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It’s gotten really cold again. Inside, I’ve got the heat cranked. Maybe I’m still just chilled from walking. Out on the trail in the darkness I felt a little vulnerable because Dave wasn’t home. If someone had attacked me, no one would know for hours. This time I took my passport. Walking swiftly, keeping an eye out for moving shadows, I settled into pace and Sarah MacLachlan’s Surfacing.
There are many voices in our lives. Many, I suppose, we don’t ask for but inherit. Some teaching us to hate, fear, distrust. Others that give hope, encouragement, friendship. I don’t know. All the voices are like necessary totems to balance out the interaction possibilities. Several years ago I found a group of voices that was unlike most I’d known; voices that liked me. They were mine to claim and I felt like I’d found what I had been searching for. I thought, then, that I would no longer have a need for the old ones, the ones that kept me at a distance and often made me feel insignificant.
Out there, I wanted desperately to be on a mountain top. Finally, I have the means to acquire the appropriate gear yet I haven’t climbed in years. The freezing wind blew across my face, the curve of the 3-ply goretex crisp against my cheek. The single layer of corduroy pants were feeble and my legs stung, but my hands stayed toasty just behind one layer of knit. Exhalations billowed like cigarette smoke and it was just like standing at the bus stop in winter when I was six and we all took advantage of the coldness to pretend we were addicted.
The thing is that now those voices that taught me they were not worth trusting seem more honest to me than the ones that profess to love me. The honesty of the caustic and the distance is much less harmful than trust betrayed. I find that, now, when I’m wanting to be alone, and when I’m OK with being just alone, and OK with whatever heap of shit is on my plate for the day, I turn to those who naturally keep their distance from me. See, they can relate to me without pretense.
Only my eyes and the top halves of my cheeks were exposed to the cold. A veiled woman - veiled in goretex. Passerby were dressed similarly. They stared harder than usual, noticing that my eyes were unusual, but couldn’t tell otherwise that I was different. At some point, a jogger approached and he looked different. I stared, trying to see how. He looked Caucasian. A lot like Lee, only a stronger jaw line. He saw me too and stared back. And that’s how it was when we passed each other: looking hard wondering if the darkness was playing tricks on our vision.
A voice on the phone croons love. The tone of the voice begs for a return of affection - affection I don’t share. I make no pretense. In my mind, I hear the words, I hear the need and I become angry because those words seem so empty. To me, truth of feeling needs to be backed by action. The action doesn’t come and I learn once more that the voice of support functions to fill a selfish need. Out of sight, out of mind. Another hackneyed cliché: You talk the talk, but you don’t walk the walk.
Nearly home, I felt suddenly like it was late and that I might just eat leftover mac&cheese. But then I felt like I needed so much to practice the ritual of cooking, as if the day would have no meaning if I did not do this important chore. I guess I needed to do that for myself.
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