Yes, it was interesting about panzade's father's art & history, Piffka.
Glad you enjoyed the pics.
(coupla days ago, jotted down on a long trainride)
She says, you promised to take care of me ...
It turns out, I couldn't take care of her.
Not the way she needed to be taken care of.
Though I tried
I just didn't find the way
I just didn't manage it.
I am sorry about that.
Of course, she had written me that she'd wrap me up in cottonwool
(talk about unfeasible promises)
And she didn't, either.
Instead, she lowered me in a cold/hot bath
of sometimes intense gratitude, care and endearment
heartbreaking trust
Then the barbed wire of implacable reproach
never good enough, never right.
Anger.
I guess I didn't meet her standards
My care the wrong kind of cloth and texture.
Hapless I was, ever more desperate to please
ever more incoherently desperate
to make it work.
Then again I guess she didn't meet mine.
I couldn't do it all alone. Truth be told -
for all my desperation to do exactly that -
I probably didn't want to. To take care of her and myself too.
I needed her to help and, somewhere, I guess, expected her to.
I offered out my arms to cradle her
But then wasn't up to paying the price.
I just had never imagined what it would be.
I guess we both got stuck in the contradiction.
We wanted to wrap the other in cottonwool,
truly we did,
care so he/she would never need to fear again -
make the kid inside, for always, safe.
But in the meantime you need the other to be an adult too.
Chip in, be there, face up, do your bit
I can't do it all alone
Yeah, I guess that was part of it.
Wanting to care for the other
like we promised to. Like I promised her to.
But when push comes to shove
you also have these expectations
of what you want your life to be
Together make that life you were still somewhere hoping for.
I couldnt let it go. Not even for that year or so.
Some wish inside was too impatient - too panicked, mostly.
I couldnt just take care of you.
When I should have been able to.
I couldnt take care of you, and me too.
I'm sorry I failed.
I know I promised.
I forced you to go to school.
I asked you to work. We needed the money.
I expected - stuff you couldn't do, back then.
I was impatient, in the end.
And impatient was good for me, or necessary, anyway - but bad for you.
I did want to wrap you up in cottonwool
I wanted nothing more in the world
Make you safe, for ever, create a safe space
under the blankets. I really tried. I did my best.
It wasn't very good.
Aside from my own breakdown
My own collapse into little boy lost
It's probably simply also, and this is the part that shames me,
because I still wanted that other girlfriend too -
the other relationship we'd dreamt about.
Who'd be there beside me taking on life
when it was a tough enough challenge to be taking on, even alone
Working, going out, doing stuff, building, cautiously -
that other image of what we would be about.
I couldn't discard it; so I became angry
when reality turned out so much more harsh
so much more perspectiveless
and me, so unable of dealing with it.
I tried to step up to a life once again that much harder
and I missed a step, stumbled, and got stuck.
Entangled in rungs, rails, bars, lost, collapsed
unable to care or rather, see how.
I probably still don't see how.
I couldn't step up to a life that much harder
Not enough for the both of us
So I got angry too.
It must have been a cold/hot bath for you too.
The sweetest boyfriend, always caring
then again, exasperated, exhausted or upset.
That cant have been a safe place.
I'm sorry I failed to create a safe place.
I know you needed one
more than you'd needed one in years.
And this house turned out not to be it
because I didnt make it so.
That I regret most of all.
That through my failure
I violated your trust.
Made you feel like you were turned outside again
Once more.
Beautiful apology, Nimh, and very, very sad.
I was married to a girl like that once nimh. I'm over it.
Strangely, being cottonwool, making cottonwool, dragging cottonwool over from the cottonwool store, is not a favor, though we all think we want it, sometimes, the cottonwool.
Beautifully written, nimh!
I know what you're talking about, nimh. <sigh>
I want to apologise to the tragic little weeping cherry that I finally removed from my front garden yesterday. It'd been struggling along, losing the odd branch here & there as a result of windy weather & has been generally quite sickly, despite my efforts to revive it. So yesterday I replaced it with a small magnolia. A big improvement! But .... & couldn't bring myself to just throw the weeping cherry away .... so planted it out the back!
You've been very poetic recently, Nimh. I know what you're talking about. *Sigh*
I met an old beggar woman near Santander's Central plaza. It was about six o' clock, the heat sweltering, the noise of tourists asking whether we spoke American clogging up our ears. I was passing through, drinking pineapple juice, trying to support myself against the hot weather. She was there, her olive face withered into two-hundred age-strokes, washing her used underwear in the public fonte. She grabbed my arm and asked for money, but the best that I could do was offer a few euros. I'm sorry that I couldn't have given more; who knows what happened to her.
I want to apologize for trying to blame a2k for my pc problems....sorry a2k.
When in Nogales, I gave an Indian woman $20.00. She slipped it into her pocket before her husband could see. I was glad, then started worrying about the beating that was sure to come if her husband found out. If he did, I apologise.
Sometimes the road to hell is paved with good intentions.
I;m sorry we let this one fall behind. I'm sure there are some more apologies due by now...
I'm sorry Gracie got shut in the closet today and no one noticed for hours. (The hall closet is her "room")
squinney wrote:I;m sorry we let this one fall behind.
Lets see: the last post to this thread was 2004-08-27, 22:12!
I'm sorry Gracie got accidentally locked up, too, squinney! Poor little possum!
Has she recovered from the experience?
Hmmmmm ..... I've built up a bunch of apologies in my extended absence from this thread, too!
Where to start?
I'm sorry those sparks from the incense stick flew into your eye, Ruby. I hope you did not go blind. I still wonder about you, to this day...
Eva wrote:I have a question. What's the point of apologizing if we don't know whether our apologies will be accepted?
As for me, I spent entirely too many years apologizing for things that weren't my fault. I'm all apologized-out.
Well, the way I've been taught is- our amends aren't made dependent on what the reaction to them will be; they are made to heal ourselves.
I'm sorry that in 2007 we're missing some posters, particularly Cav, that were here a lot in 2004.
Bi-Polar Bear wrote:I'm sorry that in 2007 we're missing some posters, particularly Cav, that were here a lot in 2004.
... and I'll second that!
I'm sorry I didn't respond to MsOlga's questions - I'll do better next time!
