Cupping Ash

How to not let go

I dreamt about you again. I can’t remember the specifics, but there you were. I know that for sure.

Dreams, we’re told, are manifestations of the unconscious. The subconscious. The hanging off the edge with both hands, fingers rapidly whitening, lactic acid shooting throughout the veins of our deltoids, wishing you’d been doing more assisted pullups at the gym, conscious. They say that dreams return the familiar to us through unfamiliar forms.

I awoke in a panic. There I saw myself: heart pounding, eyes pried open by an icy bowl of psychic pain. Wrapped in the tortilla of my duvet. Splayed but pinned.

If I had the chance, I’d tell you I’m sorry. For how things played out. That’s too passive. I was there. For what I did. What I said. What I chose. What I didn’t say.

I’d tell you about my awareness - how I know I acted unkindly, that my callousness was ultimately motivated by my own insecurities and fears. Fears I still hold: that I’m not good enough. That I’m selfish. Fat, balding. Unable to live up to a potential I formed my identity around when I was 15. Unlovable.

I’d tell you I was irresponsible with my language. That I fantasized about a life together in which you brought me the stability and reassurance I was afraid I’d not be able to realize in my own life. How I should have been sensitive to what alluding to or describing a life together, the length of our dinner table, fit with a forever olive oil cake, just for picking, the number of our Tenenbaum children who’ll sing together in the study, says to a partner. To what extent it was personal carelessness or our own shared hopes, I’ll never know. The shades of past light have burned and faded the images. The story I’ve told myself is now the history.

I’d tell you that I was afraid to voice when things bothered me, because you might leave, and that I now recognize that showing up for a relationship means voicing them. I’d apologize for the decisions I made for us in my head, without you. Of making you subject to my temperament, my impulses, my fears. Of abandoning you. Of suddenly hacking off the limb I pleaded for. The scarlet drops still stain my sleeves.

I have no idea if you’ll ever allow me to tell you these things - to tell you about the truths I believe I’ve found.

Or if I want absolution, or merely the chance to win you over. I can tell myself I want to cleanse. To apologize whether or not I am forgiven. To lighten my soul. To move closer to my aspiration to live freely, no longer beholden to the mistakes of my past. Though, I cannot dismiss the possibility that on some level, what’s prompting me is the discomfort that someone who once knew me - whom I let get close enough to see me - in all likelihood holds me in poor regard? That I wonder if there’s a group chat of all the women and men and people I’ve wronged and when the meetings are. If bimonthly means twice a month or every two months.

Is what I crave a chance to lighten my load or remove a thorn from thin skin? I don’t think you want to hear from me, but I don’t honestly know. I’m not going to pretend to either. We haven’t spoken in years.

The sing-songy sayings we’ve been told form twin camps. On the one hand, to the east, we learn that fortune favors the bold. That the spoils go to the victor. That we should fight for what we believe in; wear our hearts on our sleeves; should steal the blue french horn; kiss the girl; leap before we look; leave no stone unturned; memento our moris and minimize regret. That the beauty of life is only available to us when we throw caution to the wind and just do it.

On the other hand, to the west, we’re taught patience. Acceptance. Or is it resignation? If we truly love something, we must let it go, and if it comes back, it was meant to be. That we ought to protect our peace; let sleeping dogs lie, put to rest by the babbling of water flowing under the bridge. Leave bygones in the rearview, and move in the one direction of Time’s arrow: forward. Better than scooping ash in our hands and calling it life.

I don’t know if it’s selfish to fight for a relationship with someone who doesn’t seem to want one with you. Seeing it on paper is sobering. Applying a full detachment of how it feels to carry an unresolved breakup, I should respect their autonomy. But there’s that little bird flittering on the window sill crooning its song.

If I were to translate it to English and paraphrase, it sounds roughly like: will it ever be a mistake to let someone know you’re thinking about them. Why wouldn’t I? Life is too short. I’m not arguing that setting yourself on fire in someone’s backyard is a reasonable expression of your love and human passion. There are obvious bounds. Honest, succinct, and respectful feel like good touchstone values. Maybe I could start by asking if you’re even open to hearing my feelings. I shouldn’t just tell you them. Drop a surprise feelings bomb during a midnight, or rather, Sunday morning emotional air raid. I don’t flatter myself by believing I could inflict any kind of devastation on you.

If I got diagnosed with a terminal illness, I’d want to tell you the unspoken things. But is that a way to operate when 12 months from now, barring calamity, I’ll still be here to live in the consequences? Is YOLO a good practical strategy for a life of 80, if I continue running, hopefully 85+ years? I’m certainly not afraid to have egg on my face. By now, I almost like the feeling. How my cheeks get sticky when the yolk hardens.

I don’t know if morality even applies here - if there is a right thing to do. I guess it depends on intention. Do I want to reach out because I’m unable to sit in the emotional discomfort of having hurt you? Of someone who knew me not liking me? Am I afraid that whatever ugly things I fear they think about me are in fact true? Or am I not reaching out because I’m afraid of having an uncomfortable conversation?

I feel the scar tissue hardening. We could go our lives without ever seeing each other again. In fact, we might. I don’t think I’m trying to pre-empt the odd chance that we do, to avoid a tense …Hey! How’s it going? Long time, no nothing. You look well.

Losing someone by your own hand is a hard pill to swallow. I want to live like the water I wish would wash away my mistakes, but all I’m feeling - what I’ve been feeling - is choked. Stuck. And it feels awful.

Does anyone know the heimlich?