You Only Live Once) moments. The latter happen quite often, and I like that cos I kinda [read: really] hate routines. That I haven't been in a relationship for over a year may also be the reason why I've been yo-yo'ing on this having kids thing. I mean, I have no one to have this talk with...so I have all the current time in the world to free-style the fuck outta this crazy life that I'm living.

About 5 years ago, I dated a guy who had a 6-month old baby. He and the baby-mama fell out before the baby was born cos he felt she was trapping him (pause! Only just realized that I got given "the line" :-(...*sigh*). Long story short, I got annoyed by his whining about the baby-mama and having to run off to see the kid every two seconds (slight exaggeration here) which kinda lead to me mistakenly sending a text about my annoyance, to him. I was upset and frustrated and venting all that in a text that was meant for a friend of mine. I can't remember what I said but knowing me, I couldn't have used euphemisms; unkind words tumble outta my mouth and thumbs when I'm upset. So that's how that relationship ended. I wasn't about to apologize for any of that and neither did I want to patch things up cos my three weeks of step-motherhood became the bane of my existence.

I've since known that I didn't want to be in a relationship with a dad cos essentially, there are four people in that relationship (additional kids obviously add on to the count). For someone who has attachment and sentimental issues, it just doesn't make sense for me to find comfort in having My time with My man, shared with his past and future that have me playing a supporting cast member in his life's story. I've fooled myself into thinking that I could be that girl: The one whose understanding knows no bounds, but I'm not. Not even having fallen for a dad recently has changed my mind. It's a beautiful thing, seeing how he loves his kids...but I want to be with someone who'll be a first-time parent, like me. I want to be with someone who I'll experience THAT first with. It's not to say that guys who've fallen out with their girls become some kind of Kryptonite, no. It's just that that's not what I want for me. It's also a nightmare assuming (from fear) that the baby mama(s) would probably make life a living hell for me as a baby-less woman who is now with the father of her/their kids. I mean, in addition to having had a fall-out with someone you created a child with, you now have to trust some girl who know nothing about motherhood (let alone YOUR child) to co-raise the child with you and his/her dad. That's gotta take some kind of special, non-vindictive person to trust. I don't want to be a part of that equation. There's also the fear that the kid(s) may reject me *sigh*.

I cannot accept the 80% shot in the dark that my cousin fired. Cannot because I happen to know a lot of guys who have no kids (99% of which are having beers in the zone I've sectioned out for them in my friendship circle). I especially know of one who doesn't look set on having kids anytime soon...which makes him someone I should be hanging out with a little more often than I have been. It's not like I'ma catch babies if he sneezes, if anything...it just may be a flu that'll keep us bed-ridden for a while, having a few practice runs for when we DO decide to create a living testament of our love for each other

Tri-messed-her

Look, I’ve read all sorts of things from women who are being cheated on. When they start saying things like: “he cheats with you cos you’re not good enough to be THE woman”, I feel like slapping some sense into them. How does that make sense to you?  So, you’re staying with his philandering ass because YOU are THE woman? Someone needs to explain this to me as I may be looking at this from too much of a black and white perspective. Yes, it sucks that he’s cheating on you and that you (don’t) know the girl, but don’t pacify yourself with bull shit ideologies. Same ideologies are the ones that have women stay in fucked up relationships for the sake of the trimesters they went through to birth niggaz' kid(s). Can’t be turning yourself into a victim when you could alter your life and be with someone who believes you’re enough woman for them OR you could alter your thought process (seeing as you believe you’re THE woman) and wait for him to get over the side chick (in hopes of there not being another one thereafter) and while you’re at it, you could come to the realization that his cheating ways may be independent of you and what you may or may not lack as the woman he loves enough not to hurt.

I’ve been one to think that men cheat cos they want to. Hell, women do it for the same reasons. It’s not always about you as the main chick/guy (I was gonna use the crass euphemism for penis for the sake of rhyme, but…). I had a boyfriend who after I had an elicit cyber relationship on the side, was so broken that he took to look for an extra-mural activity with one of the students he tutored. I stumbled upon that extra-mural info and when I stepped outside of myself and watched how we both - with the straightest faces - lied to each other for weeks on end, something in me shifted. That moment still gives me the chills. When either name (my cyber-person and his student) came up in conversation (cos the suspicions hung like an old woman’s breasts in the atmosphere), we both dismissed that shit nonchalantly. The battles that followed those two mishaps lead to the final demise of that relationship cos the truth is, neither of us could look past our cheating ways (emotional and intending) and the hurt that came from being cheated on. More than anything, I think it was the shocking revelation of how it was so effortless to lie to each other when there was so much love and so many plans mapped out for us, between us. It doesn’t help much that I allowed myself to be in a threesome with only two people knowing about it, soon after. But I know myself. I self-destruct before I re-group and I guess that’s what happened in the months that followed the breakup.

Looking back, I didn’t think of that other girl as being more nor less woman than me or whatever. She was there as a childish response to my childish philandering ways. I can’t allow myself to think that I would’ve stayed in that relationship had they gotten intimate while I waited in the shadows for him to first come back to his senses and then to me, when he was done clearing his one head of stressful thoughts and the other head of some sperm. I know I could not have handled it and I know why I couldn’t have: I want to be with someone I can and want to be with…without having to fight off anyone. That’s what relationships should be like, ideally. There’s nothing wrong in still believing in the ideal. It’s when illusions cloud judgement that you should worry.

A man will cheat because he wants to. A woman will cheat because she wants to. These things can’t always be avoided but it’s a beautiful thing when you love and are loved by one.

Dear Possibity

Things have been quite crazy and weird between you and I in the last year, more so in the last 6 months.

When our eyes met for the first time a year ago, it was as though a page had been ripped out of a movie script and personified itself into our moment. In a room that was full of people, yours were the first pair of eyes I met; and we held on to that moment with the understanding that that moment was so much better than the bullshit we were both dealing with in our separate lives. It was beautiful. Those few seconds of possibilities, were beautiful.

But I guess anything that resembles a promise of being different is worth the escape, when you're consistently bombarded with the not-so-in-your-head voices that tell you that most of who you are is not good enough for them. So in the days that followed our meeting, we drafted the blueprint of an escape route that only you and I understood...which lead to date number 1. There are so many possible outcomes that could've sprung from that afternoon. For one, I could've not pitched or not enjoyed myself; which would've lead to date-number-2-until-this-moment, not having happened.

I've questioned your presence in my life because at the moment, more of my parts are made of skepticism than they are made of faith. I'm hoping that this is a temporary malfunction, as even I don't recognize this glitch. I've loved that even amidst the questioning, the exclamations that've been cheering for you (few as they've been) have been annoyingly louder.

I guess I'm writing this to let you know that my interest in you has not waned. It's just that I can't reveal the events that lead to the break in transmission just yet. How you're still interested in me (even with all these unfortunate-looking mixed signals of late) is beyond me. I guess it just boils down to the promising possibilities that we mapped out in the moment our eyes locked for the first time; they're worthy of being explored.

I got the Love Jones

I remember a morning back in '99 where I got up early for school so that I could catch "Love Jones" on DSTv. I loved that movie THAT much. It helped that the soundtrack kicked ass and that the young Larenz Tate was super hot. Forward to 2012 where I got the movie as a birthday gift and I couldn't help but see how it had shaped me into the person I've since become: A writer; a believer; a Hopeless romantic.

In that same year (1999), I "fell in love" with my friend's best friend. I knew that said friend was into me...but I was more into his best friend cos we had a "Love Jones" moment: that I-got-it-bad-at-first-sight type of moment. As an English assignment at school, we had to come up with our rendition of  Elizabeth Barrett Browning's "How Do I Love Thee (Let Me Count The Ways)". I can't remember what drivel I manipulated out of my pen, but it was enough to fuel the love for poetry and the power of words in relation to the emotions they evoked. My subject for that poem was said best friend to future boyfriend. Let's call Best friend "Blue" (Blue 6's "Sweet Love" was our song...LOL). So anyway, I went on to write quite a lot of love-inspired rhymes for Blue; he heard/read none of them.

A year later, I met a hot little something during the first of five years together with Blue's best friend - go figure. No, his name's not "go figure". Hot Little Something went to the school down the road from my house so I saw him almost everyday after school. He (let's call him Love Jones for now) reminded me so much of Larenz Tate that I just HAD to watch the movie again with my girls to make sure that I wasn't making this up in my infatuated head. So I eventually got Love Jone's numbers and we furiously texted each other daily (remember those cute SMS's that managed to fit images like Teddy Bears shaped outta punctuation marks into 160 characters? Yeah, we sent those to each other thanks largely to the ExactMobile booklets that we bought the SMS's from). I became that girl who puppied after the Soccer Captain of a random school, same girl who'd ditch her friends and run home so that I could catch a few minutes with Love Jones before he got on a bus to town, and then a taxi home. This crush went on to kill me right up until two years into tertiary where outta the blue, I got a call from him and I almost went into full pathetically-in-love-again mode. I even remember what I was wearing on the day that he called *as I roll my eyes*: An olive green Indian skirt, with an olive/brown top and sandals. My dreadlocks were tied up at the beginning of that call and were a royal mess by the time I hung up. We decided to hook up some days later and I dunno where I got the sudden proverbial kahuna's from but I braved being with him...at his house...just the two of us! A cricket Test match was on when I got to his house so we watched that for a bit. I don't quite remember the events that followed but I do remember how nervous I was. For a reason I can't muster now, I decided to wear a VERY long skirt with a top that exposed my tummy...so while we were on that couch together and I had one of the cushions covering my flat tummy, I just felt his hand move over mine and the next thing I knew I was having a Darien and Nina moment - four years after I first laid my eyes on this fine speci-man. It was an intense kiss - I probably fainted at some point cos the only thing I remember about that afternoon, was that kiss. The only thing that had stayed solidified in all the time that had passed between me and To U M In-love was our mutual hormonal love for each other. I had to jolt out of that house before his mom got home, so we decided to continue this uhm...."thing" some other time. It didn't happen. I don't remember why but that was the last time I saw him. And because I had also changed my numbers and didn't remember his, communication came to an abrupt end.

I haven't thought about this guy since '06 or something, til a week ago when I watched this movie again and the scene with Darius (topless) making breakfast for Nina just made me swing right back to the years 2000-2004. I swear Tumi looks *clears throat*... or looked *cringes* just like Larenz Tate in that breakfast scene...that smile...mmmmmmmmm! I'm almost itching to track him down. Knowing the way my world operates, I'll probably find that he's been under my nose all this time. It would be quite a blog-post if I discovered that he's still Yummy Tumi; kid-less out of choice and not attached to some wonderful woman. However, if I find that he's a father and/or husband, shem I'll just secretly wish him well and not bother him at all. I'm so Hopeless *cues Dionne Farris to sing me a lulla-Bye to Yesterday*.

"I miss you" - - - *crickets*

Everyone has that one person that they like but feel incredulously uncomfortable around. Right? Just me, then? Ok. I'll be the poster child for all other fumblers that are hiding behind waterfalls and under tree trunks, then. I don't mind. Well, I do...but. Ok. So anyway, I dunno why I always struggle to come up with a confident and truthful "I miss you too" when presented with the opportunity. Did I say "Opportunity"? *sigh*...

Alcohol helps. Alcohol helps a lot; and all the times that I've been around him, I've needed alcohol to give my vocab a boost so that I could at least string a conversation together and be on cue for the jabs of humour that he throws around. I otherwise fumble and trip over my tongue without the -OH (this is how Chemists represent alcohol: -OH...I miss studying Science...oh Gosh...I digress...). So, to avoid what could be an incredibly embarrassing situation (even though I've decided that I don't get embarrassed), I need some alcohol in my system...lest I elevate to drooling cos my words find it hard to roll outta my mouth.

So it's either I really like this guy (and my friends don't like him at all - LOL); or I'm hoping he'll be a passing fad, eventually. I do nothing to keep him interested; in fact, we hardly talk. But when he's around...and we have those moments that make me picture us lying on a grassy hill, head-to-head facing the opposite direction...I lose all clarity and most of my control. It's in those moments that he'll look me in the eyes (if we're together) or change his tone (if we're on the phone) and say: "I really miss you" and I'll respond with "eerrrr...uhm...yeah, we haven't hung out in a while, ne? My fault!" Works so much different when we text though. I guess it's true that texting makes things so much easier cos you have time to think of a response, unlike with verbal conversations where you have nanoseconds top come up with something that'll keep the conversation flowing non-interview-esque. I go from being an older, sexier PowerPuff Girl, clad in tight leather on a mountain-top in the Captain Morgan pose...to a whimpering Ugly Betty, within seconds.

I wish I had enough time on my hands to conjure up a Nobel Peace winning psycho-analysis of why this guy makes me nervous, alas! Being generally shy also makes such a possible analysis all the more futile cos I combat this shyness with lots of words (most of them unnecessary; so as to have command over the conversation) or with silence cos the neurons in my head get all limp.

It would be interesting to see what events would unravel if I were to gather up some proverbial balls and string a sober sentence together. I might even be able to remember our conversations this time. Yeah, let's see what happens the next time I'm around him. Or maybe I should just start by getting comfortable with a truthful: "I Miss You Too."

Crack is whack!

And you'll recognise this feeeling, you've felt it before. You'll clinch your chest as your stomach turns. Your body will go ice cold, sending shivers down your malleable spine as you lose control. Frozen heart; it will begin to crack. You allowed yourself to get here: Cracking heart, breaking heart.

"I could fill a thousand pages telling you how I felt, and still you would not understand. So now I leave without a sound, except that of my heart shattering as it hits the ground"

Back 'n Forth

The ex will cue the queue of excuses...