25 - arrow into the heart
There are many matters in which you may waylay Destiny, and bid him stand and deliver. Hard work, high thinking, adventurous excitement, and a great deal more that forms a part of this or the other person's spiritual bill of fare, are within the reach of almost anyone who can dare a little and be patient. But it is by no means in the way of everyone to fall in love.
—Robert Louis Stevenson, An Apology for Idlers
~~~
Life, so unpredictable.
Some do live happily ever after. You can see the way they are with one another. Married for decades, a lifetime, the raising of children, the facing off with disease and death, the management of difficulties and travail, careers pursued, dumped and reinvented. The elements that brought them together and kept them close, the mystery and magic of the incipient passion and love, the developed trust and ongoing friendship, are sustained and enduring.
Of course some of us never find or come across the right person, and some of us recoil from the risk and challenges involved in loving another, and some, over and over, inside relationship and out, find themselves in the deep down, attracted and engaged, a ceaseless romance, unconventional and unruly, something that can last 2 months, 2 years or 20. You never know. Even when you’re fierce in your commitment and loyalty, if that which brought you together erodes, if the elemental ingredients of the connection dissolve, if the mystery and romance are gone, no matter the will and determination, no matter how much therapy you engage in or how many long and heartfelt conversations you have, if it’s dead, it’s dead.
There was a moment in the last months with Maya that I imagined some kind of renewal, that though we had gone through a long stretch of pain and suffering, estrangement (the cancer complicating it all, making it messier), irrationally, I still had hope, that we had been through so much that it might be possible to revive what we had. But alas, we found out about courage and fearlessness, and the unknown. The moment the door was open to begin again, to step out alone, we both went for it. Brutal it was, damned unsettling, but the slate was wiped clean and there we were facing off with old habits, old ways of seeing ourselves and each other, and a challenge to begin again, to create anew.
The last few years with her I found myself casting about, engaging others in a way that was inappropriate, a recognition that I was stymied, unfulfilled and failing to provide what was needed to keep the love I once had for her alive. I became unfeeling and numb. Began not to care, and today I am struck by how unemotional, distant and indifferent I became. Even during the series of cancer treatments, and with the biochemistry-changing Lupron coursing through my veins, the high emotion and mood swings that were usually there (and here right now) were absent when she was around. I had shut down with her. The only thing I expressed was disdain. I quit trusting her, quit listening to and caring about what she was saying. It was over long before we ended it. Sad.
And now this, I must sound like a broken record, but what I once felt for Maya, I’m now feeling tenfold for Camille. Not some conscious or rational decision, it simply happened, nearly seven months after I moved out, Camille walks up at the Infusion Center, and the snapping of the bow, the hissing and swooshing sound, and then the thump, arrow into the heart—so very unexpected.
It was a moment where epiphanies occur, an "Aha" and clear seeing, a realization that love of others is essential, that it’s the one thing that makes life worth living. And I’m talking about "touch," the sweet touches in the daily round, with our lover, with our friends, with our family, with our coworkers. Simple human touch.
Don’t have a photographic memory, all a conjuring now, I’ve recounted it so many times, but Camille chimed right in, we agreed on “touch,” and that was it, everything follows from this. She was all serene and at ease, she gave it off, no words, it was there in her manner and tone, "I am kind, considerate, warm-hearted—I am SPIRITED." I saw it and felt it. Blew me fucking away.
That's the ground, the core element in the scene that made a difference for me. And make no mistake, I understand how vulnerable and in need I was. How what I had undergone in the previous couple of years made me susceptible to self-delusion, and the romantic visions of someone wounded and in repair.
When you love someone, when you commit to them, when you understand that you have an elemental connection, and then it ends, well, it's earth-shattering. I was still in pain, still wondering about Maya, still processing, still trying to come to grips with the loss, with the break. It was all right there when I met Camille.
In the short time I was with her, in that first sublime hour of our relationship, in the heartfelt and honest conversation we had, everything fell into place. I was four months away from going online with these probe-goads, and it's like a light went on. I saw and understood things I had not previously seen or understood. I came to see myself clearly, saw Maya clearly, saw my work at the nonprofit REACH clearly, saw my want of getting into a print as an unusual, unique and late-arriving author clearly. Saw it all. Life a grand, grand thing. Love the baseline.
And full-on, when I wrote that first note to her I was a romantic wanting to seize upon and make real the sensation, the enchantment, the mystery. Of course we're always in the "unknown" at such times. I had no way of knowing if she had felt anything I felt, if she had similar sensations and a sense of connection. All I could do was reach out, however feebly. And I did, sent the notes, unrelenting I was, and I have to tell you, what a resounding and momentous turn of events. She came into my mind/life in that first hour and has not left since.
How do you predict such things, how do you know where they lead?
You don’t, it’s life at its utmost—dynamic, whimsical and fantastic. You simply have to trust, remain open to the possibilities, go with what you’re seeing and feeling. You have to peer into those eyes, sweet tides, pools of love, and decide.
Sunday, January 23, 2011 at 2:14PM 
Reader Comments (2)
You are a hopeless romantic, but that is what I love about you. Old habits are hard to erase or change. New experiences draw the essense out of you and make you new.
I like that, if we stay awake and are attentive, new experiences draw the essence out of us,... and maybe this new experience, new situation, new person has such an impact that rather than having something pre-existing drawn out (the newness simply a recognition of that which already existed), something previously unknown and original does indeed come into existence, something coming into being because of the idiosyncratic moment where synapses fire off affecting the neurons as they adapt, reshape, and reform; and as I've written previously, this is life lived in the crucible, this an alchemy of soul, so much comes from the "staying awake and attentive" moments, from our willingness to embrace fearlessly the pain and suffering that comes, and how they are transformed into joy and grand exhilaration through our intrepid and courageous spirit,… a life lived whole, without illusion.