"What was so addictive and compelling about your previous relationship?"
"He would get lost with me."
"Can you be lost alone?"
This question has been haunting me all weekend.
Can I be lost alone?
When I was a kid I really loved that "Court Of The Crimson King" song. It came on late at night during a family vacation. It was so dramatic. The timing on the drums, those melancholic ahhhhhhhhhs, the gratuitous flute, and the despair in that Mellotron felt gigantic to me. I remember being in the back seat, windows down, skies clear, and so many stars in the sky. I was mesmerized by this feeling of escapism it gave me; how I felt profoundly alone but completely whole. It sounds cheesy but that song felt like my secret and I wanted to exist in that moment indefinitely. I'm sure the station got changed somewhere during the flute solo and I was ripped out of my astral prog wonderland by Lionel Richie stopping by to say hello... or to dance on the ceiling.... or to run with the night.... or whatever it was that sonic cockblocker was doing that summer. I'm sure I was appalled that everyone in my family wasn't as moved as I was by a Mellotron and a good chorus. ARE YOU HEARING THIS? DO YOU FEEL THAT? ARE YOU FEELING WHAT I'M FEELING? I NEED TO FEEL THIS WITH SOMEBODY! Maybe my brother did but I'm certain we probably started fighting about something stupid. I'm sure a lot of dreary, real world things came between me and that perfect moment. I don't remember much of anything from that vacation except that song and being so lost in a feeling that I transcended space, time, my body and myself. I have been spending every moment since that family vacation trying to recapture that feeling.
Can I be lost alone?
Over the years I've tried to feed my need for escapism through music, psychedelics, painting, filmmaking, meditation, walking, drawing, dreaming, drinking, Buddhism, dancing, tarot, star gazing, books, travel, science, mysticism, marijuana, goth clubs, astrology, bands, philosophy, activism, writing, comedies, tragedies, men, MDMA, caffeine, sleeping pills, sex, Jungian psychotherapy, and actual escape. Some of these attempts have been more successful than others but I am nowhere closer to a feeling of peace than I was at 13 or 19 or 23 or 27 or 30 or 39 or even 10 years old; a little girl in a car transcending time and space. Maybe 10 was the last time I knew anything.
Can I be lost alone?
I used to have a boss in his 70's that I would talk to in the employee break room. I was always fond of his sharp wit but when I asked him one Monday how his weekend was, he very matter of factly proclaimed, "I was just diagnosed with cancer. Have to eat raw peppers now." Shocked, I offered my condolences and asked him how he was doing. He took a bite out of the pepper and told me that life was meaningless. I found the resignation and certainty in his voice oddly comforting.
LIFE.IS.MEANINGLESS. Chew.Chew.Chew.Chew.Swallow.Die.
MEANINGLESS. FUCKING meaningless. I have to eat peppers now because of the cancer.
SEVEN MEANINGLESS DECADES. Peppers. Cancer.
There was something so goofy and human about him eating that pepper. It wasn't going to save him. It really was the LEAST he could do but I could tell he wasn't ready to stop fighting for his meaningless life. When fighting with human beings becomes tedious, there is nothing like a spirited fight with cancer at his age. Even Hitchens couldn't outwit it.
Can I be lost alone?
On New Year's Eve, I ate the worst burrito of my life and drew pictures of Nick Cave eating infinitely more promising foods for a book being published later this year. People kept inviting me to things but I stubbornly stayed home. New years is for idiots and couples, I reminded myself. I lost track of time until I heard the fireworks and celebrating outside. People were probably kissing, falling in love, drinking, dancing, and being idiots and fucking couples out there. I was sober and my room was eerily silent. A feeling of profound loneliness consumed me. I thought back to the NYE I spent with my ex husband where we drunkenly and playfully threw drinks at each other. It rained on us that night, like it did every night in Portland. Did all that rain cause us to grow too much? To grow apart? The grass may have been greener there due to precipitation but I wonder if our relationship would have lasted longer in a drier climate. Like a cactus. I thought about a NYE I spent with my ex boyfriend. We drank whiskey and watched old Led Zeppelin videos. He paused a German performance of "Dazed and Confused" to kiss me at midnight. I remember thinking what a romantic gesture that was. I left for Los Angeles the following day. That was the last time I was kissed by anyone on New Year's Eve.
It's a night for idiots and couples, I reminded myself again.
Can I be lost alone?
My roommate has been out of town for a while. I keep worrying about choking on a piece of food and nobody noticing that I'm dead. I have no pets and my correspondence with friends and loved ones is pretty sporadic. Until my roommate returns, I've been chewing really carefully and having a bigger Facebook presence so a sudden absence would be more noticeable. It seems more practical than morbid.
Can I be lost alone?
My ex managed to give me that same intoxicating feeling of escapism I had as a ten year old girl hearing her favorite song. He was also the first person that would change the station during the good part and pull me back into a dreary netherworld. I'll never understand why.
Can I be lost alone?
I was given a "Law of Attraction" book a year ago. You're supposed to visualize what you desire in a lover (or anything) and somehow the laws of attraction would bring it to you. I could only take it so seriously. On a scrap of paper full of crass dick doodles, drawings of bears and a math equation, the following requirements were sloppily (and presumably drunkenly) written.
"Just don't make me cry on my birthday and return a text... but if I were to be greedy... kindness and wisdom. Intellectual curiosity. Passionate sex. Witty rapport. Dark humor. Romance. Mutual respect. The element of surprise. Attraction. Desire. A treehouse in the woods surrounded by fairy lights. Someone who will get lost with me."
Instead of a soulmate being dropped at my door, I discovered that the universe is actually a cat because all I saw were dead birds that week. My grandma also died. No clue if she saw her life as meaningless in her last moments but she certainly added meaning to mine.
Can I be lost alone?
I have a terrible sense of direction. On my 40th birthday, a best friend of mine gave me this compass with a picture of France on the other side of it. The two of us have had this long lasting inside joke about something a teenage girl once said on Maury or Oprah or whatever trash show we were watching. It was about high school drop outs and one of the girls claimed she didn't need to pursue any further education to be a model. She knew everything. Enraged, an audience member challenged her but the girl rebutted with, "I can count my money. I know were France is." It was enough.
Can I be lost alone?
It is absurd that I want to be lost with someone else, that I even keep trying. Why do I romanticize the idea of two fumbling idiots with no answers and no compass trying to find some sort of meaning together? Didn't my old boss teach me anything? Do I really need to keep eating these relationship peppers? I have a fucking ulcer. Besides, it's hard enough on my own. Haven't I had enough heartbreak? Do I really need to be a greedy grabber and have MORE failed relationships? Do I want ALL the failed relationships in my tummy? GET INSIDE OF ME FAILED RELATIONSHIP! I WANT TO CONSUME YOU!!!! MY TUMMY IS BURNING AND SO FULL. ME SO HUNGRY AND GREEDY. NOM NOM NOM NOM. UH OHHHHHH. NOM NOM NOM NOM NOM. COME BACK! NOM NOM NOM NOM. Do I really need another person to figure out this maze with? Honestly, I don't even know if I want to figure out the maze. I've spent so many years with men that are trying to show off their sense of direction when all I've ever wanted was to get more lost. Show me the wild weeds and your favorite hiding spot. I don't give a shit about your map. It's your parents' map anyway.
Can I be lost alone?
I already am.