So Dave got his hair cut over the weekend, and with the new haircut I realized how much he looks like an ex of mine from college. I'd never noticed how much he looks like Tom... I don't actually mind, Tom's a good guy (we're still friends.)

It was kind of a weird awkward half relationship with Tom -- I met him when he had a regular acoustic set at a local cafe, just him and his acoustic guitar, mostly all covers of Beatles/Paul McCartney and Killers and some others.  During his set break, he came over to talk to me because he was happy astonished at my taste in music that I was singing to myself along with all his song choices AND wanted to know what i was writing (it was a short story for a contest that i won.) turned out he was an English major as well and then he deliberately put in one of his few originals in the second half.  He specifically asked if I'd come back the next week and get work done and I told him it was a good day for me as long as he didn't move his block of time earlier when I had a late class or later when I had Irish dance practice. He's also the first person to express astonishment about something I said about my color-timbre synesthesia and he suggested I read the Oliver Sacks book Musicophilia to understand better why I surprised him explaining that I liked his voice color.  But then we just sort of idled in that limbo between friends or more than friends but he never made a choice on the matter and we kept it open on both sides just fun and I didn't presume. His best friend (in his band) AND his sister both drunkenly told me about how he felt I was the one for him longterm once he was ready to settle down and I definitely know specific songs were about me. And then whenever he'd get in a fight with his now wife, he'd call me drunk to ask me why we never dated properly and I'd tell him straight out, "Because you never asked." when he told me he was thinking of proposing to her, I congratulated him but told him that he'd have to either except that he'd made his choices and let me go from his wistful wishes or he'd never be happy with her and if he couldn't do that, then I needed us to be distant acquaintances because i wasn't going to be party to him having even unacted upon infidelity.

Yeah, I know. Another musician, another singer-songwriter. I met Tom AFTER accidentally cursing myself when I was 20. Wait, you know about that yes? When i was 20, I flippantly told a friend of mine who only dated cheerleader/sorority girl types and who I considered like an older brother figure, or rather that to him I was like an annoying little sister, "O I'm not the sort of girl a musician would ever date." And he told me I assume too much if I think that. And I insisted I wasn't and he told me straight out that I'm the sort of girl that musicians fall in love with and write songs about and someday I'd marry one -- and I laughed said if it was true, the Universe would have to prove it to me because I didn't believe it. Since then, I've never once dated any guy who didn't turn out to be a musician and songwriter...... Even if music had nothing to do with how our paths crossed or their career path and I didn't find out til after dating for a while, every single guy I've dated since I was 20 has been a musician and a songwriter.... Every. Single. Fucking. One. Even the Olympic team alternate (in steeplechase) that I dated WHILE he was an Olympic team alternate for the Summer Olympics.....

So yeah. There's that. When i was 20, I accidentally cursed myself to only ever date musicians/songwriters....  I have yet to break that curse (it doesn't feel like I ever likely will. Guys who are songwriters, especially on guitar and piano, has become my comfort zone and it's a standing joke about me since I was 20 that that's my type.  Also, it means that there are a LOT of songs I've known to be written about me and a lot that I don't know for a fact are about me but everyone assumes they are.... That's actually another curse I put on me, back when I was about 9. I was upset that my sister has a fucking Beatles song with her name in it, hates The Beatles (don't ask, my sister has weird music tastes) but I got angry that there would never be any songs about me and that my name was so uncommon that there'd never be any songs with my name in the title or even my nickname in the title... Yeah, um, I now know of 2 songs titled Daniella (don't ask me how many baristas have hit on me after asking my name by singing at me, "Please Daniella, be my Cinderella" AND my nickname Dani is a Red Hot Chili Peppers song about a fucking female outlaw/bandit AND the music video tells the entire history of music videos -- and as mentioned, musicians/songwriters are apparently my type and I'm often theirs.)

Anyway. It doesn't bother me that Dave with the way he's grown into himself AND his newest haircut looks like Tom. Tom's a good guy, and he IS hot, even if I haven't seen him since he and his wife moved to Portland like 4 years ago. Also, I do love Dave's new songs he's been writing over the last several weeks!!  There's, ehrm, several that fall into the category of songs I (and many others) assume to be about me and are pretty obviously about me.....

~*~*~*~*~

As for Eric. O I've not done anything to the bond. I'm starting to get tension in me EXPECTING to have pain along the bond on Friday when he does... whatever the fuck he's been doing these last months on Fridays that have caused pain/burning along the bond every Friday night. But I said I'd leave it open until it causes me pain. And me readying EXPECTING the smack of hurt along the bond from Eric isn't the same as him actually doing something that causes pain/damage to me and thus the bond between our souls.  So I'm expecting it, and my hunch is it deals with the band Instagram account since me getting blocked from that account after being honest that the country music was causing me enough physical pain I'd not attend further Delta Rae shows AND Eric knowingly going live exclusively on the band Instagram account AFTER me telling him personally on multiple social media forums why that was unjust to go exclusively there where fans had been ostracized due to honesty by someone representing the band and that's when Eric shattered my trust, by going live on the band's Instagram account (not his, that was never an issue) right at the end of the Kickstarter without caring about causing me pain OR caring about him intentionally acting as a bully in an unjust way by going live there.  How can you trust in someone who doesn't care if they hurt you and doesn't care if they act as a bully and take ACTIVE part in system of ostracism and injustice (even if they didn't create it, still they took active part in it)? That's why I said nothing good can grow from the bond til I can get all the poisons out of the love that Britt and Eric planted in it...  What sort of healthy love can you have if you don't trust the other person to care for you and you actively expect them to hurt you?

So the bond is still active, I can feel it and feel him and his shadow of hope in the fact I've left it open and he can at least reach me..... But nothing has ACTUALLY changed since he chose to go live on the band Instagram account (still never having dealt with the injustice/bullying issues of taking part in ANY system of deliberate ostracism, especially when it was unmerited and only about having been honest and Britt wishing to punish honesty that cast her choices in a bad light.)
~I've still not listened to The Light. I haven't listened to ANY Delta Rae music since mid-March. None of their songs.
~I still no longer follow the band or any member of the band on Instagram or twitter (I do still like the band page on Facebook though it doesn't give me notifications or show up top of feed any longer  and I haven't unsubscribed any email lists or kickstarter list) and I never have checked in on them since.
~I still have removed and put in a closet the signed posters off my wall (and rearranged the posters of other bands on that wall so there's no empty space where their 3 were), my copper mugs and ceramic Christmas mug, and all the tees/tanks I had purchased over the years.

I HAVE loved some of their recent posts when they've randomly shown up in my Facebook feed -- but only when it's them sharing music from melanated voices. Because the justice issue and them standing on the right side of that is bigger and more important than the wrong that Liz, Britt, and Eric did to me and how broken it is for me having any trust in Eric now....   because the social justice issues matter more than wrongs done to me personally and my broken faith.

Nothing's healed. Nothing's changed even a little. I'm actually still waiting for the smack of expected pain from Eric along the bond on Friday night and me having to slam back down and spend my energy muting him out shutting down that bond once he hurts me again by knowingly doing what I've told him is ethically wrong as well as intentionally causing pain. This is an armistice of exhaustion and him overwhelming the bond --  not anything healing, not any rapprochement of any sort, not any renewal of faith/trust in Eric to be anything other than a source of hurts to me, not any desire in me for anything related to Delta Rae in my life, not me in any way seeking to bring him or his band into my life, not him having done ANYTHING to show me there's any change in him or reason for me to trust him. Just me being too tired and low on energy at this point with everything going on in the world learning what must be learned in the year of perfect vision for me to pour my own energy into trying to shut him out and mute the bond between our souls.  And as soon as he DOES cause me pain via the bond, I'll shut him out again and mute the bond. It's about his choices/actions before I'll do it -- but I won't hesitate to do it to protect myself from him continuing to willfully and knowingly do wrong by taking part in the unjust system of ostracism created in the entire band's name. And the thing is, i don't have to even know what he's done -- because of the bond, him knowingly do it will cause me pain by the way it burns along the bond while he's knowingly committing that ethics violation AFTER I told him it existed and nobody form the band ever once reached out to me or even responded about it no matter how many times I brought it up, publicly and privately, on band socials AND to individuals in the band. This is their ethics fuckup and their refusal to acknowledge Britt could ever have done wrong and supporting her defensiveness over that which has brought this to pass. There's literally nothing else in Eric or anything I've ever observed from him or the band as a whole that didn't appeal to me until 1) the decision to sign to a country label and sell out their music and everything the band ever stood for and 2) Britt's defensiveness at receiving honesty instead of admiration about that choice and her choosing to be a bully and make the entire band act as bullies in a system of created injustice towards fans who had merely been honest. It was Eric's willingness to follow his sister's lead and take part in a system of bullying and ostracism and injustice AFTER being told that it existed that shattered my trust in his character -- and not a damn thing else.

But I'm a Capricorn moon this life. And when you deal with a Capricorn sun or Capricorn moon, they will NEVER forget when you violate ethics and break their trust. And that broken trust will forever color their ability to extend further love or allow you to hurt them once you've shown them you can't be trusted. And you will only ever get two chances to hurt a Cap by breaking their trust -- the first time will hurt the worst -- but if you show them you've grown and changed and time has passed and you seem sincere you can have probationary trust to see if you really have changed from who you were. You break that probationary trust for a second time, especially along the same faultlines in your character, and you will be dead to them for the rest of that life no matter how much pain the Cap must endure cutting you out of them and what emotional sacrifices that demands of us after you've broken our trust.... My da and I were actually just talking about this earlier tonight surrounding some family things with his siblings -- about how "hard-hearted" Capricorns appear to others if you ever break our trust in you and your ethics and how it's really a defense mechanism of self-protection after you've hurt us by shattering our trust. My da is a Capricorn sun and I'm a Capricorn moon, so this is something we have in common in our natures. It's also why you want a Cap sun or moon around in an emergency or to lead your war -- our ability to set aside our emotions and calmly analytically look at what we must do to get the best possible outcome with what we have available in the current crisis we're triaging.

So I haven't forgotten that Eric knowingly acted in a way to cause me hurt after being told why it was wrong and bullying and bad ethics and I still EXPECT hurt from him as a result of what he showed me to be the weakness of his character, especially when following Britt's lead about her defensive and cruel streak to try to hide when she has been wrong or cruel by her past choices/actions. I've left the bond wide open, but I still expect from it and from Eric that he will just use it to repeat his past choices that cause(d) me hurt and prove he doesn't deserve a second chance of any sort of even probationary trust waiting for him to break it again. It's as much a way for me to gather data on my own growth toward numbness and stoicism so he can't have the power to hurt me AND a way to measure if there's any chance he HAS learned anything or grown to be deserving of even the smallest amount of trust in his character and ethics to be extended to him.

But as I've said, I'm tensing up mentally preparing myself for him to hurt me again via the bond by whatever it is he's been doing on Friday nights in recent months (though not last Friday, actually) that sends fire and acid along the bond as he once again KNOWINGLY acts in unjust cruel bullying ways (likely involving the band's instagram account -- though that is my unsubstantiated in any way hypothesis based on that's the issue that broke my trust in him and brought up what in him requires healing/growth/learning his fucking karmic lessons.)

And of course, Mercury just went retrograde, starting the week long trials of karmic lessons and setting of future karmic options of having so many planets all retrograde (Mars doesn't go retrograde til August or maybe September -- don't remember exact date right now, but this year of perfect vision, all planets will be retrograde at some point, usually more than half of them at the same time throughout the entire year) AND a solar eclipse during a 3 eclipse portal where the solar eclipse just HAPPENS to coincide with the summer solstice, the most light there will be on any day of the entire year of 2020..

But. Threre's always free will. I don't know what he WILL choose. I just know that I expect him to act in ways that cause me pain and remind me of how shattered any trust I had in him or his ethics has been since late August 2019. Just because I have no faith and EXPECT him to hurt me and remind me why the trust is shattered doesn't mean he will.... And every day that he doesn't do it, it shifts my esteem of him just a little in his favor. Not enough to start building up any trust in him on credit or to expect anything besides hurt from him at this point, but still a glimmer of tiny hope that maybe he's growing and learning to be a better man than he was and maybe he can/will do the work so i can extend him his second and only other chance with my trust in this life. (I am after all a Scorpio Venus as well as Capricorn moon -- breaking my trust in the ethics of you as a person AND showing me you don't care if you cause me hurt is generally the single worst "destroying everything for the rest of this life" thing you could do.... My trust is hard enough to gain in the first place for me to let you in enough you could ever hurt me. But after you've broken it? Every moment that you spend not breaking it again is the tiniest grain of sand in trying to build a foundation to earn even my cautious probationary trust that maybe you deserve a second chance.... And anyone who knows anything at all about astrology would know that just from finding out they're dealing with a Cap moon and a Scorpio Venus (regardless of how my sun and rising soften these aspects of my emotions.)

It's glacially slow, but not impossible for Eric to earn himself back a second chance if he stops causing me continuous hurt along the bond by repeating his acts of bullying/injustice/taking part in a system of intentional cruelty and ostracism towards fans who were honest.  It's not impossible, but it would mean him choosing to stop repeating the harmful/hurtful actions and refusing to take part in the system of injustice that was created in the name of the entire band on their Instagram account. It's entirely possible for him to start that work and conscious choice of him choosing not to intentionally do wrong or cause hurts. I don't expect it, but I won't lie to myself or anyone else by saying it's impossible or beyond what he could do.

And. Just abstaining from causing further harm, without fixing the injustice done in the name of the band or trying to heal the wrongs done..... it will stop him from continuing to break things further and continue losing me... But it takes more than abstaining from hurting someone and abstaining from doing something you know to be ethically wrong and unjust to begin the process of undoing the damage of past bullying and pain you caused. And if all he does is abstaining from perpetuating himself from knowingly joining in the system of bullying and ostracism that was created in the band's name on their own official Instagram account, then unless Dave somehow changes his mind, he'll still lose me to Dave in this life for as long as I am building anything good with Dave -- even if that means 20 years, 50 years of me having that bond unreachable while I give Dave a fair chance with my heart. even if that means that in this life we both grow old or one/both of us dies before Eric gets his second chance to prove to me I can trust him with my heart not to knowingly hurt me again..... O in another lifetime, or however many future lifetimes, Eric will have a fresh slate, especially if he properly does his karmic work and learns to be better than he has been. But in this one? Abstaining from doing further wrong is a bare minimum not to make things worse -- it's not going to make me want anything to do with Delta Rae in my life again any time soon nor will it stop me from allowing myself to love Dave for who he is in this life and for me to give an unbroken trust in Dave and David's capacity to  love and him not choosing to hurt me or betray me by following another person's bad ethics into bad ethical acts of his own.

That's the consequence of Eric choosing to do things he was told before he did them why those actions would be unjust and hurtful and wrong but rather than facing it to correct the ethical wrongs or doing anything for him to NOT be a bully, he chose to take active part in accepting and perpetuating the system of intentional injustice and ostracism created by his sister's choices born from her cruelty and defensiveness of her having been wrong and being called out on it honestly.  She may have created a system of injustice in the band's name -- but she never forced him to choose to be active part once he was told DIRECTLY that it existed and that putting ANY content exclusively on the band Instagram account was to take part in an injustice and bullying via ostracism. And it was his choice that broke my trust in him -- not Britt's inherent weaknesses (that she mistakenly thinks prove she's strong, but only make her a bully) of cruelty and defensiveness about trying to hide/deny what she does wrong.

So yeah, bond is still active, Eric can still reach me on it for the last week now... But he's not actively healing anything and I'm still waiting and expecting his weekly betrayal and the fire and acid down the bond as he retrenches in choosing to act as a bully and to choose ethics of injustice/ostracism rather than ethics of inclusivity.  And as soon as he DOES hurt me via the bond by choosing to continue to act as a bully in Britt's system of injustice/ostracism that betrays  in hypocrisy everything she or anyone in the band has ever claimed the band stands for ethically, I'll shut him out and mute down to nothing the bond again so he can't reach me that way......

That's how that stands right now.

And also..... for so long it's always been Eric's songs and the timbre of his voice singing that has filled my inner space, especially in my moments of silence. But that has changed since late October 2018 when Britt blocked me on her personal page for being honest that the country music would stop me from attending future Delta Rae concerts as much as I loved Hands Dirty and wanted to see it live. -- and then the next day I was blocked on the band page for repeating that same truth.  When I refused to have Eric stuck between his sister's bullying choices and me, knowing that he loves her since she's his sister, so I'd let him go as well as the band (before deciding in April 2019 that I was doing wrong by punishing him and the boys for what they didn't know had been done in their name and I should give them a chance to learn and make right the wrongs she'd done before they deserved to be lumped in the category of bully with her.)  That's when I started trying to stop his voice from being the one inside my inner space. And ever since my final straw "one last chance" for Delta Rae to fix what Delta Rae broke and did wrong  with the expiration date of the release of The Light, I've not heard him in my inner space. Most of the time, the songs I hear in my inner silence are Dave's singing and his songs. especially since Covid-19 lockdown and his weekly livestreams including incredibly new songs as he's working on them and finishing them about his current inner state.... I've been pretty consistently having Maybe Love's Enough, Hummingbird Love, How Will I Know I'm Ready, and the fan livestream group co-write garden song (which he used a LOT of my suggested phrasing and imagery in) repeating in my head. Especially when everything around me is silent. Especially as I'm falling asleep or waking up..... I think since March 20, the only handful of times it's been Eric's voice/songs are occasional lines of him wanting to reach me/find me or about him being strong enough to get there and fix this -- and only when Eric has been in such inner distress that it bleeds through despite the bond being shut down as impossible to reach me via it as I could achieve..... But mostly in my inner silence now, it's David's voice in lines saying he believes in love, asking his hummingbird love to stay not run away from him, and wanting to know when he'll be good enough for what he wants or know if she loves him in return and how only by trying will he find out.... Anyway. That's also worth knowing. That since the world shut down, it's been Dave's voice and lines echoing inside my inner spaces in my moments of silence where it used to always be Eric's....all this life it's been Eric's,  even before I heard his physical voice with my own ears.... That change now is uncharted territory.