Love and passion. A ramble.

I read the vaccuous headlines so I deserve the eyeball strain. But since when did "passionate" become a synonym for "argue all the time", especially when you know it's nothing to do with passion and everything to do with YOU SHOULDN'T BE TOGETHER? Passion seems to have been accepted as a good excuse for dysfunction when it comes to relationships. Can't those of us who live together on a pretty even keel be passionate? I 'd chase Mr Y à la Benny Hill all day long if he didn't have to go to work. Because we don't fight, there's not passion? 

I've read that back. What the heck am I talking about? Passion has been used as a flattering cover to excuse excessive shitdickery since time immemorial in both life and fiction. Look at that bastard Heathcliff. People swoon over him left, right, and centre when the fact is the character is an EPIC ballbag (all right, I'm not surprised he turned out to be fucked up considering his childhood, but come on! Really? Romantic hero? Broody spiteful ball sac, more like) And Cathy wasn't any better. I spent much of the last time I read Wuthering Heights muttering crossly to myself about the bloody idiot behaviour of two people who were more aberrantly dependent on the memory of each other than in love. Literature is full of fools who regret their massive arsery later, but indulge themselves in it without a second thought. Is that the human condition? It is, isn't it? We baste ourselves in our stupid, pigeon-eyed reactions and wonder why things turn to excrement. We think the highs and lows of love are what make it special, what make it count. If it's not turbulent, it's not worth it. 

What utter bollocks.

Love, true love, whatever you want to call it, is about a bond. A connection that isn't tenuous, but is as solid as a double decker bus. I only have to look at Mr Y and I feel an intensity that I can’t verbalise. He can be on the other side of a packed bar and I'll still feel it. He could be on the other side of the ocean and I'd still feel it. Time and distance don't change it, it just is. It's not about that old Buddhist bugbear, attachment - which is why I fear many people keep their disintegrating relationships alive. I can understand it. There have been times in our relationship - which is nearly 21 years old - when I've felt utterly lost, but you keep on keeping on, y'know? You work through the hard times and learn your lessons and a little more about each other, not to mention yourself. It doesn't mean yelling and screaming the same old petty abuses at each other ad infinitum, picking the scabs, getting nowhere, then indulging in some hot monkey sex that's really an excuse not to take a good hard look at yourselves. That's not love. That's demented. Like Albert Einstein once said "Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results". Quite so, old boy - and he knew a thing or two about the old love squeezings ... wait, I’ve gone wrong and we’ve ended up back with Benny Hill. 

I don't know if love can last a life time. How would I know? I've not finished mine yet (touch wood). I hope it does though, because frankly I lucked out like a motherlicker the day I met Mr Y. What I'm saying is don't let them fool you. You don’t lack passion because you’re not haranguing each other all the time. It's not boring because you're not humping each other like dogs on heat every five minutes. If you're not taking lumps out of each other, it doesn't mean you're not in love. The perma-tanned airheads (of both sexes) who parade their "passionate" relationships up and down the side bars of tabloid websites aren't good examples. Passion does not trump good behaviour. If you love someone, you behave well towards them (most of the time, but because they love you it's okay when you sometimes don't) Stop and smell the roses. If it's not making you happy, and I mean long term happy, not "he didn't put the loo seat down and the toilet has that green mist again, I'm leaving" term happy, dump that shit and run. Life's too fucking short. 

Scales of Depression

To say I'm despondent today is a fucking understatement. I weighed myself. Stupid stupid stupid. I had a naughty weekend filled with carbs and alcohol and I knew I'd put weight on. I was pretty strict yesterday and wasn't going to hit the scales until the end of the week. Like a kneejerk ballbag, I found myself stepping on them this morning when I distinctly said I wouldn't. I've put on more weight since the weekend.

Now I feel stuck (Common sense has no place here). I feel like I'm going to be trapped here forever, one step short of the Good Year blimp. I can't explain how fucking depressing it is. All that effort last week? I lost 2lbs. 2 fucking pounds. And now this. The week before that when I exercised 3 or 4 times and ate chips 3 or 4 times, I lost 8lbs. Explain that to me! No, don't. I don't need explanations, I don't need platitudes, I need to keep going. I also need not to weigh myself. No more scales. They are self-righteous bitch queens and they're tyranny must be ended.

None of this is helping the fact that my Depression's reared its ugly mug. Nothing like the classic Chloë meltdowns of 01 or 94, but a bout of hopelessness that, weeks long already, just won't bloody shift. It's like a worm that's chowing down on the apple of my mind and plopping out big nuggets of bleakness. The only things keeping me going right now are Mr Y, Miss Maudie, running and writing ... but you know, when I write that down, I've got to say I'm pretty fucking lucky to have those things. That's how I know I'm winning. I can see so much more clearly these days. I used to be Depression's bitch. I can't say I never will be again but for now I can say I know what to do with him when he trots along all proprietary and shit. I know when he's arrived (there's nothing worse than him suddenly hitting you in the chops, like a misery ninja) so I can face him down like Gary Cooper. It's just very tiring. Some days I feel old beyond my years, worn down by the cycle.

These days, however, I understand there are differences in the manifestations of my Depression. There are differences in me too. Sometimes, it needs swinging at. I need to get angry at its tenure in my brain pan; not that morbid anger that just feeds the little fucker, but a righteous determination that drives me to find expression and makes me stronger. I have to refuse to give in to it. On the other hand, there are times when I have to give in, but under controlled conditions. I have to sit down and take stock and let it flow through me.  I allow it. It's a part of me that may never leave. So I air it sometimes. Let it breathe and say its name. If I stifle it, it just gets stronger. If I'm not afraid of it, it can't beat me ("you have no power here, begone") Then I get back up and get on with living. And that's the biggest difference of all.