My Sagging Bookshelf
The hard part of loving someone, of being in love with them; is dealing with all the information about their lives before they fell in love with you.
What do you do with this information? Do you file it away like a book on Subatomic Physics, that Distros required you to take in college? A book that was worth $3 at the end of the term, so rather than sell it back, you held onto it and put it on your shelf. A shelf full of books that were there solely to show your friends and relatives that you were a well read, well rounded scholar. A pursuit that was worth more than the lunch the $3 would have bought you.
The problem, question, situation is made worse when you're me. I've made a career out of loving women from afar. I've turned rejection and heartbreak and chasing the wrong women into an art form that rivals anything the Dutch Masters ever produced. But not surrealists and some of the Italian Renaissance guys, they were the TRUTH. Can anyone tell me what happens, when Mr. Bitterness falls in love? I'll tell you. All hell. All hell is ripped from the safety harnesses that keep it from breaking loose. It's like when Hannibal Lechter escaped in Silence of the Lambs. Bad scene, yo. A really bad scene.
I'm in love with an incredible woman, a woman that previous experience would lead us all to believe I am incapable of appreciating and less capable of even knowing existed. Why? Because, she doesn't treat me like shit.
There's a long list of women that I've wasted my time on. La Jovencita, La Fea, Pelo Crespo, La Reina, and so on. All women, coded by my mother according to their least desirable traits. My mother is pretty remarkable like this. She'd listen to my stories of loss and heartbreak. Assess the situation, and in a few seconds come up with a name that would encapsulate everything one needed to know about the woman. This list of my mother's is long, to be sure, and one that I'm not particularly proud of. They're all part of the learning curve that led me to the woman my mother has named Nena.
The issue here is that I've been in love with this woman for years. She's the last remnants of this former part of my life. She's the one woman I fell for that was actually good for me. The one who actually cared about me for who I was, not who people perceived me as. Unfortunately, we both had to go out into the world and find each other again to realize this.
Which brings us up to speed, of a sort. She's really pretty incredible. And she, like me has her own list. Hitman, Old Guy, Mr. Producer, Homebody, etc. . .Which brings me to the "I'm an asshole" part of our story.
I'm an asshole. Why can't I come to terms with these stories of her past the way she's come to terms with mine? What do I do with the information of Old Guy's failed attempts at romance? Especially since while he had her, I wanted her.
That's the crux of the issue. How do I come to terms with wasted time that was never even mine to waste? How do I deal with the fact that there is a yesterday that I can never reclaim? Memories that are not of me and how great I am? It's selfish and wrong, but we all do it. Jealousy is a human trait, and it's like leptons, it comes in many flavors.
Sure, I could avoid the jealousy by not asking, not knowing, insisting that there was no life before me. But that would be a lie, and it would create an incredibly unhealthy relationship. Instead, I'm left to try and shelve these books on Subatomic Physics, in a vain attempt to remember what the hell a quark is, and what the hell leptons do.
My generation doesn't date. We fall. We're all living the joke about the two lesbians and the U-Haul. And while we might not move our physical stuff every time we meet someone, we do move all of our emotional baggage. And soon enough, the two of you need a bigger emotional space to put all the emotional Physics books you've accumulated over the years.
Why does this matter? What in the world is the use in hanging on to these books, and bits and pieces of failed love? Sex run amok, love disguised as lust or longing or loneliness. These are components of who we are, and where we've been. They're proof that we took that class on Subatomic Physics, that we learned the lessons on top and bottom quarks, and flavored leptons.
If I'm going to love Nena, I need to love her books as well as mine. They're the libraries that make up our lives, and maybe I read some of them, and maybe I don't. But I'm starting to be cool with the idea of them being there. I think I'm starting to figure it out. Bit by subatomic bit.
Heh. I've never heard the one about the 2 lesbians and the U-Haul, but I think I'd like to.
My mum only ever named one of my girlfriends - "Sitonfoot." It irked my mother to no end that she didn't sit up straight, that she didn't do all the things a normal, well-raised (according to someone raised continentally, a good ways back) person would do. Like not have, or argue, opinions.
This is why I try not to involve my parents with my love life. Only under duress, my friend. Only under duress.
At least you're figuring it out. And I want to hear the joke sometime...
the joke:
What do lesbians do on the second date?
Rent a UHaul.
*rimshot*
Oh, La Fea. Heh. I remember that one.
So, let's say I buy into your metaphor - which, for the record, I wholeheartedly do. How about this, then. You are at a point in your life where you don't take too kindly to the idea of maintaining a facade. You've given up pretending to be someone you're not. So why bother keeping the books? Maybe each of them would only sell for $3, but if you add 3 to 3 to 3 to 3 ... you could probably make a pretty penny by selling them all off at once.
See, here's the thing - selling that book will in no way affect how much Subatomic Physics you remember. You took that class, and you read that book, and nobody will ever take that away from you. But do you really need that book lying around to remind you of the days when you learned something that wouldn't actually be useful in your adult life? Probably not. If someone brings up Subatomic Physics in conversation, you can still say "Oh, hey! I used to know a little bit about that. There are leptons involved, right?" and people will be impressed. Right now, if someone comes over and sees the book, they will expect you to have a more in-depth knowledge of the subject matter than you really do, and if you get questioned on it you're going to come up empty. I say sell the set and use the resulting dough to take Nena to dinner.
Along those lines, I've got a few books I'd like to sell myself ...
Good points, all of them. The thing is that these books are no longer available to be sold. They're worthless to anyone but me, written in a language that only I understand. The knowledge is the book and vice versa. These are things you're stuck with.
These thoughts stem from a conversation I had with Gladee on a porch summer after frosh year. Remember that summer? Remember those nights? It was late that night, and I was reeling from my breakup with La Huevona. Around Midnight everyone went to bed and it was just Gladee and I sitting on the porch, drinking beer and smoking cigars.
So there we sat, smoking and talking. The Alumna and the recently escaped frosh. At some point she mentioned La Huevona for the first and only time in our short acquaintance. She didn't know what was wrong, she just knew something was. So we talked about exes and the way you deal with them. Then she said it. The most profound words I have ever heard until that night. "Once it's over. What do you do with all of the knowledge about them? The way they smell, the way the brush their teeth? You can't forget it because its burned into your mind. But you don't want it anymore either."
In the 5 years that have followed that night, I've often tried to solve Gladee's question. And I've decided that she's right. You're stuck with it. The best you can do is let it go, and deal with it when it comes up.
ps- how glad am i that none of those above mentioned women read this space? SO glad.
I'm sure none of them would be able to decipher the nicknames. (Truth hurts, unless you're buried deep in denial.)
I guess my point about the books is this - to me, there is a difference between having read the books and actually keeping the books. Keeping them means, in some way or another, clinging to that history. Some people wear their baggage so proudly - as if having a fucked-up past makes them a deeper and more interesting person. I don't believe it. I prefer to let go as much as I can, and to retain only the essence of that memory. This is the heart of the experience, as it remains in my head, as opposed to the full documented experience with footnotes. You know better than most people how memory can shift and alter, and I prefer that fuzziness to the stark clarity of all the stupid shit I've done in my life.
This is not, of course, to say that I always practice what I preach. I really want to sell one book in particular, but nobody's buying, and I can't quite bring myself to throw it away. I suspect that I will have to toss it when I buy my next new book, because there will not be room for both of them on the shelf.
p.s. As for Gladee's late night wisdom over booze and cigars, I benefitted from it myself that summer. There are times when I wish I had her handy to ask those kinds of questions of again.
You're right, a lot of people wear their baggage proudly. Hell, I used to be one of those people. The idea was to wear the baggage so I could be better able to accumulate MORE baggage. Fucked up as it seems, it actually worked every now and again. Well enough that I continued to do it for a really long time.
Wow, this is starting to sound like that George Carlin routine about "Stuff." So brilliant. . .but anyway.
I guess we see things differently. I see the books as things that can never be gotten rid of. The past, the lessons learned are the books. They're the small parts of baggage that you'll always carry with you.
This is not to say that I've always been in this place. Many years ago I was neck deep in baggage. I had not yet learned to throw out the heavy stuff so I could move on. Right now, I'm down to the bare minimum. But there are some wounds that will always sting a bit, when poked at. The older I get, the farther removed from all of it I am, the less poked things are.
To quote Neo, Whoa.
Funny thing re: freesia's first post? So I'm on a bus, and not only do I end up talking to a chem teacher, but I'm remembering a lot of crap, asking intelligent, if not entirely pertinent, questions, and actually suggesting a cool demo from my high school days. Useless knowledge comes in handy sometimes.
I can barely remember gladee's face anymore, and I don't specifically remember her ever giving me advice, but she was such a cool chick. And that's a great observation she made.
Funny. I don't even know what my baggage is anymore, just that I've got a lot of it, and if I'm lucky, it'll get lost in my travels. Hey, the airlines manage it all the time.
God, I fucking love complicated metaphors. Sometime, ask me to explain the "birthday cake" = "sex" one that I got from my mother.
wow, yeah
i'm totally wanting to hear that
I may just be a naive youngin' chiming in here, but I see the "library" as a wealth of information of the mistakes made that we learn from.
No reason to think that holding on to the book is a bad thing. On the other hand, the fact that you still have the book while in a commited relationship with Mr/Ms Right shows how good your present relationship is. You have the books, yes, but they helped you learn that Subatomic Physics was NOT you. Not good for you. But because you studied Subatomic Physics, you now know that Subatomic Physics is bad for you, and by extension, how great Mr/Ms Right is. Keep the book as a reminder, remember the faults of the past, in order to appreciate the greatness of your present relationship.
Ok.. Waay too many metaphors in that comment.