About losing yourself

I am a dreadful procrastinator, I wait until the very last minute before the shit actually hits the fan and then I spring into action and execute. That is one thing I will change about myself. Another is my heavy thighs; I would make them maar boure! Don’t get me wrong it is masterfully hidden behind layers of muscle thanks to the thigh master but it is there nonetheless. Just waiting to explode, smiling at me after one too many Marie biscuits or a few Copenhagen’s…

I have quit smoking; truthfully I am only smoking 1 ciggie per day. That one-a-day is reminding me how much I really hate it. The real acid test will come when I go to Katzy’s on Thursday and have a few glasses of wine. The point is – there’s always something to change, something we can improve on, have more or less of and deciding what to do first can take up a whole lot of time.

My dancer friend – in turmoil – going through a divorce as we speak, does not know where to begin. He has lost everything, his kids, his fully personalised home, his massive Nigerian drum in the garden, his garden, his sense of purpose and in all honesty he has lost all direction. He is selling his restaurant (there goes my hopes of being ravished on a butchers block!), he has lost a lot of weight and is quite literally half the man he use to be. Divorce hurts and there is no getting away from it. Not the same kind of hurt as splitting up after a long relationship, I’m not trivialising shit either pain is pain but divorce – it wounds you in some of the deepest crevices of your being. It actually does not matter how long you were married, how rich you were, how much love you had for each other, kids or no kids when you stand up in court and admit to making a mistake, to being wrong, to wanting nothing – NOTHING further to do with this being you once loved – it hurts.

I am like a magnet for pain. I find it and it finds me. Use to take that pain inside myself but I have learnt. No sir, not anymore. Perhaps this is why I am still without a lover after all this time, lots of people are hurting and lots of people are lost.

What do I do first? How do I prioritise? He asked me this question on Friday and I could see that no matter what I said – he would have to come up the answer himself to fully understand and believe. He just used me as a sounding board, I was happy to oblige – so I try to say the most out there thing. Eat raw vegetables I told him. Ingest life. Think of the concept of low hanging fruits; take what is within reach now. Move on it. At that point I moved in a little closer. Take me…my heart pounded. There is no stopping the woman in me sometimes. He looked at me – I took his hand. Ingest life I intoned, dropping my voice to just below earshot. Trying to reach his soul I whispered. Ingest life and learn to love, not another but yourself. Ingest life and learn to love not another but love yourself.

I think I got through to him, he lightened up. He glowed a little. Then the phone rang – his soon to be ex wife. As if by some emotional beacon she was notified that he was starting to become light, he was starting to lift away from then pain suffering and strife and she was not ready to let him go. When we hurt we want others to hurt just as much to validate our pain, we will share sorrow faster that joy and it should be the other way round. He answered the call. Clunk!

He dropped down again into the valley that has now become his home. The years of pain piling onto him like wet blankets thick and uncomfortable smothering him. By the time the 30second call ended he had forgotten what I had said, what he was beginning to believe. We had to start all over again. No worry dancer, I have no where else I would rather be. You are worthy to be healed and loved for no good reason and you are special. Dancer you are special.