pivotal

I had 2 very important competitions coming up that I could focus my energy  on.

Finally a distraction!

One was happening in the next town and the other was happening in a town 6 hours away. They were occurring a few weeks apart and if I performed well in both then I could solidify my reputation as ‘up-and-coming’.

I was up every morning at the crack of dawn, following the surf up and down the coast, I practiced so hard that the ocean began speaking to me. She communicated to me in a language that I instantly understood, as though the thoughts that surfaced in my mind were of her own manifestation.

She guided me to wait for a finer wave, how to gently carve her mighty barrel and where to find better surf. It felt like I didn’t even have to try, like the tension that used to arise from trying to swing around to hard or holding on too tight while balancing had softly melted away and I was free to glide through her essence like a firefly swirling around a night canvas.

I wanted a distraction but I still thought of you for inspiration. Regardless of what the current situation was, I couldn’t deny the fact that you made me feel good. As proud as I was for challenging myself, I held you with such high regard that I hoped you could see me and be proud of me too.

I’d reached a better understanding of accepting the way I felt for you. Focusing on that alone uplifted me and what I felt for you was all that it ever had to be. I was happy that I was happy for you and I was happy with the way I felt about you, if that made me happy then why did it have to be anything more? Why did I have to turn it into some sort of suffering? The answer was that I didn’t and that felt like a pivotal realisation for me.

wild world

I heard Wild World by Cat Stevens today and thought of you.

I find myself lost in moments of songs and thinking of you. Thinking of you because they remind me of you and wondering if you think of me too. The feelings that some of these songs evoke are much stronger than one heart simply yearning for another. Sometimes they resonate so strongly with me it feels as though you’ve actually experienced these same feelings while listening to these songs and what I am experiencing is a form of communication transferring from your soul to mine. As though we are communicating to each other in ways we could only hope to when standing face to face.

It helps me to understand separation. Everything has progressively helped me to understand separation, it’s had to, it’s been the most dominant perspective I’ve had to view reality through over the years. I haven’t been alone, mind you, but I have been separated.

I find myself lost in moments of songs and thinking about why it is I even feel separation. Love is limitless. The definitions and boundaries that I understand of love and relationships comes from a lifetime of social, religious and cultural expectations – they are all something I have learned from others’ beliefs and have adopted them as my own. The separation that I feel is based on associations of what I think love should look like and the role it should play in my life based on these conditioned beliefs. When I think of you, I think of love, I feel love, so why does that mean I have to have you physically in my life?

It’s this strong association of separation that has lead me to ponder these questions and it’s a strong attachment to this separation that guides my emotions and reactions. Better Be Home Soon by Crowded House and Every Breath You Take by The Police, among other songs, are what compelled me to see you again. They lit a fire within me that sparked with such intensity that I could no longer bear the separation and allowed myself to be pulled towards you like the tide to a full moon.

Wild World is helping me understand the separation from a perspective I’ve never considered before. From the perspective of letting go. Although fleetingly liberating, it scares the hell out of me.

inception

I loved the ocean, it was the only place I could go to be by myself and never feel like I was alone, it felt like home to me. The quiet solitude that shimmered off of each ripple of water allowed me to enter a space where I understood that I was the ocean and she was me. I would catch glimpses of this every so often but it was challenging to hold on to.

Sometimes in calm waters I would head out to sea on my surfboard, paddling until the shore was barely visible and when I finally stopped I would just sit there. With my legs dangling on either side of my board, I’d soak in a 360 degree view of an expansive sea.

I wondered what it would be like to be lost at sea.

Would I have the instinct to survive? Would the ocean remain my friend and nurturer or would she relentlessly take until there was nothing left to give? I wondered if my love and respect for her would implode unto itself, blowing itself apart to distances beyond what the eye can grasp turning the very reason I love her into the very reason I could fear her. Could there be such a thing as fear of agoraphobia?

I’d look off to the horizon where the sky met the ocean and wondered what experience felt like at the point of inception. I wondered if there was more to this life then what I had been lead to believe. I romanced the idea of what land looked like on the other side.

I’d lay back on my board and close my eyes and imagine looking down on myself, hovering further and further upwards until I could see myself as a dot in the ocean from the atmosphere. I began to recognise gratitude and sensed that it was all I ever needed.

wavered

I wavered between being happy for you and being hung up on you. This was of course fuelled by the incessant torment I caused myself by watching your broadcasts whenever I had the chance.

It became a game of tug of war that gradually exhausted and wore itself deeply into the sand. When it reached this point it became easier not to pay attention to it but it was still there, I knew it was still there. Every acknowledgement of its existence allowed each side to dig their heels a little further into a rut.

I needed a distraction. There were more competitions coming up that I could focus on but I was starting to evaluate my life from a different perspective. I felt that even though I had a lot going for me, I wasn’t going very far. I was young, energetic and curious. My surroundings were growing stale.

I was growing in a different direction to my friends, I was doing the same thing day in and day out and love interest prospects seemed to only reinforce the notion that if I settled then I would become stuck. It certainly would have been wonderful to meet someone special – someone nice, fun and inspiring but to come across a balanced triad of such characteristics proved to be more difficult than I thought. I found nice or I found fun and I found only one inspiring. Like most girls at that age I was too young and naive to understand that nice will take you a lot further in life. My preference became so specific it was like I was searching for a needle in a haystack. 

I was still enjoying life as much as I could but I felt more and more like I was operating on auto-pilot. I was sensing that I wanted more, I wanted more for me but in a tiny little crevice of my heart I sensed that I wanted more for you. I wanted to be more for you. I wanted to be the kind of person that could care for a heart like yours, that you would want to care for a heart like yours. 

I think around this time I subconsciously decided If I couldn’t have you then I was going to wait for someone like you. Regardless of how long it took.

impose

Maybe I came on too strong somehow?

That is, I wanted to let you know I was there, that I was out there but I didn’t want to impose on you… or did I?

Fancifully, I knew that I wanted to impose myself on you in all the right ways. In raw, passionate ways, but I certainly didn’t have the audacity to impose myself on you with such presumptuousness. And I certainly didn’t want to impose on you in a way that would result in negative consequences.

It was never my desire to have you question my intentions.

Would things be different if I had said something to you at our first encounter?

If only I had been even 2 seconds earlier in trying to catch your attention that night at Gaston’s!

Does it hurt because I came so close? Because we came so close? Why does it even hurt at all?!

Is this just a case of me wanting what I can’t have? Or wanting the attention of someone who holds the attention of so many others?

It feels like more than that. I’ve never felt this way about anyone. But why?

What does it even matter now anyways? You and the universe have given me a clear indication that this is not my path to follow. So, why am I holding on?

You’re probably not even thinking about it.

You probably don’t even know who I am.

your heart

A few days had passed since I watched you walk away and although my heart still felt a bit fragile I tried my best to be resilient.

I was a little confused with myself because up until that point I wasn’t very clear about what I wanted from meeting you. I didn’t have the foresight to think far into the future, I didn’t even have the foresight to think into the next week! I just wanted to meet you and not necessarily question where that would go. I wanted to be open to the experience and proud of myself for initiating it. I would have been incredibly happy with simply having a conversation with you. I also would have been incredibly happy if I incited the same kind of attraction within you for me.

But like a broken glass all of that was gone and what was left were pieces to examine and discard.

Of course somebody had your heart!

That made perfect sense! There were many people that would gratefully take that claim, including me.

I’d taken stock of the course of events and realized that I was more shattered by the fact that I decided to face my fear and all it did was slap me in the face. I didn’t know how to process it but knew in the end that I was happy for you. You deserved someone special and worthy of your love.

If anything it helped to bring some closure and resolve to some of the wanderous ideas I entertained in my head. I have quite an active imagination and can let it run away with me at times. Having this information drew a line in the sand for me.

It also evoked feelings I never had before or maybe I’d just never bothered to explore them. I had such an affinity towards you and instead of feeling sad at the thought of knowing it would never be I actually felt happy, happy for you… and proud of me.

It was the first glimpse I caught of selfless love and that realisation catalysed the unravelling of something that is still in motion to this very day.

practical joke

My arm was lifted and cleared within inches of your skin as someone interjected themselves directly between us.

‘STEELY?! STEELY, RIGHT?!’

‘DO YOU REMEMBER ME? I BET YOU DON’T REMEMBER ME!’

I stood there stunned and my reality began to speed up to live time. I shook my head and tilted it to the person standing before me with a bewildered look on my face. I felt like I’d been blindsided.

‘STEELY! IT’S BEEN A WHILE!’

As he kept repeating my name it sounded like he was getting louder and louder. Hearing my name so clearly projected in your presence brought me right back to the incident of our first encounter and I couldn’t help but flush with embarrassment. I had you in my peripheral vision and am quite certain the commotion caught your attention.

I pulled myself together and quickly tried to decipher what was happening. It only made sense to me when I decided the universe must have been playing a practical joke on me. If I were to allow myself to believe that it was a sign not to proceed I might have just given up on myself right then and there. I would not allow for the possibility that a door was closing on me when I’d come this far. All I could do was chuckle in disbelief and go along with it. The person standing before me was a friend from my childhood. It was interesting because I hadn’t thought about my past in a while, the symbolism of that confrontation wasn’t so apparent to me at the time.

We had a quick catch-up but I was focused on my mission and tried to excuse myself from the conversation by telling him I wanted to say hi to you before the band started up again.

He was rather obliging and even grabbed your attention for me.

‘Hey Alfeines, this girl here would like to say hi to you!’

‘Nah, sorry, I’m here with my girlfriend.’

Without even looking at me all I saw was your back as you walked away.

I couldn’t help but take that comment a touch personally. Surely that couldn’t have been DIRECTED at me?

Could it?

Maybe I should have taken that sign from the universe as a roadblock instead of a hurdle.

What lay before my eyes shattered into pieces, with bits of shard swaying from the frame as they clung to the remnants of the scene.

My heart and my pride were in a race to the bottom but at least my pride was cunning enough to not make it obvious.

square in my tracks

I picked my moment. I saw you standing at the bar and I saw others vying for your attention. I decided I’d wait my turn and hoped that it wouldn’t take too long because I knew the longer I waited would amount to an exponential proportion of pressure that I’d place on myself.

I took a pause to recognise the beauty of the situation. It was such a touching sight to see how many people appreciated you. In recognising that I discovered just how special a person you are and that I shouldn’t be so hard on myself for being so affected by you, you obviously stirred something within many others.

It’s a strange energetic reaction that takes place within when you’re confronted with such attraction. It was such a simple gesture yet somehow I found it beyond my capacity to simply tell you how great I thought you were. Something about you freed my being and sent my heart soaring while simultaneously stopping me square in my tracks.

I can accept a reasonable level of accountability – I’m quite shy when I want to be; I was young, foolish and insecure; and I was slightly intimidated by seeing how many people wanted to spend time with you.

But there was something much more powerful than all of those factors combined. You managed to draw me in with such magnetic force and once I came within a certain distance of you, I froze. My movement ceased and my mind drew blank. Subtly, I was all over the place – I could feel my pupils dilate, my heart beat faster and blood rush through my veins at the speed of light.

I saw my opportunity to seize the moment as people began to break apart and a pathway opened up towards you.

I felt my reality begin to move in slow motion as the excitement of connecting with you cascaded over me like a fresh rush of water. I lifted my hand to tap you on the arm and within inches of making contact, the universe decided to throw another curve ball at me.

‘STEELY???!!!’

‘Your name is Steely, right?!’

celebration

I made it past the next couple of rounds but unfortunately did not advance to the finals. I was satisfied with that, I was proud of my efforts and reminded myself that it was only the first competiton of the season.

I was still affected by how you managed to make your way into my thoughts. I was reminded of our first encounter and shuddered at the embarrassment that surfaced and the pang of regret that followed. I harboured hopes of seeing you again but continually reminded myself of the different worlds we came from. I tried to convince myself that it was a moment to learn from and to let it go because that’s all it was ever going to be – a moment in time.

Hopeful thoughts aside, this night was going to be about celebration. It didn’t really matter what there was to celebrate – it was going to be celebrated!

We ventured on a bit of a crawl and ended up at our favourite pub Gaston’s. They had the best live music going in town and the walls were teeming with the clanging of pint glasses and comraderie.

I lost myself in a moment of music (and perhaps an ale induced haze) and when I came to, I saw you. 6 people over and 1 ahead, I had to shake my head and do a bit of a double take. I was overwhelmed with the emotions rushing through my veins and luckily the band was taking a break because I had to take a minute to absorb what was happening. I convened with a friend and attempted to have a rational discussion about the opportunity that  presented itself to me.

The combination of spontaneity, naivety and regret fuelled by alcohol gave me the courage to decide to change the path I was on. I decided I was going to walk right over to you and say something. Anything. I wasn’t going to think about it too much because that would just hinder me, I was just going to do it. I was going to release the uncertainty and doubt that was starting to nest in the pit of my stomach since our first encounter and change the course of my conditioning.

I felt elevated once that decision was made.

panic

The trick is not to panic. Don’t panic and don’t breathe in – no matter how much water thrusts up your nose. Let the water take you where it will and most importantly DON’T PANIC.

Seconds can feel like a lifetime when you’re under water and movement is beyond your control. You don’t know which way is up or down and you just have to trust that you’ll end up on the surface. The ocean is such a powerful being and there’s never a moment when you’re not at her mercy. She can be so forgiving at times, the way she innocently plays at your feet as her tide rolls in and relentless at others, the way she can swallow up a boat of innocent fishermen and spit out the remnants without a shred of remorse.

You almost feel a sense of betrayal when she decides to turn on you. You start to wonder how she could forget you – a sense of abandonment that serves to remind you of the lessons you have yet to learn. I learned a long time ago that she doesn’t belong to me, she doesn’t belong to anyone.

Lucky for me I knew this part of the ocean like the back of my hand and have been through this turbulence countless times before. As I finally started to surface I could hear waves behind me and crowds on the beach in front of me.

I made my way to dry sand and waited for the next round, promising myself not to let your memory distract me again.