Attempting to get thoughts out of my head before I lose them.

[kiya]

None too coherent.


A while back I hit an articulation of love that I have half-lost, but which had something to do about deriving joy from witnessing joy in the loved one. Ideally, to inspire that joy, but sometimes that's asking too much of someone, to let that happen. But recursion if so.

This is easy at the beginnings of things, in what erispope calls Bob Hates Peas, or what I saw someone refer to once as "Wow, you breathe air too?" New relationships are exothermic reactions; they throw off energy that will power joy straight into stupidity if it's not watched. Finding the stuff that will keep driving that response after the surge settles down is hard. It takes work, and it's too easy to break down when the bottomless energy supply goes, or just start running down from there because the work wasn't done when it was so, so easy to do anything having to do with that interaction.

I wish I could articulate partnership better. I can wave my hands around but not say it, the sense of taking care, the shared balanced looking after each other's well-being. A shared discussion of rocks in heads (and the monsters that lurk under them), people don't like me, I'm not good for people. . . But back to recursion. I don't know. The thoughts are there, the words aren't, I haven't jiggered these Tetris pieces around the right way. [It's all territory, Stormy handles that stuff and she doesn't do language.]

Even when the responsibility goes, the concern lasts for me. That's why it was important to me recently to find rubberskunk again -- because of the lasting care for a partner, even though the partnership itself ended. (Ma'at is the force that gathers people into communities again.) It was a good impulse to follow through on.

Today I love and today I am loved. And I found in myself the caring for a partner, the free offering of those things I had, and I won smiles with it. And mischief.

I am full of joy.

Comments

[suzanne.livejournal.com]

Today I love and today I am loved. And I found in myself the caring for a partner, the free offering of those things I had, and I won smiles with it. And mischief. I am full of joy.

*ponders* whispercricket asked me for a definition of the quad recently, and I've been having trouble articulating what this definition of family means to me, and how it is different from blood family, and even other choosen family. I think I just found a piece. Seeing this, even though I know there are still difficulties and... stuff, seeing that you are happy, made my skin stretch with joy too.

*hygges* Family.

[baratron.livejournal.com]

I really enjoyed reading this.

[artan]

"Wow, you breathe air too?"
Not nearly as much as would be properly healthy.

Rather, Stormy doesn't do standard language. Action, posturing, general noises of pleasantries or distress, that's all communication as well. It's just harder to read...

[kiya]

Stormy once had something to say that I had to get someone else in to translate, which came out eventually as a disgusted, "You say you're going to be careful and then you turn around and knock everything off the table with your fucking tail."

It was all posture in my head.

[the-real-diana.livejournal.com]

Wow. Awesome. Do you think maybe your love for the person you describe changed from eros to more of a friendship-caring? What do you see as the difference?
Preach on sister, your disciples are listening...:)

[kiya]

The critical thing is that while I may care about people and want to look after them in the abstract, most of them aren't mine to care for.

A partner is.

It's a territorial line thing.

[arianadawnhawk.livejournal.com]

because of the lasting care for a partner, even though the partnership itself ended. (Ma'at is the force that gathers people into communities again.)

That's a pretty good description of my and a good friend of mine right now. (Thanks!) Our friendship is occasionally a little weird, to the point that occasionally both of us will wonder what's going on.

[kiya]

Whee belated comment notifications!

Given that the relationship that provoked this journal entry appears to have settled into a perpetual state of amiable "The hell is going on?" I'm not surprised by it.

Dealing with being in touch with rubberskunk some seven, eight years after we broke out is interesting. A lot of the context of things is missing and makes for awkwardness, but nonetheless the caring remains.