Friday, January 06, 2006

Taken Out of Context I Must Seem So Strange

Alright. I am really into this whole exposing myself to you thing. I loke the idea of getting to know you all, and showing you who I am. I have some questions for you, and of course, I will be more than glad to tell you the answers to them as well. Post them in my comments or on your blog, and email me to let me know you have.

1. Pick a lyric from a song that best describes you and your personality.
2. Have you ever been in love? How did you know?
3. Have you ever loved someone or something that would/could not love you back? How did you cope with it?
4. What is the feeling [emotion] you most dread or dislike having? Do you have it often?
5. If there was one moment in your life you could re-do, what would it be? Assume your life will still turn out the way it has.

by the way, the lie was the one about the ferris wheel. Despite my fear of heights, I think ferris wheels are great fun, and especially at night, when you can see a long distance and a large amount of lights.

My answers:
1. "I'll become what you became to me" from Black Balloon by the Goo Goo Dolls. I think I spend an inordinant amount of my energy trying to return to people the feelings they give me. In the case of people I dislike, this requires little or no energy. However, I do have a huge amount of energy expended on a regular basis trying to express to people who have effected me how much I appreciate it. This involves me trying to make those I love love me back, which doesn't always work. I think this is one of my major personality flaws.

2. I would say I have been in love several times. I catergorize love for, and being in love with a person by the following: passion for them that goes beyond sex, affection for them beyond what may be returned, a willingness to compromise more than you normally would, appreciation for ideas that goes beyond their agreement with your own, and willingness to sacrifice what is important to you for them. I believe that when you fall in love with a person, you will always love them in some small measure, whether you stay in love or not.

3. Yes I have. You suffer through it, you think about it, you love them anyway, and you, in time, find something you can love just as much- but not in their place.

4. Every once and a while I have an overwhelming feeling of emptiness likeI am missing something important or I have lost something very profound. It is a hollow feeling in my chest and an ache in my throat. It stings behind the eyes. I am generally overwhelmed by it all at once, and for no particular reason. I suppose you could call it meloncholy.

5. I had a friend who invited me to his prom when he graduated high school. He was a yar younger than me, and we had known eachother for several years. I knew very well he was in love with me. I drove up to his prom (in St. Louis, MO) and spent the evening with him. His friends didn't like me and at the afterparty they werehateful to the point of making me want to leave. I caught them doing drugs (I had never done them at that point) and I told him I wanted to go home. He offered to take me to his house, and stay there with me. I knew he wanted to go to bed with me, if only to sleep in my arms. He had told me as much. I left, without letting him kiss me goodbye. I have only talked to him once since then, on my 21st birthday - a mutual friend tricked him into getting on the phone with me so I could tell him I was sorry. He hasn't maintained contact with me over time, although I have tried. This was a choice he made, and I don't blame him. I knew I broke his heart as I was driving home, and still, I kept going. If I could do it over again, I would stay the night with him and tell him I loved him too, because I did love him very much. His friendship meant a lot to me, and losing it through my own selfishness, and hurting him the way I did. I regret it more than anything else I have ever done, and even if we were to never be friends, as we are now, I wish I would have told him that night how much he meant to me.

There. So I'd like to see what all of you think. your answers, I mean. I know you'll tell me what you think of me...

My love for you all tonight seems quite tender. I suppose it must be to want to share this stuff with you.

XO-AG

6 comments:

HistoryGeek said...

I'd written #60 as my second choice!

I'll be doing your meme tonight on my blog so stop by...

Aravis said...

Alecya, I really liked your responses. I suppose the only thing I would say is that, as painful as breaking his heart was for you, it might have been the kinder thing to do. If you had stayed, loving him as a friend but not as a man, how much more pain might that have caused? There's no way to know. I hope, though, that someday this will have a happier resolution for you. You're a loving person. :0)

1. "Oh how I wish I was a trinity so if I lost a part of me, I'd still have two of the same to live. But nobody gets a lifetime rehearsal; as specks of dust we're universal..." I often feel that some lyric resonates with me in any given mood, but this one has been the most enduring.

2. I have been in love a few times. It was usually unrequited, so it was easy to realize the source of my pain. *G* With my husband, I knew intellectually I loved him but as I was a drunk when we met and married, I was too far removed from myself to feel it. So it was about 2 years into our marriage and I had been sober for a short time. I literally woke up one morning and knew that I really and truly loved him. I can't tell you what a relief that was! Our marriage has been much stronger and happier ever since.

3. Yes, I have. I pined, in some cases for years. The sharpness of the pain wore off, and it turned to bittersweet nostalgia. Now I'm grateful for having loved, and even more grateful that I didn't wind up with any of them because if I had, I wouldn't be with Randy.

4. Like Spin, I think fear plagues me the most often, accompanied by anger which is really born of some sort of fear. But I could also really identify with your feeling of being lost and empty.

5. One night when I was drunk I accepted a ride home from a trusted male family member who also happened to be at the bar. I shouldn't have. He didn't take me straight home; instead he pulled over in the woods and assaulted me. So if I could change anything, I wouldn't accept that ride home.

All of which makes me sound like a pretty down person. I'm not. I have a good life now and wouldn't change it. :0)

HistoryGeek said...

Aravis - how horrible that happened to you! I'm glad you did find a happy, healthy relationship.

And we do love our Indigo Girls, don't we!

Alecya G said...

Aravis, I am so sorry to hear about what happened to you, but am glad you feel secure enough to tell me about it. Strength makes a woman, if you ask me.

xo-ag

Aravis said...

Thanks ladies. It took a long time and a lot of work, but I realize now the shame isn't mine. That made it easier to let go and begin to heal. :0)

sunshine said...

As you wish.

1. This doesn't really explain me or my personality, but it is the most fitting for how I usually feel about the people I care about a lot. " I know someday you'll have a beautiful life, I know you'll be a star. In somebody else's sky, but why oh why can't it be mine?"

2. I've been married. So I guess the answer to that question should be yes, easily. Yet, I don't know if I was. I know I loved him, I always will in some ways, but IN love. Yea, I guess I was IN love with my husband, why you ask? At the time, I couldn't have imagined having any happiness if I couldn't share it with him. My happiness was nothing if it didn't make us both happy. I enjoyed sharing those kind of moments w/ him.

3. I have loved very few people in my life, but all I have loved except for 2 ever knew it. I never told them how I felt about them, so I had nothing to cope with. Though I have had people tell me they loved me after we broke up or after years of being my friend. Weird, I know.

4. Worry. I do it all the time, I can't stop it, I'm working on ways to cut down on all the things I worry about, but it's hard. I worry about how not to worry. : )

5. I need to give this more thought, I honestly can't come up with one right now, but I know there is one, I have one kinda like Avaris' but I don't know if I necessarily regret it, it taught me not to trust people, tought me signs of what to look for in a "rough" man. Don't ask for details, I don't fell comfy discussing it.

I will get you an answer on that ? sometime, just drawing a blank now