Into The Rabbit Hole

I cleaned my room today.

Not spending my entire weekend up in the mountains or away from home gives me a lot more time to do the things I neglect otherwise.  I love having a clean room.

I found a friendship bracelet that I had started knotting over a year ago.  I remember that I started it while I was at Apogaea in the summer of 2006.  Oh, yes, the beginning of so much change for me.  It was a great time!

I was single, and eating it up.  I was surrounded with a group of amazing friends– amazing men.  It was the beginning of so much for me, so much growth and learning.  Who I was then is a completely different woman than who I am now.

That was the time when I was free, when I was bouncing my head to the music, just enjoying the scenery.  Beautiful people in costumes, scantily clad, good music, great food.  A man fell in love with me over that.  Nothing ever came of it, but it is interesting to know that I was able to elicit that sort of reaction from someone. 

I picked up the bracelet and started tying knots in the rows.  I noticed that somewhere along the span of the last year or more, I had spilled something on the thread I was tying.  My fingers were getting sticky.  I thought about washing the threads and putting the bracelet down for another time.  There was something about tying the stickiness into the bracelet that kept me going.  I wanted it to be there– it was almost representative of the last year for me… not wanting to lose it, bundling it up into tiny little knots, incorporating it into a bracelet I started before my experience, finally finishing it at the end of the experience.  For me, it was closure.

I was a little surprised to realize just how fast the sticky parts were incorporated into the bracelet.  Apparently these tiny knots eat up the string a lot more quickly than I thought.  Before I knew it, the sticky parts were gone, forever a part of the rows of knots, rows twelve threads deep… It made me think of how much I have changed in the last year… how many lessons I’ve learned about my relationships, about myself.

You know, Apogaea was a pivotal time for me.  I had so many single men around me– so many people I loved.  I almost climbed into one tent– knowing where it might lead me.  Instead, I climbed into someone else’s tent.  It was funny, because I climbed in there with yet another person– not the owner of the tent, but someone else who was around at the time.  I didn’t know what I had in store for me, and it didn’t matter to me then.  But I was about to introduce myself to someone who would change my experience forever… or maybe it wasn’t him at all… maybe it was me, and my own path… maybe he was just a catalyst for something that was already going to happen.

The last year has been amazing.  Absolutely incredible.  I wouldn’t change it for anything.  Who I am is a better person because of it.  I have had so many interactions– so many people with whom I have made decisions– sometimes difficult decisions– regarding who I am in relation to whichever man I choose to spend my time with.   Last year I left a man who finally said those three words for which I longed so that I could be with a man who I would ultimately end up not dating any more because regardless of whether the words could be said, I knew in my heart would never be felt by him.  I chose to hurt another man, my “not arbitrary,” and have had to deal with the emotion of guilt and sorrow for having to take a risk and go for the lesson I knew passionately in my heart hadn’t been learned yet.  I’ve had to discover myself beneath all those layers– all those characteristics I thought I had solidly known of myself– and realized that most of what I had tried to be all my life was a falsehood– a fable– my god how I’ve learned about me.

It’s funny how much I think when my fingers are actively tying thread.

I remember thinking about my future as a young adult.  I remember thinking of tomorrow and it being a great big blank slate in my mind– and knowing that I was true to myself no matter what.  I was a system-bucker, a stand-upper, a sassy, independent do-as-I-wish kind of young lady.  I had everything all written down, defined, understood, and I knew EXACTLY how I would react in every situation.   As the years have passed, I have begun to think much differently about myself.  I’ve realized that I don’t really know who I am in all circumstances.  I’ve given myself permission to be exactly who I’m not– dependent upon the circumstances I’m in at the time.  I’ve realized that who I am is subject to change at any time and that there’s a great lot of experiences I’ve yet to have– yet to discover– and yet to use as a definitive when I think of who I am or where I’m going tomorrow or the next day.

I’ve finally let go of the security I found in saying I am a certain way or being a particular kind of person.  I’ve decided to truly trust myself, my intuition– the parts of me that simply aren’t rational– can’t be rational– because I realize that what I do or say simply doesn’t really matter in the scheme of things.  I AM, and there doesn’t have to be anything that follows it.  I AM AWARE of myself and encouraging of myself and allowing me to be whoever I want at any given moment.  In this, rather than feeling scattered, I’ve found clarity and calm.

There are close friends to me who can see this difference in me.  I’ve heard more than once that who I am now is a completely different woman than who I was even a few months ago.  This is a magnificent, beautiful thing in my mind.  I am growing.  I am changing.  I am evaluating and re-evaluating and prioritizing.  I am blossoming into something that is purely me, and me alone, and doesn’t need a relationship with any other person to define it because there is no one but me in this experience.

I want to finish tying the bracelet… to tie the final knots, closing the door from the past because I trust that all new doors must open.  I am eager rather than afraid, and it is different now because future doors have little to do with anyone other than myself.  Yesterday I was a woman who was consistently waiting for the next relationship.  Today I realize that there is more to me than a relationship or a man.  There is more to me than any other one person can interpret or define. 

And in saying so, I am.