"You don't seem yourself today" Bas si ne valja. But it's raining so everyone is a little off. Whatever it is, you have your health, and that's the most important thing. I lost a friend the other day. She was 48 years old." This is what my postolar told me when I went to pick up my shoes yesterday morning. He was right, I wasn't right yesterday. He is right, I was sad. It's a sadness about relationships and who knows if it will ever end but the point is that he could see into my soul and somehow that made me feel less alone on an island of female singledom.
Which isn't actually alone on an island, there are many women on that island with me. So much gender discrimination at work has left us jaded. The basic entitlement of men has left them stupid, selfish, and barely functioning socially. And in our interactions with them, we can be blind to the behaviors that are the outcome of that entitlement, and we can call them out. Either way, we have to deal with those behaviors, and ask for some accountability. That's emotional work, and it's exhausting.
It is so much easier to run from all of that and I want to. Then what? We carry around a shell that protects us. It is full of cynicism, history, and fear. We step out of it when some one coaches us out of it. The parts that happen after getting out of the shell are usually a disaster, because we are so raw and there is so much fear that comes with it. Is there any coach who can help us stay out of the shell? What kind of fears is that coach carrying with him?
A related problem is that the relationship is off the island of female singledom, it's outside the squad, the team. So you (ok, I) am on foreign turf. Not playing on my home court, where I have all the advantages. That's stressful. What am I supposed to do here? What are the rules? Wait, are there any? Why aren't you behaving like my girlfriends do?
What was the accident that brought us together and fragmented my shell for a moment? Can I please put that all back together again? I now feel like I've gone two steps backwards when I thought trying meant that I was moving one step forward. I really don't want to talk to you about this.
