or, One of the Ways My Chi Got Blocked....
Once upon a time, in a land not so far away, about 30 miles to be exact, I had a secret relationship with a guy. I can't say he was a man, because after all, we were both teenagers. Now, this was over 30 years ago, so things were different back then. Relationships such as ours were frowned upon to say the least. Only our closest trusted friends knew about us. Let's call him "V". I was in love with "V" and since I couldn't talk about it or show it in any public sort of way, I did the only other thing I knew how to do to get my feelings out.....I wrote about them. A lot.... Poetry.... Prose...whatever I could do to say how I felt....
In the meantime, there lived another bunch of guys up on a hillside, overlooking my little village community. These guys were a normal sort of partying, frat boy (without the fraternity) lot. Some of them worked real jobs. Some went to college. They all drank and partied and did what the could to get over on other people. I had dated one of them. We'll call him "P". He really wasn't like all the others, but he lived there with them. He had gotten a job on a riverboat where he would stay for weeks at a time, only getting time off for a few days here and there. He would call me, occasionally, when he was getting off and make a date with me for when he would be in town. We always had a great time together. I liked him a lot, but he wasn't around much and didn't expect me to sit at home and wait on him. In fact, he encouraged me to go out with other people and have a good time. But that's another story.
So I started going out with V. We had a good time together too. We both dated other people and kept it casual. Sort of. I was probably more emotionally attached than he was, but that's another story, too. Eventually, he moved to Little Rock. We still saw each other, but not as often. I met another guy. We'll call him, "TROUBLE". As I was withdrawing emotionally from V, and beginning to have feelings for TROUBLE, I came across some of my old writings about V. These had been my innermost thoughts and dreams, but I was outgrowing them and decided that in order to move on, I shouldn't have those around any more. So I did what any normal 19 year old would do, I put them in the trash with my phone bills and other assorted objects that could be traced back to me.
It had been several months since I had seen P. I broke up with V when I realized that I was spending more and more time trying to hang out with TROUBLE, even just as friends......
Then it happened. I got a phone call one day. This was the dark ages. There was no such thing as caller id. You answered the phone and you took your chances. This guy didn't say who he was, but he sure knew me. He knew me better than just about anyone. He knew my deep dark secrets and innermost thoughts and dreams. He wondered out loud how P would feel about them. He wondered out loud if maybe I would do things to keep P from finding out how I felt about V, or that V even existed. He knew where I lived..... right down the hill from where he lived, where he and all of his partying, drinking buddies lived. He wondered out loud if maybe they should all come down and "party" with me so their friend P wouldn't find out about V. It seems that my cheapskate landlord didn't want to pay for trash pick up in my little village and had taken all our trash up the hill to the frat boy village dumpsters on the hill. Some hillside varmits had gotten into said trash dumpsters and scattered my deep dark secrets, phone bills, and other assorted identifying information all along the hilltop for everyone to see.
In short, he scared me shitless. I wasn't scared about P finding out about V, or anyone finding out about V for that matter. It was over and we were still friends (we still are, but that's yet another story). What I was scared about was that these drunks knew exactly where I lived, and there was not one voice of reason among them. I wouldn't put it past them to come up with all sort of unsavory ideas, and I was 19, living alone. This led to many worried and sleepless nights. Several more late drunken phone calls, and more sleepless nights....
Well, long story short, no one ever showed up at my door in the middle of the night. I lived through it, only left with this unsettling feeling of not feeling quite safe. Like the shoe might drop any minute and there's nothing I can do to prevent it. And the idea that it's not safe to show your true innermost deep feelings because someone, inevitably, will use them against you.
Not really a happily ever after to this one.....
Except that maybe these feelings come out in my artwork. I obscure my innermost feelings within the artwork. Only the ones who know me best might see what I'm really saying, maybe only me. Maybe I'm not even aware of what's coming out. Maybe I'll see it some day, 30 some odd years from now. Maybe I'll see that the poetry and phone calls and infusing my work with my emotions is what helped shape me into who I am today.
