i have a fetish for knowing what’s going on.
it’s, like, the most important thing to understand about me.
some might say it’s because i’m an enneagram eight. others might think it’s because i was raised by a virgo.
me, i say it’s because i couldn’t be more turned off by not having a clue.
i pretend to be aloof all of the time. playing dumb is my second fetish. this is the best thing a person who has a lot of information can do for themselves. this is what makes the information fun.
my third fetish, you ask? it’s wondering if actually knowing anything is even possible.
my friend leta once said of all the people she knows, i’m the hardest to love. she said it’s what makes loving me so beautiful. i wonder if that’s still true. i wonder if it’s because i’m often two things at once, with one of them being a disguise. i wonder if it’s because i don’t always know how to love myself first.
early last summer, i changed your name in my phone to love yourself first. this was an attempt to negate the effect you had on me then, which was to push aside my needs in order to satiate whatever it was you wanted from me at any given moment. it was an attempt at a reminder to love myself first every time you texted, asking me what i was wearing. i think it worked momentarily, but then i wondered if changing your name in my phone to anything other than your name was making it easier for me to message with you because i didn’t have to face the fact it was you right away, when the messages came through. i wasn’t equating the pseudonym with the actual person behind the messages. i was cheating myself. and that was problematic. plus, every time you called there was only enough room on the screen for the “love you” part of the name, which made me feel sentimental. so i changed it back to your name, that way i wouldn’t be able to hide from what i was doing by being in relay. right now, your name in my phone is still your name. and little chemicals in my brain whiz around at a million miles an hour when i see it pop up on the screen.
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i returned to duluth from a month on the road less than a week ago. driving down the big hill, looking out at the lake while the sun set behind me, i wondered what the fuck i was thinking by coming here for the winter. i asked god why he let me do this. i considered turning back around and heading south again. i wondered about my sanity.
then i thought about my apartment and its view of the point and my house plants and the beach and how much work i need to get done before august and remembered why i came here. i thought about you too, and damned myself for it. when i tell people i’m in duluth for the season they laugh and say something about how it makes no sense on account of the cold weather. what they don’t know is that hardest part about being here is you’re here too. i spare them that detail.
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i ran on the beach for a long time today, my dog trailing behind me. it was freezing down there. i wore two pairs of leggings, two sweaters, and a jacket. mittens, a neck-warmer, a hat. the whole kit and kaboodle. the waves crashed on the sandy ice and the wind stung my face. i felt good and alive then. like i was really doing something.
i’m going to take up running for a few months and see what it does to me. right now, i mostly think about smoking cigarettes when i run. not necessarily because i want one, but because i wonder what they’ve done to me over the years.
i talked with a guy for a long time at the charlie parr show last night about smoking and running and being out on the road. we agreed we’d rather smoke intermittently than drink too much. he signed up to run grandma’s marathon. he’s thinking about hitting the road this spring. he plays the pedal steel guitar and has a beautiful face. he crossed his arms a lot while we were chatting, which made me curious what he was feeling.
i asked the internet about it and it said the crossed arms could mean a variety of things, but often signal someone is defensive, uncomfortable, or creating a subconscious barrier. the internet also said it could mean they are cold, deep in thought, or self-soothing. i’d like to imagine he was one of the latter options. we were smiling and, i think, having a sweet exchange. maybe he was just nervous. sometimes men tell me i make them feel that way.
i warm up some coffee from yesterday and consider eating something before doing my laundry.
i’ll go for another run today.
and i’ll think about everything i know and i’ll wonder what i don’t.
or maybe i won’t. maybe today is the day i find eternal peace.
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