genamarie

The Secret Garden
2013-07-25 00:50:46 (UTC)

Deep philosophical thoughts

So He's been telling me for at least a year, probably closer to two, that he would be coming to Arizona at some point for class or training or something. To be 100% honest, I wasn't really paying that close of attention to WHAT he was coming for because I just wasn't. Anyway, I wasn't sure it would happen or where I'd be or what I'd be doing, whatever so I just lost track of time and this vague reference to a trip to Arizona.

Well, he told me about 2 weeks ago that he'll be here in August and that I needed to find a way to come down to the valley to see him. Its about a 4 hour drive, and I can stay with him both nights he'll be here. I am so excited, and we've talked about this chance for pretty much forever. What we'll do when we finally can be together, how we'll spend our time, what we'll say, all that.
But now...

All my life, I've allowed myself all these grandiose ideas about how things would be if I got what I wanted. I always wanted a violin and I believed there was something deep in my soul, part of my Irish heritage, that cried out for a violin. I just KNEW that the moment I laid my hands on one, it would be magical and I'd instinctively know how to make it do what I wanted it to. I'd be able to make it sing, and it would be like heaven itself had opened up and connected my fingers to those strings in a way nobody had ever been able to feel before. I truly believed this with all my heart and soul. I believed it because the sound of a violin instantly shuts out all other sounds in the world, it sings directly to me and I hear music, words, thoughts, and I have feelings that are so pure, so golden, so encompassing, that I had to believe there was some sort of mystical connection between my hands and my brain and the strings of a well-tuned violin. I also believed this because I knew I'd never have a violin and I'd never have money to afford lessons nor would I need them because again, I'd never have a violin. Well, for my 7th anniversary, my husband bought me a violin. It was amazing, beautiful. The most beautiful thing I've ever seen, and it was all mine. The wood glistened and shone and the strings were taught and they hummed when I first touched them. The bow was a reddish wood, stark white horsehair strung flat and smooth, crying for me to touch the handle, to accept the rosin so it could sing the song I had in my heart-the song that only a violin with my mystical touch could set forth from the wood and my soul. I rosined the bow. I closed my eyes and lifted the body to my shoulder, tucked it down under my chin. I pulled the bow across the strings and it was like the sound of someone slaughtering a goat with a pocketknife. The bow skipped over top of the strings in a raw, evil sounding screech that not only offended my ears and my husband's ears, but broke my soul in a kind of pain that I can't even begin to describe. I tried again, but no matter how I held the bow or where I put my fingers on the strings, I could not make a recognizable note come out of that thing. I took lessons from a friend, along with 4 other ladies who had never played the violin. I got this group together so that it would be worth the teachers' time, but also because none of them would make me look bad as I learned to play.
After about three months and not being able to even play the most rudimentary tune, I put the violin in the closet and there it has sat in its sleek black case for 10 years. I get it out every now and then to remind me that my dream, with no hope of every coming true, was much better for my heart than the reality of that goat-killing sound that I feel offends the very violin that makes it.

I had a very similar experience with the piano. I used to listen to "The Red Strokes" by Garth Brooks, and I watched the music video over and over and over, and how that beautiful white grand piano could make the most amazing music. The keys were soft but could be played sharply or strongly. A master could make that piano into a conduit for angelic melodies. I just knew I would be able to sit down to the piano after all these years and make it sing and close that connection between heaven and earth with my hands. I can't explain the disappointment I felt when I sat down to my very own piano after all these years since I took lessons as a kid. I had softened my heart, I had prayed, I had dreamed and dreamed how much natural talent I had in me and how I could serve as that conduit through which the angels could communicate to the earth. I KNEW this would happen. Yet, I practiced every day for 4 hours a day for about 9 months and the music was not any easier for me to play. It was not any easier for my hands to come together and blend those low, deep notes with the happy, singing melody. It was devastating, and I have stopped practicing entirely because it is obvious I was not "meant" to play the piano. But I remember those dreams I had, that belief I had. I remember what it felt like to truly believe that all I had to do to be an amazing piano player, was open myself up and let the music flow into my own piano.

There have been many times I have let my imagination run away with my heart. I have let myself believe in magic, in mystical "destiny" of a sort, only to have my hopes, my dreams, my best-laid plans dashed to the ground as a small child will dash a favorite toy in a fit of temper.

When I was preparing to go to Las Vegas to be with Him the first time, I told myself I was so happy to finally be able to be with someone who would let me be myself, who I WANTED to be myself with. I told myself I would be true to myself, dance in the street, make out with him on a park bench if the spirit moved me, in front of God and everyone. I told myself I'd dress the way I like to dress, walk the way I like to walk, sing with the songs on the radio like I do when I'm alone, and I'd laugh and have fun like we were the only two people on the earth, like nobody else mattered. I dreamed of that time together, literally for weeks. Every time I closed my eyes, I'd see him and I'd see us dancing on a street corner, or holding onto each other in a forbidden embrace down some dark, dirty alley. I just KNEW our meeting was going to be magical and I looked so forward to it I almost made myself sick. The first time I saw him in the flesh, my knees were literally week. I will never forget how he leaned over, gave my friend Renee a kiss on the cheek, and then grabbed me and pulled me to him like he was as happy to finally meet me as I was to finally meet him. He went to kiss me and I turned my face away, whispering in his ear, "not with Renee here." He kissed my cheek instead, and I held onto him in one form or another the entire time we visited-about two hours. I sat on his lap and fingered the ring in his nipple as we sat there and talked. When I stood up so Renee and I could leave, my knees were so weak I thought I might fall. Renee looked at me as though I had sprouted another head. Later she told me she was embarrassed to be with me because I was acting so silly.

The next night, I went out with him by myself, the moment I had waited for for at least a year. We walked, we talked, we shared a margarita or something. I can't remember what it was, in all honesty. But I remember that in trying to be someone i thought he wanted me to be, at the last minute I had ditched my comfortable cowboy boots for a brand-new pair of sandals. To this day, I don't know why I did that. I wish I would not have, because my one-perfect feet now have scars on the tops of them where the leather from those brand-new sandals ate a hole in each foot while we walked around the strip for 5 hours. We went to a toy store, a place where I LOVE to go because they let you play with the toys. There were frisbees and big bouncy balls and a floor piano where you could play songs with your feet. I've always wanted to dance on one of those suckers and at least play chopsticks. But I didn't want to look silly in front of him, so I played shy. I would not walk on the floor piano. I didn't play frisbee in the store. I didn't play war with him with the laser guns because I didn't want anyone to think I was being immature.

My heart was heavy that night because I knew I had not been true to myself nor true to my dreams. While I had no control over whether or not I could play the piano or the violin, I had 100% control of the person I let him see that night. I chose to let him see the person I've tried to run away from for the last 17 years. I let him see a lie-the shell of the person I really am...

The highlight of my night, of my very life, was the kiss. In that moment, that probably only lasted 20 seconds, I was entirely, blissfully happy. I was with the man I had already given my heart and soul to. I wanted to preserve that moment in every pore of my body. His taste, his scent, the way he felt pressed against my body, the way his hands felt on my face. The look in his eyes. I had my eyes wide open as I looked into his eyes as we kissed. I vaguely remember hearing some old codger laughingly say "get a room" as he walked by. I had always wanted to hear that said about me. In that moment, my reality was every bit as good as the dreams I had had. That is the only moment in my LIFE where I have not been disappointed in what I let myself believe would happen. Every other instance I have ever let myself believe something great would happen, I have been so disappointed in the actuality of the real situation, that I vowed never to allow myself to hope again...

Now here I am, less than a month away from my meeting with Him. I've been dreaming of that meeting, that first night, every night since he told me he was coming. Flashes of our kiss shoot through my mind periodically as well. Some dreams have been amazing, some very frightening. Some have made me question my sanity in even allowing myself to want to meet with him. And every waking moment, I'm wracked with the worry that I am going to build myself up to this magical moment, just like I did last time, just like I have every time I've ever wanted anything I thought was outside my reach, and the actual experience is going to be less than what I hope. I worry he is going to be so hung up on who I am 500 miles away that when I'm 5 feet away, he's going to realize I am not the little hottie he was with in Vegas. That was 10 years and 40 pounds ago! I worry that, although I desperately need to trust and believe that he loves me for me, he's going to see my huge body and be turned off in a big way. He's never been with anyone my size, not ever. He made the comment to Renee one time that he thought any woman over 180 was fat, and I am WELL over that. I know I've sent pictures and I know he's said he LIKES the way I look, but I don't think he realizes what I really look like, or what it will feel like to wrap his arms around someone so big and mushy. I worry that I'm going to be so nervous that I'll shut down and be a stick in the mud again. That I won't really be able to open up to the fun, crazy, silly person I really am when nobody is watching. It has been a long, long time since I jumped heart-first into ANYTHING, and its because every time I have in the past, EVERY time, I've ended up being made fun of, being turned away from, being laughed at. Every time, I've ended up regretting it. I've learned NOT to let people see who I am because I've never had good results when they've seen me. I worry that those facts and those thoughts will somehow undermine all my carefully-laid plans of fun and that I won't be able to go through with anything out of fear.

And these are the things that plague my mind constantly. My psyche is so damaged and I don't even know how to begin to fix it.




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