I hold back

I no longer write everything here I would otherwise write. I've made the mistake of letting people in my life know about the blog. I think I do this because I want them to know me better or see other sides of me or think me clever. But I have people from every part of my life who know about it, and read it. And while it creates a kind of intimacy, it also keeps me from being straightforward about some issues that I struggle with.

I waver between letting myself just be and do "what I need to do" right now in my life, and trying hard to embrace the idea that maybe I don't know what's best for me. It's the insidious circular logic of most religion: We are but poor, imperfect souls. Who are we to question the divine wisdom laid before us in official doctrine?

Yeah, well the "official doctrine" says that it's right and unquestionable, ergo, it's right and unquestionable. No external way to validate it. Therefore faith, or no faith. I've never been long on faith.

There are these fleeting moments, after I've satisfied my desire to do something to hide from my feelings that I experience them directly. Right now, I miss my wife. Most specifically, I miss the happy times with her. I miss seeing her happy. When my thoughts go to the absence of her in my life, the image in my mind is of her, swaddled in every fleece blanket on the couch, turning away from watching some vacuous "movie stars in pretty clothes" gossipy fluff on TV, to look at me, and smiling like a four year old who hopes to get out of trouble by being adorable. I miss that smile. I really did live for her happiness. But I needed some of my own, too.

Maybe I was just not understanding. Maybe I was selfish and couldn't handle sharing her attention with school and work. Maybe I didn't communicate how neglected and rejected and sad I felt. Maybe I needed to know how to be happy on my own. I know I could have done better.

I continue to learn in my life that things that feel permanent and lasting are not. Everything goes away, in the end. Living life with eyes wide open is frightening.

I remember very clearly the moment when my awareness of mortality extended beyond the generationally obvious and the egoisticly horrifying to contemplating the fates of my brothers. While I am the oldest, I may outlive some of my siblings. And while it doesn't make me withdraw from them in any way, I was horrified to consider I may have to live through that some day. Things end, and therefore, attachment to anything which is impermanent brings pain.

Maybe my monastic life comes most from my fear of attachment to people and things. I don't want to feel loss, so I avoid feeling gain.

It's another rainy-ass Sunday, and I'm blue. I sit at my kitchen table, filling out divorce paper work. I didn't want this for my life.

M sent me a book from Amazon. Dali Lama "Art of Happiness". She's a very sweet girl. Wishing me happiness as I start my life anew, in the little note. I wish I had a Kenneth for her who was ready to be her committed boyfriend. But there's only one, and he's keenly aware of the impermanence and illusion of love. I think she loves me as she sees me and wishes me to be, not as I am. And I find her pushy, and her teasing confuses me and hurts my feelings. I don't want to be her boyfriend. I do like her, still, for who she is.

For those who know me, I was "bad" this weekend. This is how I feel the day after.