Fleeting Wor(l)ds

CARTE BLANCHE #5

Tonight, I don’t recognize myself. Who is the stranger looking at me in the mirror? Is she me? I am not sure I am part of her body anymore…

Yet, this body I am living in can’t be denied anymore. I am not allowed to ignore it, my body is more and more present by the minute. I feel like I am exploring new organs, new members, I am pierced by extreme feelings.

All started with tachycardia. No kidding, I feel like I spent two weeks holding my breath anytime I took a leap of faith. Then, once I made the leap, came the heart attack. During the fall. And not the little fall in the swimming pool! No, more like the fall in diving events when athletes can win medals! Or even worse! A swimming pool is too safe compared to the dangerous fall of love. Then, let’s say it was a 12 meter cascade, where you have to add the fear of hitting rocks to the vertiginous fall.

First tachycardia. Before the jump. Then heart attack during the fall. Everything helping you to remember your heart is beating, and in this love situation, is improvising like in a jazz song or thrumbing like an electro dance!

Then, came the shock. When my body stroked waters. Each yard of my skin has found a new brain. Not a wise 36 years old brain; no, a thirsty vampire one, only thinking to its needs and wants. Miles of skin. Revitalized by the shock. Revived by the water. Electrized. Miles of skin which don’t care about my requirement nor my duties. Don’t care a hang to teach, to work, to lead. I am a wild animal!

And after the fall, after the shock, the deep waters diving…

Here is one advantage of falling in love, you can choose where to land. I didn’t jump, without a parachute, to splash into the ground. I have chosen my corner of water. As deep as high my jump was. I didn’t plan on dying. Falling in love, you can’t die of it, can you…?

But, when you fall in love, you fall into another brainwashing world. The fall doesn’t stop with the shock since you can’t see the end of water. You sink into a new world. Where you have never learned how to breathe. I can’t see, but I can tell there are “interesting” stuff down there… Here is the reason why I was so afraid to jump… My child wound, my teen break, my first or last love pain are all secretly gathered. I meet some thoughts, already thought, deciphered, never digested; but my brain lacks oxygen and I am freaking out in this deep watery world.

One last shred of senses finally takes over, I can’t stay here. Or my heart will burst. I need to resurface and enjoy a breath of fresh air. To go back to reality. To collect my thoughts, put the right numbers in the right boxes, the right words in the right sentences.

Above water though, I am utterly alone…

Yet I am sure I didn’t jump on my own. Where is the one holding my hand? Has he really jumped with me? Or did my fear of heights blur my judgement. Did he throw me off the edge? I am starting to curse the very one I was ready to fall into dakrness for. Fuck, where is the bastard?! I am trying to identify the uppar part of the cascade, but my eyes can’t see that far. I can’t tell… And if he finally decides to jump, I am right under his fall and will soon regret my time under water…

All of a sudden, a worst perspective comes out: what if he has jumped – I am 100% sure he was holding my hand – and dived into my secret darkness – all those fears which make me cuckoo -, and just decided to take off? I think I would prefer him to still be up there, far from my mess…

The only thing I am sure of: none of is above is impressive!

Fighting with my doubts, I am trying to stay afloat. I struggle to remember if the hand in mine was not made up, but I am losing energy to cling to reality, invented or not. I need all my will to keep moving, to fight the flow and not to get overwhelmed. Since, of course I can’t stand in the water. I can see the bank, I could quickly swim there… I am not sure I want to go back there though… Maybe he will finally show himself, jumping or surfacing…? And, honestly, after this roller-coster, I don’t feel like returning to flat lands! May I go back straight up without crossing the GO box? To check if he is still up. Or, why not, to run into another lonely soul ready to actually jump with me?

I might as well dive in, to rest my arms and legs… Staying afloat is always more tiring than sinking. And my whole body is surrendering, as the flow is stronger and stronger, as the water is wider and wider. I feel sucked in deep waters and I am this close to yield.

I have seen the bank, it is plain without him, without us. Up there, I’ve seen too. And the odds are even, the next guy will also chicken out.

My whole body is on strike: you’ll have to make a decision, love, you won’t survive longer. You are getting close to hypothermia: you feel like it’s been two minutes, but you have spent the entire day fighting yourself.

At least, that’s what your breathless brain is saying… you can’t trust anyone anymore.

What do I do now? Swimming back to the bank? diving? drowing? Even if I come to hike back up there, I’ll need to get out of water anyway.

Here is where I am standing, utterly spent, surrounded by water, ready to burst into tears, as I feel “something”… I am already positive I am going to be abducted by the big monster of my fears. Yet, along my body, surfaces the one I was seeking. The fool was enjoying my inner seas’ backlash, without any oxygen issues apparently. Glad to gaze at me from every angle. Even the ugly and distorted ones.

At that minute, I don’t even know why, but I cry. Released? Frightened? Exhausted? Or renewed but this burning feeling in my heart I thought I would never feel.

He reaches out: “let’s go?”. I don’t know where, but his hand in mine, I am definitely ready to go.

My body still hurts from my ordeal, I am out of breath, my heart is pounding, my muscles are yelling, my brain is not braining anymore. My body is drained out but my will has never been so pure. So aligned. So assertive. And I can also feel a sparkle in my heart, tingling like happiness.

As I watch the one I was not expecting anymore swimming to the bank, I stop: “wait, I want to show you something”. And, excited, letting myself drawn by nicer stirs, I drag him deeper, I share parts I have never shown to anybody. His hand still holding mine, he follows me. His hand still holding mine, he guides me elsewhere. To his own depth. He might have been through the whole process as well: tachycardia, heart attack, thermal shock, and everything that comes with falling in love… He might have been delayed then, fighting his own battles?

His hand still holding mine, we surface together and he only thanks me as he finally drags me to the bank where we lie together. Peaceful. Exhausted. Exhilarated from the fall.

Tonight, I don’t recognize myself. Who is the stranger looking at me in the mirror? Is she me?

Tonight, I don’t recognize myself. But, as the stranger is staring at me, I slowly realize this non-recognition is not about my appearance. Even if I tend to bruise and I should be marked by my wild fall, my reflection hasn’t changed a bit. My bruises are inside. Not my soul or fear bruises though. Those are memories of my hope, my recklessness, my victories.

That stranger, in the mirror, is me. She is the reflection of my Psyché who, changed by her encounter with Eros, has come back from hell to utterly and peacefully be in love.