Pre-Arranged Marriage

Sometimes I feel like I'm in a pre-arranged marriage. And because I'm a basically good woman, I try to have faith that one day I'll fall in love.

I was walking this evening, in a naturey place, a naturey-peopley-place, and having good alone time. Sat on a railing of a little bridge for a while because I saw something suspicious, and I decided to wait and see if I could see the suspect again. And I did! It was a beaver. A real big feller, building a nice, sound dam. People don't seem to notice this stuff much. Maybe I'm the only one who doesn't see beavers everyday. But it was a great moment. It made me really happy.

Later on that solo walk, I was thinking about unrequited love and love you can't requite. I've been snaggled up in these tricky situations too many times. Actually, I think all of my relationships were with people who loved me too much or who didn't love me enough... (or at all?) I know that's no great insight. Most people would probably say, 'Me too.' I think.
It's an awful thing to like someone so, so, well, but not be able to fall in love. (You know, I think brains and hearts should match like socks and shoes. Am I wearing wooly workmen socks in patent heels?)

I tend to fall off the wrong cliffs. The ones with the jagged rocks at the bottom. And then stay frozen in place, on the edge, when there's nothing but soft grass and springey shrubbery down below. Mixing too many metaphors today. I'm not really trying to write about love with men. Relationships are now just rumoured islands in the South Pacific, and I'm on an Atlantic barge. The pre-arranged marriage is with my self, my body. My mind can think kind and conciliatory thoughts. I know this corporeal home is a good one. But my heart aches with the inability to love it. This is the hardest thing. I catch myself, a thousand times a day, feeling scornful and mean towards my body, and when I do, I try to redirect, try to check myself. But when will I wake up in the morning and not feel sad about the marriage, tinged with disgust, trapped?

A woman who is forced into marriage with an icky slob will really dislike those who say the icky slob is a great person. Those who admire the icky slob, and seek out his company, she'll deeply scorn. She'd much rather be around people who agree that the icky slob is, in fact, beyond repugnance. I guess that analogy might be a little extreme, but maybe that's why my heart has been troublingly unresponsive towards the adoring ones.

Experiencing sound oddly today. Keep having to stop and listen carefully, because I think I hear singing. But it's just mechanical noise. All day like that, in different places. I've written a whole bunch of songs this week. I wish I'd written them down. Guess that means I didn't write them. It's such a struggle to pull things out of the abstract imaginary and make them tangible reality sometimes. Just imagine how much *fantasic* artwork has happened out there, that didn't get hauled over into our sharing-realm. Maybe others, like me, are often too content to just watch the silver fish in the stream... and the fishing rod and net just sit there.

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