I used to view personal interplay as a chance to “put my best face forward” – and in so doing I shut myself off. There’s a line in a Talking Heads song – Nothing But Flowers— “Years ago, I was an angry young man, and I’d pretend, that I was a billboard” — and that’s where I was at. I was truthful, sure, but I think I always tried to spin things in the most positive way possible. Maybe that’s an Enron thing, using accounting tricks to show profits and success when really there was none. Not of course that I was that destructive and deceitful. But I definitely hid things about myself. A blessing of these days is that I’m much more open about my own faults. This has had benefits in the personal, the romantic, the professional, the artistic, and the spiritual spheres.
Jenny and I had dinner last night. I made my hamhanded attempt to cook (the salad was lovely!) and we spoke and talked about this and that as well as more serious topics. It was open and good. Jenny is a good friend to me. Then we went and saw the Austin Powers movie. Then we went to what is supposedly the largest Target in the world and shopped and talked. I feel very much her friend. We spoke openly and honestly. It gratifies me to be in that space. Pleasant.
I’ve been struggling lately with the compulsion I have to be with someone. But I think I’m realizing that I don’t have to be with someone all the time. Someone wrote to me we are always with ourselves – which sounded odd to me at first, but makes sense.
My Mom says that we are always with God. I don’t have the faith in that truth that she does. But I do believe in truth, and in love. These are both unmeasurable, abstract concepts. So perhaps there’s more faith in me than I ever realized. But the ideas of God as presented to me in my youth do not motivate or convince me. Spiritual growth is something I have as a goal, certainly. Much reading and research and self-searching to do in that area.
Okay, onward.
