It Is Written That It Is Still Unwritten

Diego and I went walking today and I found myself in familiar territory, in all sorts of ways.  

We tend to traverse the same streets, since, well, we live in a neighborhood.  

(It's a bit hard to write this, and I'm resistant to doing so, because of what it admits in me.)

So, we make a square by covering several blocks, and then Diego pulls me in the same direction...to walk the same square again.  

As we're walking, I'm kind of smirking, trying to play it off to the kids we passed...again...like "Heh heh!  I'm just following him!  I know we just saw you playing ball in the street.  How's it going....again?"  And it made me pause: did God lead me down this path again by utilizing my little dog?  And did I miss something that I was supposed to see the first time?  I look around me and examine the houses, the garages, the lawns, the trees and bushes, the front walks.  What did I overlook?   

Suddenly I remembered when I first came home from California about 14 months ago.  I was searching through boxes and boxes of old journals and keepsakes, reading things I recorded over a decade ago.  

Nothing had changed. 

Yes, I had hit a sort of apex in my life, going to school, moving out, and shacking up with someone I thought I was going to marry.  And then later, after all of that had either abandoned me or I'd abandoned it, moving to California, to be with someone I loved, and trying to make a fresh start.   But I've ended up back here, literally right where I began, and I'm still struggling with the same problems:  I fall for guys in the same way; I'm still feeling like I'm not living up to my potential; and I've found that, as of this year, after about a decade-long hiatus, I've got the same issues with friends.

When I read these things, and realized this a year ago, it freaked me out.  

But I've changed, over the last few weeks.  It's been somewhat immediate and somewhat a long time in the making.  It's been both all at once, and incremental.  I've done it by making small, different choices, in the simplest and seeming least-consequential moments, and forcing myself to think differently, to think dynamically, and proactively, but I've changed, and I know this.  I've come to accept certain things about myself that I've spent my whole life fighting.  I've come to realize and more importantly, embrace with two hands, elements of my nature that are beautiful, and special, and that I shouldn't try to change, even if I wanted to.   I've stopped fighting some things, and I've started fighting other things.   Basically, I'm finding it a better life to not resist: stop resisting doing the things I know I should be doing.  

I started to stop thinking that I need to be someone that I can never, ever be.  And it's a good thing.  A really good thing.  Nothing is quite so liberating as when you release yourself from an impossible demand, made impossible by nature.  Flowers can't be fish, no matter how much they try, and it's a better life for everyone that they don't try.  

I still have much to work on, but I look forward to the upcoming challenges, knowing now that there are two future worlds for me: the way I always used to do it, or the new way.  It's going to be uncomfortable, and a bit startling, and I can no longer afford to go on autopilot, but I look forward to all of this immensely.  I am piloting this ship and I can choose a different future for myself.  I am going to speak up.  If I don't want it, I am not going to go along with it.  I am not going to resist who I am, nor what I know is true and good, deep in  my heart.  This is my life, goddammit.   It is written that it is still unwritten. 

Diego and I carried along on our walk, making it towards the end of our second lap, and I found myself paused for a moment, on the sidewalk, as he sniffed around a tree.  I was standing there, rooted to the ground, like I was an oak, staring into nothing.  I wonder if I've ever stood so still in my life.  For a moment, I was literally the center of gravity.  Nothing on me nor about me moved even a millimeter.  

Finally, Diego pulled out of the range of the leash and me as a tree came to an end.  

We walked towards my house and I felt the lightest rain on my skin.  The sky has been a muted white-gray all day, and the sun was nowhere specific but had been diffused everywhere.  It was no longer a round star; it was now a round shell of white gray, covering us.  It was nowhere, and yet, everywhere.