The weirdest thing about the whole thing with Debra…well not the weirdest because it was all weird–the situation, how much it rained those months, my concurrent proliferation of poetry–it was that phone call when she apologized for the way she touched me. That it was inappropriate. And while it didn’t phase me because deep down I knew she would get something out of it, I also knew, so would I. What it was, I either didn’t know or didn’t care. Deep down, I probably knew full well what I was doing.
7 years later. So many things from 2004 resurfacing. Revisited. As strange encounters and curious quandaries.
One of my teammates on the girls team is a chiro. I remember when I first heard there was a chiro on the team I felt a spark of anxiety. I can’t figure out if it’s one of the girls I’ve already played with or one I haven’t met. I don’t know everyone’s name. But it’s a new girl.
She tapes my ankles at the tournament and to say thank you I send a fruit basket the following week because she said she eats healthy when I offered to bring her a cake.
I’m hurt and I know it. I haven’t been hurt like this in a while, where everything feels off. She tells me to come in and I say maybe but I know I won’t. She keeps emailing to tell me to go to practice so I go even though I’m too hurt to run more than a light trot. She’s excited to play against me and keeps trying to post me up, and she challenges me to one on one.
End of practice I mention to the team that I’m looking to set up my 43 year old coworker if they have friends and she says, what about me?, and I say, you have too much energy for him. He’s a FOB.
But who knows. I just don’t want anyone to disappoint anyone so I don’t always have confidence in these matters. I just try to put people in the same room.
Coach’s wife asks why I don’t date him, and I laugh and say, no way. My little nugget loves me and I love him but there’s no future. I can’t bear a world where we’ve had sex, even if no one ever knew but us. It irritated me last week when we were in a heated debate and Jerry told me later that he’d told another coworker that the two of us need to get a room to relieve the tension.
So I made a joke and said, if I can manage not to end up with a black guy, I’ll be happy. I said I always end up dating black guys.
Our team chiro says she dated a white guy once but it didn’t work out. I think, oh good. You’re not a lesbian. I briefly wonder if that makes me more willing to let her work on me, and I’m still on the fence. I figure I’ll see how the week goes.
She emails a few days later and says I “need” to come in on Friday afternoon. I instantly am both on guard and resentful because she is commanding me. And in the back of my mind, thinking about letting another woman touch me. It presents me with a threshhold that’s very difficult for me to will myself to cross.
On one hand, she could help me. I need healing. I find myself in a place where I am having dreams of future events yet can not heal myself.
But on the other…how many times have I sought healing from the very people who ended up hurting me?
I don’t know if this is about a leap of faith to help me overcome this and get what I need, or a test to see if I repeat the same mistakes.
The truth is, I haven’t decided yet. The truth is, I’ll probably let circumstances dictate themselves and go with the flow.
All the things I’ve recounted, was I really focused on these thoughts? Not really. It was something in the background of my mind I’ve been chewing on while my focus is on the intensity of challenges I am currently rising to.
But as I sit in this lounge over a beer, recounting my thoughts about this, I realize how true it is that there are so many things in life I don’t really care about, but I dedicate a lot of thought to and observe like a hawk.