Christine, Wondering

Random Musings of a Human Becoming

Saturday, October 30, 2010

Getting My Nerve Back

Back in 2004-05 I wrote a good 20,000 words of a fantasy story that had been kicking around in my head since I was 16. It was going pretty well (for my skills at the time) until I realised that there was a fatal flaw in my characterisation of the 9 main characters, and the whole thing fell apart.

After that I lost my nerve for writing. It was the longest thing I'd ever written, though I'd crossed the 10,000 word mark several times as a verbose teenager, and abandoning it seemed to switch off the flow of words in my head. I still wanted to write, and still dabbled in plotting stories constantly, but I couldn't build plots that made me happy, and I couldn't get the words out. I took several long breaks from any sort of writing, set myself targets, joined NaNoWriMo repeatedly, but nothing broke through.

Tomorrow night is Halloween, Samhain, the eve of the Celtic & Pagan new year. And I have made a commitment to myself that it will be the beginning of a new writing life for me. I'm letting go of the fear that I can't write well enough any more. In its place I am welcoming the knowledge that however imperfect and awkward my first attempts are, I can and will write, and I will continue until develop and grow until I am the writer I know I can be.

Serendipitously, it is also the eve of National Novel Writing Month, and thus begins my first writing project of my new writing life. I am working on the latest, greatest iteration of that original story, and I intend to see it through this time. I'm spending this weekend getting ready, doing my planning and preparation, so that all is in readiness. 50,000 words, here I come. Nothing can stop me this time.

Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Labels

I have had a stinker of a cold for the past two weeks - the sort that starts with a sore throat and then disappears, leaving you thinking that you've beaten it, only to come back with a sore throat followed by the sneezles followed by a cough followed by being an icky mucus monster (my current point in the proceedings, yay). The joys of working with small children, I guess: they catch everything and pass it all on to their hapless teachers.

The blissed-out realisations of my last post morphed into a blinking confusion and turmoil over the past week, and that too has now settled. It concerns sexuality yet again, so stop reading here if you're sick of hearing about it ;)

I've always believed that sexuality is not static, and that people can move up and down the spectrum throughout their lives. This may be partly due to social pressures and conformity having kept them from finding themselves or coming out (witness the number of middle-aged women who 'become' lesbians after ending marriages they entered into in their late teens or early 20s) but I believe it's also true of people who are very sure of themselves. At different times, we may expand or narrow the range of people we find attractive.

In the past couple of weeks I've become aware of a very definite shift in myself, towards the lesbian end of the scale.

This is not to say that I'm not still able to be attracted to men, nor that I would say 'never' to being with a man again (and indeed there are one or two from my past who I think I would never say no to, provided we were both single!). But when I think about long-term relationships and marriage and kids and all that, I feel vaguely panicked when there's a hypothetical man in the picture, whereas when I put a hypothetical woman in the picture, I feel both relaxed and elated.

I used to dream about this from time to time before I was out, but of course back in Australia marriage to a woman was impossible and arranging to have a family with one was fiendishly difficult, whereas here in the UK both are so mainstream that they barely rate an eyebrow flicker in anyone. That's a dream I can live over here.

I went into a bit of an identification flap this week, not sure whether I was really bisexual, or was actually a lesbian who had gone through bisexuality on her way out of the closet. After going round and round a million times in my head and seeking advice from a forum of friendly bi & les women, I've found that the only sensible answer is "I'm me, doing what I do, whatever that is".

So I'm not going to start slapping new labels on myself tonight, but I am going to be true to how I'm feeling right now, and that's all about looking to a future where I have a girlfriend, and maybe one day a wife.

You have no idea how good it sounds to say that.

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

Realisations

I've noticed a big shift in my thought processes this week. A few things have become very clear, and I've been feeling very comfortable and satisfied with the new information.

I'm not quite ready to share what's in my thoughts, but suffice to say that I'm feeling refreshed and energised and free. I'm starting to feel the shape of things to come, and I love it.

:)

Tuesday, October 5, 2010

Doing What You Know

When it was over, there was relief. Not just because the drama had stopped, but because I knew what to do next.

I know how to grieve.

I know the steps, I know the feelings, I know the score (literally, I still have all my GPYP playlists). I looked down the tunnel of that process with a feeling of familiarity and comfort, and the knowledge that I knew how to handle it.

Grieving the breakup was the easy part. The hard part was making the break in the first place.

And I've realised that there's a pattern there. In four of my last five relationships I hung on for months after I knew it wasn't going to work out. In each case, it took a single defining moment to call it quits. In this case, it was a moment where I was no longer angry but just utterly fed up and tired, and so was he. Before that - and before the defining moments in the other relationships - I just couldn't bring myself to step up and break it off. And I don't know why.

After all I've learned, why do I still commit completely to things before I know if they're viable, and then cling so tenaciously when it turns out that they're not?

I wasn't looking for a relationship when I came over here ... in fact I was intending to be a free spirit and perhaps have a few casual partners, much like my life in the last couple of months before I left Perth. And yet I dived back into an absolutely classic dysfunctional Christine relationship the moment one became available.

I've learned better and I was looking for something else, and yet I still grabbed it when it came along.

Clearly I still have a lot of work to do.

Friday, October 1, 2010

And sometimes things end.

It's bewildering that one can live, ignoring the bad stuff and highlighting the good stuff, while the fun dwindles and the fights increase, until one day, with barely a sputtering spark, the whole thing is just over and done with.

It's odd that once it's out there in black and white, the pressure is off and respect can return.

It's amazing that you can cry, grief rising up from the bottom of your heart, while feeling relief so intense it's almost joy.

It's strange that you can miss someone when they're right there next to you.

It's breathtaking to find out how many friends you have and how much they care.

It's marvellous to feel free and alive again.

It's surreal to learn that hugs are inside you.

It's a blessing to know oneself.

Here's to adventure.