rubbing elbows is an inescapable action in "close quarters" living arrangements. It becomes difficult to even remember where one person begins and another ends. You get accustomed to a way of life and each other. A fair amount of shame gets left behind on the wayside. You get too comfortable in the mundane and needfulness of the situation.
I don't like my privacy invaded. I'm an open creature and most comfortable within my own skin. Nakedness and exposure are not new to me even in a public "for instance." But like a wild creature, I loathe being looked at or ogled. It is not a reflection on self worth, but rather an abject disliking to being the subject of another's microscope. People seem to think of themselves as the only intelligent thinkers in the cosmic scheme of things, but they are not. All living things experiment and adapt and evolve based upon the trial and error of that data. Yes, some pay the ultimate sacrifice in that laboratory we call life, but the rest of the herd still learns from those failures. Even the "wild things" that roam the night.
So, I don't like to be studied and, it would surprise you to know, I like being touched even less. There needs to be a respect of privilege when it comes to touching me. I'm sure many of you can relate. Casual bumping or an unexpected hand on the shoulder or the reaching out by a loved one to touch a cheek repulse me. Even if it is my own child, and I try to be as less invading of other's physical selves as I would like and appreciate them being to my own.
This is an observation and I notice certain patterns of reason among the lesser creatures. Smaller creatures run a higher heart rate and subsequent temperature. This make the physical infiltration difficult to accept. I run a thermonuclear temperature naturally and feel "frozen" while this occurs. People tell me all the time how warm I feel and gravitate to me, but I am freezing and prefer to be left in that state and not have another oven shoved up against me causing me to feel pain and combust internally. This "contact to contact" stimuli raises body temperatures and heart rates to very uncomfortable levels for me. There isn't a nice way to say it. I don't like these metabolic changes. I feel agitated and invaded, even violated when I make it known, and people try and fuck with me to see how severe my dislike really is. It is a medical and mental condition and needs to be respected. I agree one should feel comfortable in the family unit with siblings, children, parents and spouses. I just don't. I have never made a true mental bond or connection of heart to them so the final physical one escapes me as necessary and is lost on my emotion, having no anchor. I go into "fight or flight" involuntary responses when it has been disrespected. And the range of these attacks can be mere heart pounding to possible other's bodily injury or my own, stroke based one.
It happened today. I cannot control it and I do trust people just only so long as I can see and keep distance and perimeter clear. it happened yesterday and I know it will happen again tomorrow. I can count on it. I loathe it. Like some mad game to see how far I can be pushed.
The older I get the more I abhor the fact. Worse still, I hate that I even loathe the touch of my own child. It's not her fault and she has done me no harm (nor I her). It's not that I don't touch her at all or love her or trust her either. She remarked to me about my lack of physical affection. And it occurs to me this is a repeated diatribe to my existence. My own parents lacked the ability to pick me up, hug me and comfort me. At least I have done better than that with Laurel when she was smaller, though the older she gets the less inclined and more fearful I become. They brag about it, the neglect, each with their own reasoning as to why.
The circle is continuing. Only I am aware. She made me aware and I have been trying to let her closer, little by little. Since she was ten. That's when she first told me. She hinted at it earlier when she had first started second grade and began to compare notes with other children and witness the public displays of physical affection she had already started to miss. I didn't get it then. I do now. I'm just not sure I will ever let her or anyone else completely in. There is beauty in my mental "dis"ease.
I often wonder how little humanity will be left in me in the end when I fully accept that in me which pushes you and them away. Will you stay and watch "my" experiment, my metamorphosis? Does it intrigue you to know this regression exists, that the man, woman in this case, can truly become the beast you all so fear?~mobe's love to her all and her all to her loves.
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