"The Curse of the Liberal"

A long and difficult 24 hours. A reminder that in the midst of every storm is an eye, a center, a Halcyon of tranquility absolutely untouched by the ravaging destructive force surrounding it... that is where I need to go.

Was talking to E about it... our 'happy' places, tangibly speaking. Mine is in front of the Harrison windows at the IMA or in the Lilly Gardens... E prefers the Baroque wing. It has to do with the light, for both of us... E and her Caravaggio, me and my blue-dazzled gold atrium. (I love the Chagall windows in Chicago for the same reason). It's our romantic dispositions, our need to highlight beauty or brush things unwanted into shadow, filter the world into multi-colored kaleidoscopes... take what exists in plain and make it bloom in rich jewel-tones.

On a more figurative level, I have decided I need to get back to a place where I am happy, happier with myself. Lose some of this guilt. Disassociate myself from scenarios that bring me little more than regret, bruised feelings, the sense of compromise... I know who I am. I know what I am. Lately though I don't seem to know what I'm doing.

At all.

My world is filled with decisions that seem to been cataclysmic... I put my faith and time and energy into the wrong things, wrong people even... and along that path of choosing and prioritizing other people - people who, in hindsight, deserved some priority themselves - I seem to be crushing innocents under my wheels like that monstrous tree-eater in Fern Gully.

Still working on why exactly my judgment has been so terribly wrong, how I seem to be swept into this pattern... what I need to change. Was speaking to M up north this afternoon while I waited on my brakes to be repaired (replaced, it turns out), literally shaking my fists at the sky in a mock display of rage against the fates that had led me so astray... "It's just the curse of the liberal, you know?" he said. "We want to believe that everyone is inherently good and noble at heart."

... and worthy of second chances, I thought to myself. Worthy of me trying to save them, coaxing their better selves into the open, dismissing transgressions again and again and again in the name of forgiveness and love. It's who I am and one of the greatest gifts I can offer... but unfortunately I become so blindly loyal to the ideal inner soul of a person I often fail to recognize the actual person before me, refuse to 'leave a man behind' (in the military sense)... my stubbornness is hardly a secret. My pride too.

At what point will I allow myself to throw in the towel in the name of self-preservation? In the name of my own integrity? Why do people keep taking advantage of my trustworthiness? I'm trustworthy out of principle, a firm (very firm) belief in the right of privacy, need to respect others, honor them with space as they so require, a desperate attempt at keeping relationships cordial and kind and removed from the hurtful childish cyclone of gossip or pettiness... it's worth trying, damnit. Of course this is a failed mission from the start, I know that as well as anyone... hell, I like to gossip too. And I watch E! news far more than I should. But I hold bonds of trust sacred. I really do... and it's a lonely lonely road. Keeping secrets for others is taking liability for them yourself, submitting to the burden of the weight of words. Confidentiality... necessary but often agonizing (as E so painfully knows)...

Should I consider this spring - still just hoping to survive it - my trial by fire? Of natural cleansing perhaps, like when forests burn down and regrow anew from the charred ashes of previous generations of seeds? Is it time to start planting? Cultivating new life? New relationships? Do I even remember what it is that truly fulfills me? The real me?

What sort of labyrinth have I gotten myself into?

And where is my Daedalus to show me the blueprints to freedom?
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In spite of everything, I still believe
that people are really good at heart.
I simply can’t build up my hopes on a foundation
consisting of confusion, misery, and death.
I see the world gradually being turned into a wilderness,
I hear the ever-approaching thunder, which will destroy us, too,
I can feel the suffering of millions, and yet,
if I look up into the heavens,
I think that it will all come right,
that this cruelty will end,
and that peace and tranquility will return again.
In the meantime, I must uphold my ideals,
for perhaps the time will come
when I shall be able to carry them out.
- Anne Frank