Flipping through radio stations on the long drive home, I came across one playing some old familiar tunes I hadn't heard in years....it was amazing the immediate gut reaction I had....Home Sweet Home (Motley Crue)...my heart's like an open book, for the whole world to see...it is, really. How strange is it that I feel like a worn, little known classic, first edition, even, just waiting for someone to recognize the worth of what they've stumbled upon lying in their path, snatch it up before anyone else can discover what they've found and write their name in the pages so they can claim it as their own? Is it so wrong for me to want that? Sweet Child of Mine followed, a song I've always loved, and I realized it's because that's how I want someone to feel about me, because I know I'm that intense myself...I don't do anything in half measures...but I want to feel a palm on my cheek, fingertips in my hair, as a voice sings softly about how it would affect them to see my blue eyes filling with rain. I want someone brave enough to reach through the thorns of my defenses to pluck the lush rose that's simply waiting for the one strong enough to risk themselves for the prize. I know that I should have a little Patience, but as Freddie used to sing, I want it all...and I want it now! It would take one heck of a man...yes a man, not a guy...to fit my expectations, yet how could I settle for less?
As the songs play on, I realize more and more how fitting they are...Headed for a Heartbreak...Same Old Situation...Living on a Prayer...and the station fades to static...yet station after station the songs play that trigger thoughts, ideas, or memories....Poker Face...Take me home tonight...Animal...Hungry like the Wolf...I'm filled with a twinge of remorse as I realize that underneath the hunger, part of me does feel predatory, cold, unfeeling and mercenary about wanting and needing comfort for my own situation without regard for how the person in my sights would feel, yet I enter the lists knowing I will lose any contest of this type because I am incapable of separating emotion and physicality, a precaution I programmed myself with to prevent mistakes years ago, that became permanent and is an integral part of who I am now... What does that mean for someone like me, a being who needs, craves, must be touched? I have to have physical contact to feel alive....the more I have the more I need. But the more I touch physically, the more attached emotionally I become...therein lies the danger... What happens when I want more than what someone else can give, as will inevitably happen? Those I'm drawn to are almost always similarly damaged, which gives us a better understanding of life and each other, potential for a good foundation, and passion that could scorch all those around, and I agree that Everybody's Broken, to a certain extent. But what if we're in different places, different stages of brokenness and healing, tho? Can I wait once I've set my mind to something? Is it worth the inevitable heartache of opening myself up and allowing the process to begin, knowing the pain waiting at the end, and miss out on what could be an amazing ride along the way? Maybe I should just stay in my own little world, safely behind the walls I've so carefully constructed...then again, I am an unabashed masochist, and while I will undoubtedly regret it at some point, what is pleasure without pain? To me they are inseparably intertwined, impossible to partake of one without the other, so I've come to see it as an enhancement...embrace the pain in order to feel at all...
The songs continue to play, and it's as if I can see a flash forward, a glimpse of the consequences of allowing myself to let go...I don't wanna be in love...because I always am, it's always there, like a template just waiting for a warm body to fill in, a role to be played...it sounds so cold and impersonal, yet it's not...I can't fall for just anyone...but it's as it I'm preprogrammed to fall for someone that meets the requisite criteria...taller, musical, funny, intelligent, makes me laugh and smile, has faith, cares about family, well travelled, adventurous, and most importantly, for whatever inexplicable reason, is drawn to me and has the guts to say something, as I would likely remain oblivious otherwise... When I fall, I fall fast, and hard...I try to hold myself back, but it's so difficult to deny myself what I want, what I need, even when I know the end result could be reflecting back and seeing later on that the one I thought would last has become just Somebody that I used to Know. Static again as I sit here and listen In the Darkness...because...I Want You...to...Love Me Back To Life...and it's...Killing Me Softly...because I can't be so selfish, I can't ask, I merely Wait.