I am so resilient. Its dictionary meaning: (of a person or animal) able to withstand or recover quickly from difficult conditions: babies are generally far more resilient than new parents realize | the fish are resilient to most infections. Its synonyms are: flexible; pliable, pliant, supple, plastic, elastic, springy, rubbery; hard-wearing, durable, stout, strong, sturdy, tough. ANTONYMS inflexible, rigid; fragile.
I am strong and sturdy and tough and rather springy. I fear slightly stout but I am in good condition. I am definitely NOT inflexible, rigid or inflexible.
Two days ago I received an email from a man who I was intimate with – for years. It was a difficult relationship – he was my London Lover. We have recently been in email contact although we have not seen each other since December of 2017. I did not see him in any of my recent trips to London,. He wrote and I quote:
He: As usual you set the bar high in your blog; what hope for the rest of us who may have literary pretensions? best wishes.
Is not that precious? We had this conversation at one point in time:
He: You know it is not the sex. What I love about you is your brain and your flexibility. You can listen, despite the fact you are so outspoken, and then say that you were wrong and change your opinion.
Me: I must be very smart, because I am so good in bed.
He: LAUGHTER.
Then perhaps and this is synchronicity. I receive this from Pin interest . This quote from Nora Ephori. In my sex fantasy, nobody every loves me for my mind. Almost at the same instant as I write this. I laugh and laugh and laugh. Sorry Nora, one of my heroes of all time, I love being loved for my mind. How strange! The definition of that word is: the simultaneous occurrence of events which appear significantly related but have no discernible causal connection: such synchronicity is quite staggering.
So why do men love a woman? I have no idea. This man told me. The most recent said, in a poem, that his affection for me was occasioned by the fact that I brought joy to his life. JKT’s affection was based on me sassing him and my sense of humour. He developed one, someone who knew him well said this.
He: But he is only funny with you. No one else.
Me: But he is so funny with me. So very funny.
So I did something very daring today. There was a YouTube by Fazza wherein he moaned about people breaking his heart. The song is called It’s You and was posted in August of 2019. I made the following public comment:
You act as if your broken heart has nothing to do with your actions. The question that should be asked is this: What actions or inactions committed by me causes others to break my heart. Perhaps ask a person who broke your heart what you did to force them to end the relationship. Then mend your ways. Otherwise it is sure to happen again.
Is it not helpful to have an old lady around to give you free advice?
Now that is sass.
I just learned of an amazing statistic brought by my computer guru, my Chris Jackson.
He: 5400 unique visits in the last month, not too shabby ma’am! Xx
Me: (Many swear words) ending in And other intelligent comments. Hahahaha Love you and Claire!
I am in a state of shock and went to the concierges of my wonderful building to share the news because I needed a reality check and they are always there for me. I am back in my apartment. I wonder if the Crown Prince of Dubai got 5400 unique visits to his various sites?
I think I may have beat him. He has met his match, but I won. A short plump white haired old lady, beloved of his family. Honestly, the Royal Family did care about me and I them. Perhaps the Crown Prince should stick to the camels. I am a good kisser but camels have bigger lips. And I would never come to his Mercedes if he called my name and gave me a treat. NOPE I have my principles.
But back to: Secret of My Success.
There is a recent book Sing for Your Life, which describes the meteoric career of Ryan Speedo Green. He rose from a life of depravity and incarceration to become one of the most respected and talented opera singers of our times. The author was questioned as to Ryan’s incredible ability to overcome his past. The author had a surprising answer; he said it was his ability to be on his own, the ability to look to no one or nothing to assist him but instead to rely on his own inner resources. I have not read the book at this point but I will. But as I listened to that podcast I realized that was something so true of me. That aloneness is to me comfortable. I realized that while watching a play at the National Theatre Iphigenia In Splot, a powerful one woman play. The heroine is seeking desperately for a sense of union with someone and it strikes me that that what she is trying to get back to is the sense of union with her mother in those early days of infancy. I think that motivates many, if not all, often seeking intimate relationships in the unlikeliest of places. But I am not so encumbered. I know not that state of union. i am sure that is why I decided not to have children but it has led to bad choices as well. I see that I do try to replicate the experience with my mother. I assume the mothering role and think that if I do something right then I will be loved. I unconsciously seek out cold and unavailable people and hope to bring them around. I make valiant attempts of for years and years. But then suddenly I get it and I leave the relationship. Always without looking back because I am returned to my comfortable place of aloneness. Thanks Mom.
But when did I decide to become different than her? I see that I could not reliably count on her for anything but fortunately I was surrounded by others in my early years. We lived with other people when my father was off at war – with my grandparents and then one of her sisters and her husband. So they gave me what I needed to survive. That is one reason why my brothers and I are so different. When they were born we were living as a nuclear family, a mother, a father and the kids. No one else to dole out attention and affection. I pity my brothers actually. So my outgoing personality is a result of my early living situation and one reason why I never clung to her. I could also see, particularly from my Aunt Alice, that there was a different way of being in the world. And that was instrumental surely. I learned that being attentive could get me the things I wanted and needed, like love for example. That being moody and changeable and selfish (like her) was not particularly productive. So the answer is, about three I figured out that being different from my mother would be a good idea.
I am able to reflect on my life because I have had so many years of therapy. Of course, that is where mother dearest and i differ again. She did have a ‘counselor’ after my father left her. She was in her sixties at the time and the man was not very well trained. Mother was never reflective and probably was a narcissist. Again a vast difference between us. For complicated reasons I had psychological testing in 2015. Narcissists have egocentricity scores of 100. An other directed person, like Mother Theresa has a score of 0. Normal is between 33 and 44. Where was I? Much to my amazement I weighed in at 14. That is not at all good and I have to practice being a narcissist to get my scores up. It is hard.
All of the former paragraph is true. That is the other difference between my mother and myself. I am, at this point in time scrupulously honest. One male acquaintance of short duration actually said I am the most honest person he has ever met. My mother did not know the difference between a truth and a lie and lived in a state of constant denial. I do not think I realized that until I wrote that just now.
But a recent event changed my perspective. In the midst of a disagreement with a man that was a love object I threw my shoe at him, perhaps two shoes. He brought the incident up later and then I remembered an earlier incident. The only other time in my whole life that I threw a shoe was in the presence of my mother. I was tactful, it was not at her, she was after all in a hospital bed in the University Hospital In Edmonton. But I did throw it out of sheer frustration and absolute dismay.
You will learn of the circumstances, the end of the story and what things have changed for me in the years following my departure from London. That on my next blog.
Picture is of me kissing a camel but it was a wooden one in my Dubai Marriott.
