spending all night wondering why you let me go (part III)

"The heart is knit by the pain that breaks it; the life is made whole by the death that starts it; the death is made whole by the life that ends it."
~~Diane Duane

(Continued from part II.)

More from the archives.

25 January 2012

Master,

I'm overthinking things again, but I'm thinking about talking with you last night, and I'm trying to find that dividing line. I still feel there's a rift, and maybe I'll always feel like that until--and if--we talk things out. But...I feel closer. So what I'm trying to decide is, can I adapt to a relationship that has occasional staggering pitfalls of doubt, and no explanations, and no apologies? Is that enough of a relationship? Or maybe it's just the relationship I have, and I have no choice, it's this or...nothing.

I don't want nothing. I do love you. I profoundly *hate* feeling shut out, though, and that's what I'm struggling with. And I have no guarantees right now that you're even reacting to any of the things I've said in previous letters, or that you're not simply remembering I'm here again.

Is it my lack of focus that's made you so distant? You don't want to get closer because you don't think *I'll* be there? And I don't know the answer to that, either.

This may be the only one paired with a second letter, because they were both fairly short.

26 January 2012

Master,

"Merely submitting is a good start, a declaration of intent, but not nearly enough.

"First of all, the submission has to be proven--to the sub as well as to the Dom. Every command followed, every lesson learned, every cruelty endured makes the bond deeper and more meaningful. Everyone can say 'I'll do whatever you want, Sir!', but at first that is just a fantasy. It even sounds like a fantasy. But only after you worked and suffered for every memory and experience it becomes a more realistic and now entirely believable 'I’ll do whatever I CAN, Sir!'.

"And second, there is a 'right' way to submit. But what that means depends entirely on the person who is in control. It’s not a specific role that is played, but the sum of the little experiences and lessons that shape the way the sub acts and feels. And it is not a conscious effort--quite the opposite. The only conscious effort the sub should make, in my humble opinion, is concentrating entirely on her little world, her Dom, and the task at hand. Everything else is learned simply through repetition and 'training'. The real beauty begins when the sub is doing precisely what pleases the Dom without any effort or conscious thought. Then she is truly his."

I am trying, trying with everything in me, to cling to that fingers-length of hope that all is not lost, in this. I feel less bereft than this day last week; I feel as if today is the first day I've been able to inhale, and relax, even if minutely. Then I came across this passage, and I'm pondering again.

Is this what I've been doing? Am I so desperately reaching for any kind of connection that I've fallen into "anything" and "whatever" modes of thought? Is that what you want? I know in the beginning you told me that you wanted someone to be Yours, but that it was additional to who we were, who we are to each other. I think I never took that seriously enough, because [ex] had said that too, in the beginning, and then the demands slowly escalated. And please understand it's not additional demands I would mind; it's the fact that I hear a similar phrase, and I think of the last time it was said, and wonder if they're similar circumstances. In my mind, demands escalate, and going from slow exploration, to the...the virtual, real collaring we'd reached (if that's the right phrase for it), and from then to...nothing? Months and months of nothing? I'm circling, and spiraling down, because I think if we're not advancing, then you're withdrawing.

But then I remind myself, this is you. You don't say things you don't mean. You say what you mean to say, whether it's expressing love, anger, confusion, conversation. You don't lie. No previous motives apply to you, ever.

But, I think that's also why I profoundly begin to doubt when you say nothing at all, because that *could* mean, maybe in fact *does* mean, that there are deeper things you don't feel like sharing with me going on. Things beyond simply being busy at work. Things I wonder if I could help with, at least in listening.

But again, I don't have the words to ask. Because that much has become pattern--I ask, I never get an answer anymore. And it's hard not to continually believe that.

More to come.