Intermission - Practice: Boots and VW girl

So, here I am ...trying to find myself....and instead I found S. Or better: he found me. We had an explosive beginning and a middle that consisted of raunchy sms and clandestine meetings and an abrupt guillotine ending. Two weeks. Wow!!! I found out quickly what I want and what I don't ...all the while trying carefully not to get emotionally involved too quickly. Hold your horses, I kept telling myself over and over again. Give it time. Give him time. But really?
Well, I do have an allergic reaction to people who are trying to press me into a mold that I don't want to be pressed into. That's good, I suppose. It's good that I can say 'no' and 'stop' when it doesn't feel right. But why don't I feel the satisfaction I should for standing up for myself??? Why does it taste bitter and why am I close to tears? It feels quite ridiculous even talking about this because this is what people do all the time...they buy a pair of shoes or boots, wear them a couple of times and with the generous capitalist policy in this country they can return them or dispose of them to their liking. It's quite normal, I guess. Well, I grew up in a country where it was very difficult to get any boots at all. But does that mean that now I have to feel bad for not wanting those boots? In the past I would have had to wear them...simply because there wasn't a choice and indeed a shortage of boots and actually of everything else... But hang on, I'm getting side-tracked into the shoe business and maybe slightly confuse men with boots? Very odd!
Anyhow, S is a lover of Ferrari-girls as he calls them...and from day one I was suspect about what he wanted with me anyway- a normal VW girl. Maybe it is my suspicion that killed it. Maybe I am too inflexible or maybe even too scared to find out what I would look like as a Ferrari or Porsche girl. Maybe. But what I know for sure is that I want to be able to express myself and what I want, and I want to be respected for that. I don't cope well with orders and commands especially when they only benefit other people and only please me on a secondary level.
Selfishness!!!! Yeah, that must be the key!!!!! Memo to self: Be strong, be selfish and tell to go and ..you know what. Yes! I can do this. Ommmm.
 But why am I not jumping up and down, celebrating my newly-found selfishness???? Is it because it's so new, unusual???
No! It is scary and intimidating and I don't know what to do with it especially since past experience has taught me that if you're (I, that is) selfish then you'll end up alone and unloved (that's my mother for you!)  Oh dear...
Well, I guess we shall see if that holds true as well.
In any case, deep down inside I don't think there is anything wrong with saying how you feel or what you think or what you want. S does it. All the time. And if S cannot respect what I have to say well then...thank god I kept the receipt! :-)

Day Four of the Rest of My Life

The Devilish Child – Part I

Once upon a time there was a baby, born to parents who didn’t love each other but rather got stuck with one another for various reasons. That child was the second in a row of three and had no idea what it was born into. Indeed, it was a cute little tabula rasa waiting to be filled with knowledge, emotions and experiences. The first two and a half to three years went by uneventful – or let’s say, unremembered. Although the child was normal in her development, she was somewhat an anomaly: the girl had fiery red and curly hair. In village mythology she would be called ‘the devilish child’: made by the devil, with an evil mind of her own, doomed for hell and therefore to be made the scapegoat for everything negative and horrible. Now, who can blame the young mother for being embarrassed to be seen with her walking around in the village?

The little girl was curious by nature and took everything in … a bit like a sponge…registering words and experiences…and pictures, emotions…having too little knowledge for verification and reference. She was particularly susceptible to sounds and phonetic differences especially in tone of voice.  

So, when lovely Mom said, “Krause Haare, krauser Sinn, steckt der ganze Deiwel drin“, at three years old the little girl was at an age where she was able to understand the threatening ‘under-tone’ with which this phrase was repeatedly uttered. And that happened whenever she seemed to have upset her mother by not behaving like a proper three-year-old was supposed to behave (whatever that behaviour may be). More importantly, positive reinforcement and self-confidence building was not something her Mom’s repertoire had in store for Helkele – that’s her name, by the way. In fact, that devil phrase and allusions to it would creep into the daily routine - unannounced, and inconspicuous but not unnoticed by Helkele. No wonder that soon the little girl started to believe that she was the devil’s breed and not of this world.

Feeling bad about herself, she tried to do everything to make her Mom happy and love her – Mom obviously didn’t love probably wouldn’t have abused her verbally and emotionally to the extent that she did. When things went wrong Helkele felt it was her fault and she started to feel sorry for everything and began uploading the weight of the world on her shoulders. But because Helkele was only so very little and so dependent on her parents, our redhead did everything she could to please Mom and Dad and everybody else around her. Even at her young age she started to take care of other people – her two sisters above all. And in doing so she received feedback that made her feel good about herself. Later in life… this would become an addiction that would eat her up from the inside.

Growing up she never thought of herself as being worth a penny or even pretty. ‘Don’t be so vain’, ‘Gosh don’t be so arrogant’, ‘Who do you think you are?’ were the words she would regularly hear from that one person she wanted to love her. And because her Mom was as rejecting as she was, Helkele felt a great emotional pull from her lovely granny – obviously to the dismay of her mother. Oma Frieda became this one trusted and loving figure in her life who would give her the unconditional love she was so longing for. It made Helkele proud to hear that she looked like her granny when she was her age. It made her proud that her granny, too, had red hair when she was young – and obviously because she was so lovely and absolutely fantastic, there could not have been anything wrong with her. And there, just there, for a few tiny moments Helkele dared to think that maybe there isn’t something wrong with her either, that maybe red hair is pretty and that maybe she, too, might be loveable. This deep emotional connection to her granny gave her a little bit of strength and self-confidence…for a short little while.

But then Oma Frieda died. Out of the blue. Just like that did she leave her. Helkele had seen her two days before she passed away and back then they had made plans to do some tailoring and sewing and cooking together and just to have a great time.

When granny died, Helkele was only ten years old and her whole world - the only good world she knew - collapsed. She was devastated, everything fell apart. But she was supposed to be tough because crying wouldn’t bring granny back – she was told. Helkele tried to understand what had happened but she couldn’t make sense of it. She couldn’t figure out why Oma had left her. She probably wouldn’t have gone, Helkele figured, if she had been a good girl. So, there was something wrong with her after all…

From then onwards everything seemed to make sense to her. Mom was simply right: She was the devilish child; who from now on needed to be punished for everything negative that happened. Guilt became her alter ego. Mom and Dad didn’t get along – that must be because of her. The bad weather was her fault, too, as Mom told her when she was only six, that it rains only when God is sad because she had been such a bad girl - again. Her granny, her Mom told her, was an evil woman (mother-in-law to be exact) and one day, she promised, Helkele would become just as evil and fat/heavy just as granny was at the time she died, when she was 66!

 Oma Frieda was gone and so was anything positive, the little love that she felt had died with her. Mom didn’t leave and she said terrible things about her – but at least she was there…emotional dependency laid bare.

Day Three of the Rest of My Life - Draculon

He approaches slowly, steadily, not walking – but floating softly a few inches above the ground. The cold and mutinying air that surrounds him announces his coming.

He is tall, and dark and oh! is he handsome! I would almost describe him as ‘hot’ but I know better. His dark, almost black, marble-shaped eyes suck me in – if I let them. His opaque, refreshingly cold skin is as soft as satin sheets. The dark moustache makes him look like a melange of the Count of Montechristo and a Romanian prince. And his smell! This tobacco-y, musky scent - excites all my senses…and tames me.

He is strong! And when he puts those muscular arms around me I feel protected by his cold masculinity. And trapped – like a bird in a cage.

He goes by the name of Draculon and he is the loneliness I loathe so much and desperately crave.

I love him madly. When he is with me we merge into one when he cradles me under his big, heavy and majestic cape. He sweeps me off my feet and we go to far-off places only he can take me to. I melt under his cold touch – when he gently caresses my face, my neck, my shoulders…every minute with him is cherished like a precious gift.

I tell him to leave when I feel stronger, when my head is occupied by presumably meaningful stuff swirling and twirling about, keeping me busy trying to sort things out; when there are people I can try to please and appease. But that’s when he’s desperately trying stay because he gets jealous. He can’t bear to share me with others. But I won’t let him; it gets too much. I ignore him and that’s what kills him.

He is there for me though, when I am weak. I don’t even have to invite him; Draculon just appears unannounced to comfort and love me and hold me. Just like that. He knows. He knows how to seduce me. I get lost in his velvety eyes and plunge deep and deeper into is endless soul. And then he starts caressing my neck and his soft lips carefully nibble on my skin. His breath remains cold and steady but I can tell that he gets really excited. He knows he’s got me. Within a split second he snaps out his razor-sharp fangs and hacks them into my skin and starts drinking – wildly at first – thereon slowly sucking the life out of me. I see little stars before my eyes, and the adrenalin rush provides the kick. The kick that doesn’t last very long because slowly, slowly I start losing my senses and sink deeper into his bleak soul.

How I ever manage to escape from his tight grip, this life-draining fear is a mystery to me. Maybe there is an early warning system within me that prevents him from consuming me completely. Perhaps a phone call, text message or e-mail from a friend – a sign that someone cares – that is what brings me back. And then, as if turned on by a switch, I warm up again. From my core, out to my legs, my arms, my neck and face - life is quickly rushing back into every cell in my body.

Once Draculon, is gone – I barely remember what it was like to be with him; lying next to him, feeling his strong arms entrapping me, sucking my spirit into his black and bottomless soul.

But I remember the thrill, the thrill of coming back into existence, the warmth threading and sewing me together again. A tiny rebirth. A kick I can’t live without.

Day Two of the Rest of my Life. At war with me, myself and I.

 (Note: not everyday counts towards the days of the rest of my life...)

 

Now, I figured that before I can go and forge new plans for the rest of my life I need to figure out what is going on with me. (Yeah, what’s up witchou, woman?)

Don’t worry. I am not so arrogant as to attempt to answer the universal questions that even Aristotle or Plato weren’t entirely able to figure out: Who am I? Where do I come from? And, what the hell am I doing here?

I don’t attempt to be as philosophical as that – rather a bit more practical, and I will focus on the microcosm that is me, myself and I. How do I feel as microcosm about myself and within the macrocosm which is my immediate universe (i.e. the city in which I live and work, the friends I surround myself with and my family)?

So, how do I feel about myself? Instead of giving a textbook answer (I’ve always rebelled against what the majority would do…), ‘Oh, I love myself to bits,’ I’d rather go: “Oh, gee, I don’t know,’ or would rather counter with “Why are you asking me such a stupid question?” (Note here that the internal monologue or better even, the internal conversation with myself – which I always denied existed – has begun...)

The odd thing is that how we feel about ourselves is always always always very different to how other people see us, feel about us and think about us.

“You are an amazing woman.” “You are gorgeous and funny and just the nicest person.” “You are so sweet.” “I know you’ll be a good mother.” “You are really hot.” “You deserve to be with a man who really appreciates you. He is out there and you’ll meet him some day.” (This last statement, btw really horrifies me: the prediction that ‘some day’ I will meet my ‘Mr. Right’….I have always been very sceptical of that because let’s look at the facts: what exactly are the chances that this person, this Mr. Right will be in the same city, the same country, even the same continent at the same time when I am in my sexual and physical prime? What if he lives in a far-away country on some far-away continent? Do I really have to go out looking for him? (Saying that: isn’t he supposed to come looking for me?!) However, because I am quite emancipated, I don’t mind looking for him. But the most upsetting thing is: I don’t event know what I am supposed to be looking for! And, more importantly, I don’t even know where to look for him? Do I really have to travel to every single continent on this earth to find my ‘Mr Right’? Not that I really mind the travelling, in fact, that would probably be the part I would enjoy the most. But, let’s be serious here: probability theory applied – what chance have I got to actually meet him? (I am sure my friend J would be able to write a fantastic algorithm for that!). Ohh, long deviation… let’s get back to other people’s perception about me.

No matter how often and in which variation they say nice things about me and no matter how positive they feel about me – I don’t get it. I just don’t get it. Or – better – I don’t feel it. I don’t feel about myself the way other people do. I can understand why they might say that I am pretty and not entirely out of shape. Objective. Facts. But I don’t feel it, which doesn’t necessarily mean that I am a complete ice block – what with me being German and all that wouldn’t be too far-fetched - but it is more like something or someone is disabling me from feeling this way about me.

And because nobody is standing behind me with a whip – and even my mother has disappeared from my right shoulder – it must be of my own making. It’s like I am constantly at war with me, myself and I.

For years I have been exploring the reasons for this self-deprecation, self-devaluation, self-destruction and self-loathing. I have come close to solving some of these issues (and I have to mention here that Dr H. would probably do a little jig and clap in her hands if she knew that I can finally accept some pieces of myself) but still they are holding me back and hostage from myself and in myself.

Why in heaven’s name would anyone punish herself for things that other people have fucked up or didn’t get right? Nobody, obviously. But because we are slaves to our subconscious we can’t help it. Or at least I can’t.

Yep, you guessed right - it goes all back to the childhood -  patterns that were formed when the brain wasn’t quite finished yet…emotional memories that were saved without having been analyzed or explained or discussed…patterns that have ingrained themselves on top of each other creating thick layers in the gooey river that is our subconscious, interacting very strangely and autonomously with actual present-day experiences and emotions. Oh, how I love Freud!!

Now, I am not sure whether this should be alarming or not. But I what I have learned over the years from my endless sessions with the nicest shrinks is that: I matter. I matter to me, myself and I. And letting those three down is apparently the worst thing that can happen to you (although thinking of all the atrocities, war crimes and natural disasters in this world I doubt that very much). But obviously, nobody can really truly love you until you love thyself.

And there you have it: it’s easy. Just love yourself and you’ll be fine. (Duh! Why did nobody ever tell me? Why did I have to find out for myself? I could have spared me, myself and I many deeply disturbing mental boat rides…seriously!)

Have I finally discovered who I am and what I am and how I am? How my microcosm interacts with the macrocosm and the universe??? Duh! No!!

I am obviously a WORK IN PROGRESS, and therefore, not a doll that is sitting on a shelf in some social shop waiting to be picked up by Mr Right. And judging by the name ‘Mr. Right’ he obviously isn’t for me because he’d probably be looking for a ‘miss’ he can turn into ‘Mrs Right’ or Mrs Perfect. But I am not perfect and quite frankly – I don’t want to be. Perfection is a) boring and b) very subjective. So, for me there is only a ‘Mr.’ and he could be any guy. And if he really is for depends on whether he’d accept me as WORK IN PROGRESS and whether I would let him do that. (And this goes back to Day One …about what I want…)

Whether I love myself or not – I am a lovable person – actually all three of us are (me, myself and I). And we get on great – despite the occasional wars we have got amongst each other. I don’t think that people’s opinions about me should matter  - and to be fair in times of peace they don’t but let me tell you, in times of war between me, myself and I -  they are all that seems to matter. (Pause. Note: I really do sound like a schizophrenic. Help! – Or is that actually normal?)

So, I am really trying hard to keep the peace…within me with myself and I.

Day Two of the Rest of My Life (Note: not every day counts towards the Days of the Rest of My Life) - At war with Me, Myself and I

Day One of the Rest of My Life

Oh dear, that sounds actually quite gloomy...but it's not meant to be. What this is supposed to mean is that - yes, from today onwards I want to be happy.

I want. Big words. Easy to say. I want. The question is, however, what is it I want? And more importantly, how do I know what I want? Because what I want changes. Like the leaves on a tree. Only more quickly. More drastically...as in yesterday for example, I wanted to move to Geneva. And today I want to go on a Yoga-retreat-ultimate-self-discovery-journey to Goa...and tomorrow I might want to move to a small town by the seaside and be a teacher again. Not that everything I want mutually excludes everything else I want. But I seem to want everything exclusively and absolutely.
(Oh dear, I guess a team of shrinks would have a blast reading this, analyzing all my 'issues').

Happy. Always the ultimate answer to the question that comes up right around the end of a year: What is your New Year resolution? So, what are your plans for the coming year? Answer: I want to make myself happy. Ensuing question to myself– well, you guessed right – but how the hell do I do that? How do I know that I’m happy? Or maybe am I happy already and just don't know it? Do I have to be unhappy when I know that I am not happy? Am I not happy because I don't get what I want (see paragraph above)? Am I asking myself the wrong questions? Am I asking questions that I know are impossible to answer and therefore give me reason enough to fret and moan about my all-so-unhappy self?

Happy = lightness. Opposite to unhappy, darkness, heavy darkness, gloom. But can you be ultimately 100% happy with everything that you are, with everything you’ve got – or are people just lying to themselves and are actually just as unhappy as I am?
For me it’s always been a question of principle: all or nothing. Ganz oder gar nicht.
But as I have painfully realized – ‘ganz oder gar nicht’ geht nicht.
I would like to move from ‘wanting to be happy’ to actually being ‘happy. What if I am happy already but I don’t like to admit it because if I do I’ve got nothing else to worry or fuss about? Well, that’s pathetic, you would think. But think again. Especially when it is me, we’re talking about...

Or maybe I am asking myself the wrong questions. Or I should stop asking questions altogether and just make up statements and believe in them as if there were true...a la: Well, I am happy. Period. I am happy and I make myself believe that I am. Self-deception? Get outta here! No way!

Anyway, you see what I mean? And this is just the beginning...there is more where this brain crap is coming from...
But not today. Tomorrow.

Day one of the rest of my life...

Oh dear, that sounds actually quite gloomy...but it's not meant to be. What this is supposed to mean is that - yes from today onwards I want to be happy.