gotta get out now, gotta run from this

Halfway through transcribing, rephrasing, reevaluating another year past, some things are becoming inescapable. Not my errors, which are glaringly obvious from this perspective; more, specific responses. What was done to me was done, in precise exactitude, to the one to whom I'm bound before. There were many nights where that one's heart cried out against the injustice of being shut out, shut down, thrown away with no chance. No explanations, no apologies allowed.



I know I'm acting a bit crazy
Strung out, a little bit hazy
Hand over heart, I'm praying
That I'm gonna make it out alive

"Who could just do this to someone?" was said. More than once. I'm not saying it was calculated, nor even intentional; it could entirely be in the reaction of the animal wounded who seeks to crawl away, somewhere dark, to heal before the next battle starts. Though three years, shouldn't that be enough for at least the first aid to kick in?



The bed's getting cold and you're not here
The future that we hold is so unclear
But I'm not alive until you call
And I'll bet the odds against it all

Not that I'm the best example of this. It took me six years to recover from someone, and I still think of him wistfully, on occasion. I'm bad with love. Or, no, that's not it--I'm bad with partings. I'm loathe to part from anyone I care for, or even formerly cared for. Even if they're proving a bad choice. Even if we might genuinely be better for each other, both turning the other way, and walking until there is nothing but mist behind.



Save your advice 'cause I won't hear
You might be right but I don't care
There's a million reasons why I should give you up
But the heart wants what it wants

And in culling through the scraps of things I've saved, magpie-like, I keep finding these odd, disconnected threads that have turned out to connect after all. How many loves do I have to have calling me 'mysterious' before it sinks in? "Sensual and slightly sad" is another one it turns out I've heard more than once. And I have no idea how to wrap my mind around that one, both where initial attraction is concerned, and where endings and partings come into play.



You got me scattered in pieces
Shining like stars and screaming
Lighting me up like Venus
But then you disappear and make me wait
And every second's like torture

All I want is to make my loves happy, if I can. And apparently I do this by puzzling them, frustrating them, making them tear their hair out on frequent occasions. I do this by being obscure, baffling, and saying exactly the wrong words in exactly the wrong way, often. I'm beginning to wonder if I'm the same way with my friends--not the whole, falling in and out of love part (though that's also happened, on occasion), but solely that I make them struggle to remain friends, giving them no clear clues as to where I am, in any given moment.



Heroin drip, no more so
Finding a way to let go
Baby, baby, no, I can't escape

Well, consider: when was the last time I talked to anyone on a serious basis in SL? Not those with whom I share physical affections, just people in general. I speak on occasion in shop groups, in sales groups; I speak to my intimates, but largely outside of world; and those who my heart still considers close friends? I doubt I've said anything in the past year, easily, and possibly past two.

Is that friendship? Or is it just keeping a list of names of people I used to know because I used to know them?



This is a modern fairytale
No happy endings
No wind in our sails

And three years after, I still feel more broken than stabilized. It is not in me, it seems, to heal from this one's departure. And it could be anything, really, that's the core issue. Most systems can only take so many shocks before they start to fail to thrive, even with the best supports around them. And my heart took a great many shocks before I ever reached SL. The train was a metaphor before the virtual world extension of it. I have never been lucky in love.



But I can't imagine a life without
Breathless moments
Breaking me down, down, down, down

And even being me, I have no illusions in this, I never have. I have told loves, RL, SL, that I will be bad for them. My own mother pulled my then-fiancee, now wife, aside, and asked her if she really knew what she was getting into. "She's kind of crazy," she said. "Are you sure you want to deal with that?"



The heart wants what it wants, baby
It wants what it wants, baby

It is a tribute to her strength of heart that she accepted my crazy moments, especially as they began to multiply later in the relationship. It is a tribute to both of us as a unit that we're still together, throughout everything. But, just as I rely on her for love, support, and understanding...I relied on the one who bound me for the same thing. And I received back reinforcements to that effect constantly. I was not too much for him, I was told. Everything of me was accepted, I was told. All my bright places, all my dark shadows, were loved equally.

It's rather addictive, in a way. And then...three years of silence. Maybe that's the real issue, I'm trying to kick an addiction cold, and...failing.



It wants what it wants
It wants what it wants

(Song lyrics taken from "The Heart Wants What It Wants", by Selena Gomez. All pictures taken during the month-long October run of haunts.)