she turns and says "are you alright?" i said "i must be fine cause my heart's still beating"

[raybear]

As passionate and grudging as I can sometimes be, it's always been hard for me to stay mad for too long -- at least not raging upset tantrum mad. As a kid I'd go up to my room and cry and beat the pillow for five minutes, cursing my parents and the unfairness of the world. Then I'd sort of stop sobbing and pick up a book and stop reading, easily distracted from my previous mission to rage against the world. I'd select a Goldenbook off the shelf and read it aloud to myself, soon forgetting that I was supposed be angry at my mother.

Eventually I'd be aloud to rejoin the world (or I'd end my voluntary withdrawal into my room) and for a moment the anger would be rekindled when I saw the person. Often I got in trouble for still being mad. My mom would chastise me for pouting and crossing my arms, insisting I needed an attitude adjustment.

I still get easily distracted. In the midst of a vicious internal monologue I'm practicing to use on someone, I stop to notice the paper burning on my cigarette and briefly board a train of thought that travels through tobacco manufacturing and machines and how things are made. Then I shake my head and get back to the business at hand of being upset.

I used to think this meant I wasn't an angry person. That I somehow had evolved to a place where I couldn't retain the negative feelings and I let them go and moved on with my life. But as I got older I discovered that I was just eating them, all of them. I swallowed all that anger and sadness and choked until I could make it disappear and move forward. But it always seeps back up through my skin, affecting my behavior in even worse ways. I become catty, cutting, horribly mean.

At the risk of making myself into a jerk, I've lately tried to be better about expressing my anger as it happens, not letting myself get distracted, and using less of the diatribe format and more of a talking through techinique. I don't know if it's working. I can't tell. I'm too close to everything.

Last night I did a tarot reading with Damon. Here are the results:
1 -- 7 of Cups reversed
2 -- The Lovers
3 -- Hanged Man reversed
4 -- Ace of Pentacles reversed
5 -- Chariot reversed
6 -- Five of Swords
7 -- Ace of Wands reversed
8 -- 9 of Swords
9 -- 6 of Cups
10 -- Hermit

I thought reversed cards and painful swords were about me being trapped in a fantasy and needing to re-evaluate what I want, realizing all the good things I have, and try to make it fit together, but I needed more time of self-analysis (hence the Hermit outcome).
Instead it meant that many many months of work and building trust were going to be destroyed.

Fuck you. I can be forgiving, but I still have to be angry. And now I have even more to figure out.

So fuck you.

Comments

[clockwatcher.livejournal.com]

hey, i'm thinking of you and hope you resolve what needs resolving. let me know if you wanna talk.

j

[raybear.livejournal.com]

thanks for your good thoughts....

[nineinchlovely.livejournal.com]

hey buddy..

I'm sorry things don't seem to be going right at the moment. I'm here if you need to talk or anything. (and I'm not contagious..*smirk*)

~R.