long past/passed

[brightrosefox]

I am the son
and the heir
of a shyness that is criminally vulgar
I am the son and heir
of nothing in particular

You shut your mouth
how can you say
I go about things the wrong way
I am human and I need to be loved
just like everybody else does

I am the son
and the heir
of a shyness that is criminally vulgar
I am the son and the heir
of nothing in particular

You shut your mouth
how can you say
I go about things the wrong way
I am human and I need to be loved
just like everybody else does

There's a club if you'd like to go
you could meet somebody who really loves you
so you go, and you stand on your own
and you leave on your own
and you go home, and you cry
and you want to die

When you say it's gonna happen "now"
well, when exactly do you mean?
see I've already waited too long
and all my hope is gone

You shut your mouth
how can you say
I go about things the wrong way
I am human and I need to be loved
just like everybody else does

***

I went to pre-school and elementary school in Brooklyn. When I started first grade, they realized I was so insanely intelligent and gifted in reading/writing/grammar/English that for all those classes I would have to go to the next grade's classrooms, then back to my own grade for everything else -- I was abysmal and clueless in math. Dyscalculia. Therefore unable to be placed in any "gifted" schools. Also, in those years, I would be called out of class every day for physical therapy for cerebral palsy. I was alone in that, because while there were many disabled children in PS 238, and a few with cerebral palsy, I had private therapists. I don't know about the other kids. I only had two friends, Rina and Karin, whose families were were Russian. Rina and I liked to play Doctor together; she had thick black hair and huge brown eyes. I think even as a child I loved female bodies. On the school playground, I was teased mercilessly: for my limp, for my therapy sessions for my intelligence, for my shyness, for my silence, for my inability to make friends. It led to clinical depression that lasted a year. In fifth grade, I found out we would move to Sag Harbor, where we had spent the past several summers. I began sixth grade at Pierson Middle School. The kids there were much more cruel. They said hurtful things, mocked me, mimicked me, tripped me in the halls, deliberately bumped into me, teased me for not having a religion, teased me for being so smart in English class. Only when I was being published in the school paper and magazine, only when I entered the spelling bee and championed for my grade, did they cheer for me. Later, some of them tried to make friends with me, but by that time I was so wounded and wary of anyone that I pushed them away because I believed they would hurt me if I opened up. I wound up becoming friends with the school misfit, the one girl who nobody wanted to be friends with. Pierson Middle School branched into Pierson High School, and then the other students took notice of me as an intelligent writer/poet. But that did not stop many of them from the cruelty and teasing. I decided making friends wasn't worth it. Cindy and I barely had anything it common, but she was someone to hang out with and laugh with. Damar (David) lived in Southampton and we didn't see each other that often, and when we did it was mostly to fool around, explore each other, and talk. He was my true best friend but it wasn't enough. I was still alone. I did not belong anywhere except inside myself. And inside myself was a whole universe of worlds and characters I could create and manipulate. When it came time for graduation, to sign the yearbooks, dozens of classmates signed mine. I was rather well-liked, apparently, but from afar. I had made myself that way.
SUNY Purchase college. The first week, I carried around a large plush wolf toy. Not for comfort, just because I wanted to. It was different and unique. Several people knew me as "the short girl with the toy wolf" for a while. That was how I met Corinne, and then Alisa and Jovier. And Stuart. Stuart and I dated for a few weeks, even. I found myself starting to open up. Corinne and I took an anthropology class. Corinne began having ghost troubles, and turned to the Goth girl in class, whose name was Jessica but told us to call her Tish. She was a witch. She became my friend quickly. Everything was moving so quickly. Jovier and his boyfriend Jason taught me about sexuality and sex. Alisa sang me opera. Corinne and I talked about anything and everything. Tish introduced me to Bill and Cat, and we all became a Scooby Gang of pagans and witches. I had friends. I was accepted without question. Sometimes at night, I cried myself to sleep. I turned nineteen and everyone celebrated. Tish became my best friend and my first pagan teacher. Bill taught me about gods and other forms of magic. Cat made me realize the powers inside me. People who did not understand paganism and witchcraft were afraid and would taunt me and try to hurt me, saying I didn't belong, they would never accept, I would burn, I was evil. And I raised my chin, I was proud, I said I didn't care, I was who I was, you could not hurt me. No one could hurt me.
No one could hurt me anymore.
Months passed. Tish began dating her friend Bane long distance. She introduced me to his "brother" Adam. I had never had a real boyfriend, because of what happened when I was fourteen, with Mark. I was scared and nervous, but I was also a natural flirt, and it was subconscious. Jenn came into the picture and I fell in love but didn't know that was what it was. It wasn't romantic sex love. I just wanted to be near her forever. All this friendship and love made my head spin. I still cried some nights, out of joy. Adam and Jenn began talking and fell for each other, and I let it happen, with some relief, because I was so scared and not ready for him at all. Ben arrived. He was so manipulative. I was so innocent. He asked me out, and I accepted, and a month later he broke it off in a very hurtful manner. He was an asshole regardless, but I had been naive anyway. It was predictable. My walls went back up. I didn't want anyone inside. I was afraid again. Adam came up to visit Jenn. I did my best not to look at him, not to touch him. Something in my soul began to scream. I couldn't help it. I was out of my body for a while. Searching maybe. Something inside me would whisper, He is the one, he is yours, he is yours, but you have to wait, he will scare you if you don't wait. Wait, wait. Be strong. I had no idea what it meant. I had no idea what to do. Adam left for Maryland, and Jenn broke it off. Adam and I began emailing and calling each other. Months later I confessed to Tish I was falling in love, and she just smiled. The little voice inside me said, don't wait, don't wait, don't let go, do it now, do it now, go go go NOW. And I launched myself. I opened my body up and exposed my heart and told it to fly where it wanted. And eventually, my body followed and here I am in Maryland. Adam and I are married and we own a townhouse. I have dozens of friends and acquaintances, and even a few best friends. I am accepted fully and totally, and not many of these friends know the details of the past. But it is passed. It isn't even a sordid past or painful past, not like theirs. But it doesn't matter who I was. They don't care. They love me.
They love me.

It used to be a song that defined me.
Not anymore. Never again.
I love you.
Who? you ask.
You.
Because I am open, and the walls are down, and you helped.

Comments

[lightworker78.livejournal.com]

I just read the lyric so far, but its the theme song from Charmed. Or rather, the lyric to the music they snatched from "The craft". I love the lyric, having been there at one point.