When Duck left for Peru, my third-eye vision saw the path that led to us ending up together as somewhat hazy. This indicated to me that while the future is not determined, it would require some serious energy investment from both parties to clear up this foggy future, that or I needed to go to the psychic optometrist for a third-eye monocle. I thought this might make me look like Colonel Klink from Hogan’s Heroes and was pretty stoked at the prospect.
Schultz: [Klink is in prison awaiting a possible execution] I have some good news and bad news.
Col. Wilhelm Klink: This time tell me the good news first.
Schultz: You are going to be executed in the morning.
Col. Wilhelm Klink: Then what’s the bad news?
Schultz: They aren’t giving you a blindfold.
She was in Peru and I was in New York; she was immersed in warm weather and I was freezing my ass off; if someone asked her the time, she would say, “Son las dos y media”; if someone asked me the time, I would say, “Time to buy a fuckin’ watch. Now get your bitch ass outta my face!” It was a regular West Side Story romance, minus the gang fights and singing and dancing and “Jets” and “Sharks” and flaming guy playing Tony in the movie. The question was, is the world ready for a modern West Side Story with a “Duck” quacking in Spanish and an “X” barking in Balinese? (It doesn’t make sense but it alliterates.)
After I worked and worked on communicating with her through the limitations of email and Instant Messaging and snail mail and an occasional phone call, it was clear that in communication, she was like a retard with a cork on her fork in order to prevent blinding herself when she thrust it into her eye. And she acknowledged this.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7P5qJAI9BIc
“I’m just a terrible communicator,” she said.
“Is that being sarcastic?” I asked, knowing that “It’s about time you admitted that!” would probably be as supportive as the 60-year old stretched-out bra that holds granny’s double-D’s pressed against her belly.
What she told me even a stillborn birthed in Iraq from all the depleted Uranium the U.S. dropped there would have understood to be obvious. And as much as I would have liked to have leaned back with my hands behind my head and said, “I think I have made my point,” with a pomposity that would make even the Wicked Witch of the House, Nancy Pelosi, look good in comparison, instead of gloating at my victory of argumentation, I just felt sad.
We all hope to “change” our partners into the perfect mate for us and sometimes forget that they are perfect just the way they are—although this may not translate as “perfect for us.” And to try and change someone into something they are not is one of the most dishonoring things one can do to another. I am all for working on relationships and believe that if you don’t, your relationship is bound to end like 50% of marriages do, in divorce, or be like the 49% that settle for misery or the 1% that are as brain dead as Terry Schiavo and don’t know if you just changed her diaper or gave her boobs a squeeze. But how much work is of value and when does it get to just banging your head against a wall and wondering why your headache won’t dissipate?
It wasn’t until I recently got back in touch with Gaia, a girl from Canada who I met online through a raw food personals site, that I was reminded of what I really needed: someone who was extremely conscious and giving and able to form a full sentence without at least a dozen grammar mistakes. And not only did I stop rowing towards Duck but I then started to row my boat to the shore, knowing that a fall that would make Niagara look like a water fountain was up around the bend. And while before I was willing to traverse it in a barrel for the slim hope that I would live to see her again, now I thought, “Fuck that noise!” and that I rather sunbathe on the shoreline than risk a muscle cramp from fatigue.
I had sent her out a week ago some pricey raw chocolate, a flower I drew, a mala bracelet that I had brought to my Central Park tree friend for a blessing and a tiny framed picture of us for Valentine’s Day. She got it the day before Valentine’s, not knowing that at this point the sweetest thing I had left to offer was someone else’s chocolate.
She called me a couple of times on Valentine’s Day but I missed her calls. When we talked “in the box” of Instant Messaging, she asked if I was excited to see that she called. I had posted the day before on my un-blog The Emerald And The Ruby [http://rebelyogi.com/the-emerald-and-the-ruby.html], where the “Emerald” was Duck and the “Ruby” was Gaia and the gem lover who no longer found the Emerald to have the same brilliance was me. And my dwindling enthusiasm for the relationship was about as impossible to cover as one of those “North Star” pimples on the end of one’s nose. And for a guy who values truth more than just about anything, I replied like the cheating Thornton Melon, played by Rodney Dangerfield, in Back To School when the Dean of the university asked the obviously plagiarizing 60-year old newly-enrolled student who had donated millions to the school if the work he turned in was his own. “I can’t lie to you, Dean Martin. [Beat] Yes, it is.”
Valentine’s night, it was about 11:00 P.M. and I went to Central Park with Abandon. It was there that not only did I see they coyote that’s been wandering around the park for the past few weeks but where I followed Abandon up to the girl she had ran up to wagging wildly and jumped up onto, who was not only really cute but I would find myself spending the next three hours walking with talking about everything from metaphysics to megaphones (alright, we didn’t talk about megaphones but it was a nice alliteration, no?) And with her I could joke about anything and everything without fear that I would offend her or like an FCC censor she would hand me a list of things that I couldn’t include in my life show. While my fingers and toes started to get frostbitten from New York’s arctic temperature that would make even Al Whore admit that global warming is a farce, it seemed my heart was starting to dethaw from its cryogenic freeze and the high-voltage electricity that this girl was paddling was enough to restart it beating.
The next day, Duck sent me an email and asked me if something was up. Like Sherlock Holmes, she had put together a list of suspicions that included me going to dinner with a female on Valentine’s Day (who was a friend), writing The Emerald And The Ruby and my not seeming too excited about her calling me.
I wrote her back a long email and told her the truth, that while I could see at times where she was working on her communication with me, it seemed that a lot of the same issues we had discussed were continuing to repeat themselves. I said that while I could probably do without sex for a year until I saw her again, I doubted that I could do without the intimacy that doesn’t involve genitalia for that long. And the prospect of wacking-off while developing a brain tumor from my cell phone just didn’t seem to appeal to me anymore.
I also told her about Gaia and the Central Park girl and how they brought to the surface what I had been suppressing, that while I did feel a soul connection with Duck, there were needs I had that she was not filling. I told her that keeping the possibilities open for a possible connection at some undetermined time in the future while closing off the possibilities in the present was neither honoring the Universe or myself. I told her that while my love would not stop shining on her that I wanted to tell her the truth and not some modified version of it.
She wrote me back the longest email she’s ever sent me. She appreciated that I was straight up with her and while I felt there was some misinterpretation of what I had communicated, she got the jist of it, that while I was a dreamer, I could no longer deny my waking life anymore. And while her email didn’t directly say how hurt she was, I know it had to hurt popping a dream of hers that I helped to blow up.
Duck is a sweet girl and if there is any pain to be divvied up, I would request the lion’s share. Among other things, she helped to remind me that love is more important than the location I live in or any mission to save the world. She opened me up to dream once again and whether my particular dream involving her came to fruition or not, I was finally dreaming of something other than Al Whore covered in honey and placed in a large red ant hill and eaten alive. She also reminded me by her sensitivity to some of my humor that I need to be with someone with whom I can relax and be myself without having to limit myself to jokes about Barney the dinosaur in order to get a family approved G-rating.
In Native American tradition, there is the Heyoka, the sacred clown, who uses the medicine of Coyote the trickster. It is his role to make fun of everyone, including the Indian Chief, to make sure that no one takes him or herself or any situation too seriously and loses their ability to laugh at themselves. The sun may be baking and everyone is complaining about the heat and he will come outside wearing layer upon layer of clothes asking if anyone knows when the cold streak will pass. Or if there is a sentiment in the tribe that the tribal leader is not listening to his people, he may imitate the mannerisms of the leader in an exaggerated way, portraying him as a deaf mute, not only to help the leader to keep his ego in check but also to keep the unity of the tribe.
I am Heyoka and use Coyote Medicine. Unfortunately, in this society of the humorless most are like Sarah Pallin and think they are performing a civic duty by hunting coyote. But whether they are killing an animal or snuffing out the voice of one who is trying to help them to not take themselves so seriously, it is still an act of savagery. Pointing their guns or their fingers at the Trickster, their violence leaves blood on their hands.
By seeing the coyote that night, I was given a taste from my own medicine bag, for Coyote Medicine was reminding me to lighten up, that I was taking things much too seriously and needed to regain my sense of humor. He was also showing me that my Trickster humor is important medicine and that anyone who could not laugh with me was turning my medicine into poison, for them as well as for me.
When I asked Osho on the first day I met Duck if she was “the one,” he told me no. He said that we are compatible and could be happy together but that she was not the one who would add the perfect harmony to my heart’s song. And so I did what any devotee would do when his master told him something—I set out to prove him wrong. I would work harder, move to Peru, change my name to “Pancho.” But as much as I pretended that I would do anything and everything to be with Duck, I soon realized that I would not sacrifice Who I Am to be with anyone, Duck, goose, chicken or any other poultry.
And when I came back to Osho with my head down and told him he was right, he wasn’t mad at me for shunning his words and he didn’t rub it in my face with an, “I told you so,” for he knew that the only way to really know anything is to discover it for yourself through your own experience.
As sarcastic and heartless and mean as I can appear through the caricature of my online persona, I hate to hurt anyone who isn’t a Christian, Muslim, Jew, Hindu, Buddhist, Atheist, Asian, black, white, gay, straight, bi, man or woman. But when even I try to fight the Universe’s current, I inevitably get smashed on the rocks and my flailing legs will usually kick someone else in the face. And when we grab onto another with a death grip too afraid to let go and ride the current, it inevitably leads to pulling the object of our affections under water and drowning both.
The worst part about it all is that Duck told me that she was going to drop out of receiving my un-blog, as it would be too painful for her to read about my love life. This will cut my readership by 50%. I would unsubscribe myself but then no one would read my stuff!
Your post inspired me to hand Seven Arrows to my son, who has named himself Loki.
One of the best relationships I ever had eventually became LD. And then he found someone local to date. I said “What does this mean to us?”. He said “Just that we won’t be having sex any more.” I loved that he was able to say that and it be true.
Life has gone on and and he monogamously married, but he can still say “I love you, babe.” to me an mean it.
That openness and honesty have been my gold standard for all relationships since then.
FTR, I am polyamorous and, for the last 4 years, have had all my needs met by one romantic relationship and a collection of platonic ones. From the outside, it doesn’t look any different than a secure monogamous relationship. From the inside, it feels like we take less for granted.