"Above all, don't lie to yourself. The man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to a point that he cannot distinguish the truth within him, or around him, and so loses all respect for himself and for others. And having no respect he ceases to love."~Fyodor Dostoevsky (Brothers Karamazov)

So I was thinking about it objectively earlier this evening and I don't think it's a good idea for me to spend a very long time in the state of non-action and the stillness of the center on this tangle of emotions/actions/inactions/reactions. I think that in the longterm it will be damaging the longer I practice it in this case. And what i felt inside me and what I observed objectively when tonight Eric once more had a story I  can't watch but I can see exists (I presume he shared the same post from the band's insta that i saw on the band's facebook -- it's not that I can't see the content elsewhere or I couldn't create a burner account just to see what is shared where I was unfairly blocked out of defensiveness, it's that their behavior around this is a serious ethics issue matter of principle for me) So when I saw he had another unwatchable story, I did what I have to do to make me cease reacting before it spins out of my control after being poked where it needs healing -- and what I observed confirmed my contemplative concerns of earlier.

Because, what I'm doing is teaching myself not to react when poked where it hurts or angers my outraged sense of justice and ethics. And the thing with emotions is that they are guideposts, like physical pain, of when something is amiss and harmful. They're there to warn us to stop doing something before it causes irreparable damage. Our emotions are like physical pain -- it's there to tell us when something is wrong or harmful. We hurt and we sorrow and we get angry to the depth that we care. All passionate emotion is a measure of love, even when it's expressing in ways that are negative or harmful or toxic or just fucking uncomfortable to experience. 

When I teach myself not to react to him having stories on his instagram that I can see exist but I can't watch or when I steel myself not to let myself be hurt by the influx of further poisons down the bond from him knowingly doing wrong on Wednesday nights (it used to be on Friday nights back in like late Spring/early Summer, but for months now it's been Wednesday nights) I am teaching myself to put out the flame of the love -- it hurts and I care BECAUSE of how intensely I love so it matters to me what is done. Whenever I focus to minimize and remove the emotions from unbalancing me, when I teach me not to react, what I'm doing is teaching myself indifference towards him and our bond.

It's another form of my stoic streak and martyrdom manifesting to do it, to teach myself not to react. But the consequence of it isn't that the source of the hurts/poisons gets dealt with and healed or that I cut off the good flesh with the poisoned/cancerous/necrotic flesh. It's that I intentionally suffocate the flame of love that is the source of all the passions/emotions until the hurting passes. And there's a very real possibility that I continue to practice non-reaction to being pushed on this, that it very will may result in me snuffing out within myself the flame of love for him itself.  And if you keep snuffing it out and trimming down the wick til there's no wick left, than you can't relight that no matter what you do after you extinguish it. 

Teaching myself not to react or be hurt/sad/angry over it is just a more dangerous form of the stoicism of pushing him out and refusing to let him reach me. It is wrong I think to pursue it for too long rather than dealing with the root causes of the hurts/poisons... it is wrong for the same reason that trying to push him out and dim down shut out the connection is wrong. It's the same basic concept of trying to convert love into indifference so it will stop hurting, just a different method of doing it.

I don't have a better answer right now -- but I believe that forced detachment is as spiritually harmful in it own way as excessive attachment. (This belief that detachment is as harmful as wrongful attachment when it's time to let go is why I'm not a good Buddhist, though there are many Buddhist teachings I can appreciate and find deep wisdom in, I disagree on a rather core principle of it. Same as my disagreement that I believe sins are non-transferrable, I believe each sin must be made right by the soul who did the wrong, is why I can never be a good Christian -- because nobody can expiate your sins but you. My core beliefs don't allow for central articles of faith required for either of these religions.)  

I think that longterm me choosing to insist on non-action in the stillness at the center NO MATTER HOW YOU POKE THE BEAR is actually far more destructive than simply deciding to refuse points of contact and doing my best to quiet the bond. I don't think I/we should allow me to see what happens if I continue this for more than another 2 weeks of clamping down and transmuting the strong reactionary emotions into ash of nothingness. It would be better to stop sooner than that, to minimize damage. I don't think we want to spend too much time teaching me that this is the right way to respond to emotions that are born from caring too intensely... I can feel how I'm teaching myself to destroy the love whenever I teach myself not to react... And I don't think that will be healthy to allow me to make a pattern of for too long.... I feel like mid-December is the longest I should allow this without causing damage that I don't know either of us can heal down the line.... 2 more weeks is the max I should allow it. Beyond that i can't promise it won't do even worse damage than the poisons already introduced and continuously being bred in the connection due to the choices of the past. 

 'The opposite of love is not hate, but indifference."~Elie Wiesel

I should say, in the name of full clarity, that while I am choosing non-action and to observe and to see what Eric chooses for himself, I'm not EXPECTING anything to shift or change from how it's been. I have no reasons to expect any change.  I have zero expectations that anything will be done to clean up the messes of the past. i have zero expectations that there will be anything done to get rid of these poisons that have accumulated due to the fuckups of the past. I have no expectations that anything will be done to safeguard from the same patterns playing out in the future. I have zero expectations that my choosing to wait and not react and see what unfolds will change the likely fate of me having to accept that it is not in this life that the connection is to be renewed so we get to build a life together.

I have no expectations of any of those things. I can want them, but I do not expect them. I have no evidence or reason to make me expect them.

But I'll still wait in non-action and observe what he does or doesn't choose to do with this time of grace he's been given to change my mind before I accept that closing that door is the only thing I can do for my own present and future given his choices past and present. 

And I can't tell you how long this will last, my staying in non-action and waiting to see what unfolds if he can get a steady period of time without my emotions rocking the boat so intensely. I know that I've chosen to wait in non-action, in the still place of the center, to see what he chooses. But I don't know how long til it's time for me to move on and continue the process of letting go if he doesn't choose a path of healing for us to get from the mess we're in to something resembling what we both desire. It's all one long eternal now in the still place at the center - how long is a meaningless phrase there. 

As I've told you, I will not accept dwelling in or allowing a toxic relationship to continue as it's harmful for both of us. If at the end of however long this period of grace for him lasts there is still no change, then I will still choose to separate and force us both to go our own way until it's possible for a healthy relationship to exist. Unhealthy toxic patterns are not going to be tolerated by me in this connection any longer. it's too damaging, to both of us.

But also, as I told you, if there's even any chance at all of us having a healthy relationship THIS life and getting to build our lives together THIS life, then I'll take it. I will do everything in my power that conforms to my ethics to try to increase the chances of getting to have that. 

And. Also. I don't need to expect something for it to happen. I have no precogs on this, only old contingent precogs that disappeared as choices destroyed those fate lines for a time but have since sometimes flashed once more in me as those timelines return to the pool of "still could be."  I don't get definitive immutable precogs til the choice that determines the fate line, which path we go down, occurs. Now that we're past the elections which made such a tangle of fatelines this entire year, there are certain things I precogged prior to the global fate lines getting all tangled up (little things like when I put away my holiday tree last year, I precogged that for this holiday season it would be in front of a book shelf that I didn't yet have and which I only got a few weeks ago out of the blue. Random precogs like that) that are coming true and short term unimportant precogs of my own life arriving again. 

But on this matter I have no expectations and no immutable precogs to tell me what he'll choose or which fate line we end up on.That's part of why I decided to take me being over-sensitive reactionary to every little thing out of the equations right now because it was adding toooo much unpredictability and chaos to allow it to remain. if my choice is to keep myself still in non-action while observing what he chooses and does, then it should become easier to see which fate line it will be because it will hinge upon his choices, his desires, his actions, and my muddying the waters every time I (over)react won't destabilize everything making choices and precogs impossible.

But I can't say I expect trying this approach of sitting in the still place at the center will actually turn things for the better.  It doesn't actually change the things setting it all awry - it just stops me reacting from hurt or anger whenever one of them decides to poke the bear. But then,  I also can't be certain it won't help make things better. So I will continue waiting and observing. 

 O. How did I heal the iron water chemical burn blisters? And without any scarring? 

Well.  First I have very sensitive skin, generally. I react in hives and rashes and in severe cases chemical burns to petroleum products and palm oil and sometimes coconut oil (depending on how it was processed, which it doesn't usually tell you, so I tend to avoid it.)  This keeps me on the "don't use anything" or "use only natural products made from plant or animal oils and actual plants/herbs" regime for any products including soaps, detergents, cleaning products, lotions, etc.  Almost any chemical or pollutant and I get incredibly sick. bad enough that my family has always joked that I'm the canary in the coalmine for toxins. But second, I heal WICKED fast! I have a tendency to sleep a lot, A LOT, while healing -- but I heal fast. When I've had stitches, the skin was already growing over them within 3 days of the stitches and I had to have them removed 4 days after getting them. So while certain things can get me really sick, I also heal super fast once the toxins have been removed..

With the chemical burns from the iron rich water, It reached a point nothing would stop the feeling of constantly burning on the backs of my hands or help with the blisters which were second degree by then. (I showered once that visit and was in so much pain,  everywhere, that I decided I didn't care how dirty/greasy I got from hiking,  I wouldn't shower there ever again.) every expensive or naturopath cream/lotion that any of us had just made them more red and the fire burn worse, the way lidocaine burns on my skin. I was unable to try beeswax (my go to when my hands get dry) as massaging it in to blisters would pop the blisters. The only thing that gave me any short term relief was slathering room temperature organic butter on my hands, but it only helped for about 10mins or so before the burning started again.  I reached a point I nearly told them to take me to the ER because the burning pain was so constant and intense,  but what stopped me was knowing hospitals and doctors prescribe strong lidocaine for topical pain relief and numbing and I know from the time I put a hole in my leg that took 26 stitches (only 15 external) and from dental visits and from the couple times people have bought neosporin and aloe with lidocaine that for me,  both Novocaine and lidocaine cause intense burning along the nerves and creates even more intense pain than just suffering through or having the wound cleaned/stitched without it.... My reaction to lidocaine and novacaine IS part of the redhead gene mutation to pain receptors on nerves.  Blunt trauma doesn't hurt, I can fracture bones and carry on, but certain things burn along the nerves.  Even cold burns..... So when I had the chemical burn blisters from the iron rich water,  I did not go in because I knew that the doctors would try to use lidocaine on it and that would be far worse  pain than even the suffering I had then. 

Then one time, I went with grocery shopping and I got distracted wandered off (or everyone else moved on to another aisle without me,  which is the same thing really) and I randomly found a $22.50 for a 1oz bottle with dropper bottle of certified fully refined 100% pure emu oil  from Montana Emu Ranch right there in Kalispell. (you can buy cheaper emu oil,  but it's not generally refined to pure quality and/or it's cut with other oils. AEA certification not only certifies the quality of life/death of the birds in order to even be considered for it,  but they test/authorize the level of refinery of the oil.)  It was the first I'd ever seen/heard of emu oil.  And I knew it was the only thing I needed the first moment I looked at the bottle sitting on a shelf in the naturopath section where I'd come to browse for organic teas to drink and for the ingredients for me to concoct something from olive oil, essential oils, tisanes, and herbs. But I saw the tiny little bottle with its eye dropper cap and just instantaneously intuitively precogged knew that despite the ridiculous price,  this would work to heal my hands.  So without even looking it up online (no cell reception in that part of Whitefish/Kalispell at that point,  still dodgy carrier dependent now) I bought it despite my parents trying to talk me out of it due to the price of this untested "hunch" of mine. I started to lose my temper (reining in my temper is always hardest when I'm in physical pain) and  told them flat out I was buying it with my own money so I could spend my money on whatever damn foolish thing I got it into my head I wanted/needed. The light above flickered at that and my da backed off recognizing my stubborn,  told my mum to let me spend my own money on it if I insisted and we'd all find out together if my gamble was worth it.  Immediately upon leaving the store, I opened it to put the first drops on the backs of my hands - and it was like magic how the pain just vanished and stayed vanished til 12 hours later when I stupidly once again washed my hands in the tap water while washing up dishes. Anyway. 1 drop of emu oil on each hand,  thrice daily, and in 3 days the blisters were healed.  Chemical burn blisters that were continuously getting worse and worse across 7 days til I was in constant burning pain from it.

I've since researched emu oil fairly extensively in the intervening years, though there isn't much good research on it just a lot of claims - but there are some biochemical breakdowns of it.  It's been hard to study because efficacy of it varies significantly between some people and others.  No logic as to why. But it turns out it is actually THE natural oil with the highest lipid chain titres for providing everything needed to quickly repair lipid bilayers (which is what most cells,  including skin cells are surrounded by) and collagen and to protect skin from further damage. It has micro particles other oils don't (including other bird oils) so it can penetrate between lipid bilayers to heal multiple layers of skin damage not just on the surface.  This can make it a good carrier for essential oils and other moisturizers and anti inflammatory drugs for like arthritis to get them deeper than just the surface. Apparently it is recommended not to use it to relieve the pain of contact poisons (like poison ivy or oak) as it will make the poisons go deeper in your skin so the damage is a longer heal. But any sort of cleaned burn/blister or skin conditions,  it helps.  AND it's antimicrobial and has anti-inflammatory pain relieving compounds in it.   It's also quite miraculous to take orally for certain dietary deficiencies. 

So now I keep it on hand at all times. Because it's expensive if you buy it refined pure, but it's magickal af and a very small amount goes a long way. 

I mean. It's a weird viscous milky colored fluid.  And it smells STRONGLY like chicken/turkey schmaltz - so you waft an eau de homemade chicken soup parfum every time you move your hands for a while.  Which makes everyone hungry and makes any dogs/cats desire to lick you excessively wherever you applied the emu oil. 

But it's fucking miraculous for healing skin!! Even better than beeswax!! i have never known anything else like it,  in any life!!!! Then again,  I've never been born or lived in Australia before and just like ostrich farms,  breeding/farming emus outside of Australia is a fairly recent thing.... But still!!  It's so magickal!  And I feel such an intense debt of gratitude to emus for existing and for the incredible healing properties of emu oil! 

 In case you were ever wondering what it's like to be in a group text thread with me 😂

I really don't react to poison ivy - I can walk on it barefoot and wade through it in shorts and a tank with no problem. You should never follow me hiking off trail if you do react to it.  Also,  if you or anyone you know reacts strongly to poison ivy,  learn to identify jewelweed and pluck a few leaves of it, or even better the stems before the flowers open, when you see it while hiking to help with any brushes with poison ivy.(you can also now buy jewelweed soap from many naturopath/holistic soap makers. That didn't exist when I was younger,  but now I'd recommend packing it just like sunscreen and bugspray and a basic first aid kit for any hiking/camping/backpacking excursion with kids now that it DOES exist.  From what I understand (given that poison ivy has no effect on me) : the soap is less effective than fresh jewelweed, but more effective than no jewelweed.  And jewelweed soap can be used on clothing and animals that have come into contact with poison ivy which the leaves/sap can't as easily cleanse and neutralize.)

It's also true that water with a high iron content actually DOES cause me to break out in horribly painful burn blisters all over my skin. it's especially bad on the backs of my hands, probably because of washing my hands more often throughout a given span of time than other parts of my skin.  I have learned to buy bottled water for washing my hands and hair and to sponge bath style wash myself with water bottle water when I visit places with well water with a high iron content... Including my parents cabin in Montana....  Ingesting iron rich water also causes me internal bleeding issues the way small amounts of pork contamination too small to start me vomiting causes me internal bleeding.  (small amounts of pork poisoning that don't induce vomiting but will cause me internal bleeding include: porcine gelatin (including gel caps on pills - but like most pills, those I usually just throw back up anyway), eating fries or sweet potato fries or tater tots or anything fried at places that cook their bacon in the fryer (surprisingly common cooking hack at restaurants), southern style cornbread or traditional tamales that use lard,  Nashville hot chicken (traditionally use lard to batter it), ordering pizza or subway somewhere they touch the cheese/veggies with the same gloves they used to touch ham/bacon/pepperoni/sausage/canadian bacon, improperly cleaned griddle and utensils while also cooking someone else's porky meal,  making out with a guy after he's recently enough eaten pork that the proteins are still in his mouth,  etc. Amounts that small of the proteins. It's great fun...... 😒 and I don't always know the source of the contaminant if I eat out, order in from certain places, or eat anything premade.)  

So yeah.  Iron rich water causes me to have burn and blisters all over my skin and causes me internal bleeding when ingested.... Folklore would say it's my fairy blood that finds the cold iron inimical to me. Or,  more accurately,  that I must be a changeling of a fairy bloodline since nobody else on either side of my family reacts to touch of iron by breaking out in chemical burn blisters.  Science says there is a naturally occurring bacteria in oxidized iron veins that this bacteria in an aqueous solution produces burns/blisters on a small percentage of people's skin - but they don't know why. Curiously, chemical burns/blisters from this bacteria in aqueous solution IS apparently a more common reaction in people with either or both of 2 of the various redhead related genetic mutations - these mutations are specifically modifications of pain receptors, but the data isn't extensive or conclusive enough to find causation there. Also there are people with these mutations who do not get chemical burns and blisters from iron water.  So science says it's a bacteria,  they think,  but they don't know why.  😂 May as well claim it's faery blood. 

Either way, I can touch poison ivy without reacting but my skin gets chemical burn blisters and I bleed internally from iron rich water....  Yep.  That's a thing with me,  lol. 

I wasn't trying to be cruel in that assessment of the dynamics at play, just honest. Everyone has positive and negative traits and I'm actually a firm believer that everything short of actual psychopathy, all flaws are actually virtues that we've allowed to overgrow into destructive tendencies and some pruning back will bring us back into virtues not flaws. It's a theory I developed as a kid trying to understand other people's cruel or self-destructive behavior patterns and I've spent the rest of my life trying to break this theory and never have. (Science background, I'm always trying to break my theories because that's what good science does  -- you create a hypothesis, develop experiments to try to break the theory and if the evidence doesn't break or disprove the hypothesis, then you get closer to calling it a theory. A theory is just a hypothesis that has withstood all the tests thus far you've come up with to try to break it. But I'll admit that as a philosopher and spiritualist, I'm always chuffed af when I can't break a particular theory of mine no matter how hard I try.  I really REALLY love theories I can't break no matter what I throw at them to try to break them.)  All flaws, no matter how toxic we let them grow, have their root in a positive virtue. Think of your character like a garden. Every plant in it are seeds of virtue originally, and at their root, the qualities still have goodness in them as their INTENTION but if you're not careful and let them over-run unchecked, they'll start crowding out other virtues and grow into something unrecognizable for how it began. That's how virtues turn into vices, by not keeping them pruned and in proper check to make sure they're something healthy not turned toxic.  

Me, I know I get stubborn when people tell me what to do -- and while it's rooted in me knowing it is my own conscience that must clean up the consequences of whatever I do so I better make damn sure that I'm okay with that, I also know that sometimes it makes me reactionary so I dig in my heels and refuse to do something JUST BECAUSE someone else told me to do it EVEN IF right before they said anything I was about to do exactly what they told me to do. That's one of many flaws of my own, but telling me I ought to do something is generally not recommended if you ever want it to be done (unless I explicitly ask you, "Please remind me of this so I don't forget") 

 So I don't say my analysis of what happened and why the pattern will repeat if the root causes of it aren't faced and dealt with (as well as cleaning up the mess from the past) from a place of intentional cruelty. Nor do I say it in rejection of her or as blinding me to the good in her (and there is a lot of brilliantly good qualities in her.) I say it from a point of having analyzed the forces at play because it is the forces you don't acknowledge that will bite you in the ass. It's the person who you trust most who claimed to be neutral who will sell you to the English for a sack of gold and silver so they can fake a trial and burn you at the stake. It's the child you had by the ruler of Rome to protect you and your land that will make his son decide to defend his mother's honor by annexing your nation and murdering your children (his own half siblings) and parade you in the streets of Rome unless you kill yourself to avoid the shame of it. It's saving the lives of the white devils out of pity and because all life is sacred then they keep coming until they kill you off with diseases your body has no immune defense against then centuries later another batch of them return to overrun you and kill you and steal everything that was yours. It's the volcano under your feet that provides hot water and fumes for visions that will destroy everything that you built your life on and kill everyone you don't evacuate from the path of its fury unleashed not to mention everywhere that drowns under the tsunami.

The forces you don't acknowledge are always the ones that will destroy everything.Doesn't matter if they're external forces or the unexamined motives within you (or others) -- it's always the unacknowledged forces that will destroy everything.

So I didn't say any of my analysis of it to be cruel, I say it because to refuse to acknowledge the truth of the forces at play is to invite the destruction they could wreak if you don't give them their due caution. Particularly if they're forces that have already been used for purposes of destruction and/or cruelty and/or defensive lashing out. And when you won't even fix the destruction you already wrought with these forces, how could you ever be trusted not to turn them to loose them again as a recurring pattern if you make no changes to try to protect against the damage of them. 

I'd always rather turn and face something, even if I die in battle, then try to pretend the danger doesn't exist to let it ambush me. I'd rather turn and choose to fight. Preferably on my terms and my choice of ground, but still I'd rather a chance to fight a force then let it destroy me. Have the courage to face whatever terrifies you -- because it is what you run from that will destroy you. Always. So I will choose to turn and fight. I've always been that way. In every life. You will fight how you train. But you can't fight what you don't acknowledge exists -- the first step to gritting your teeth and setting your shoulders before you lift your sword is in knowing the forces at play that require being faced.  You will fight how you train. So train yourself to turn and face and analyze all the forces at play, because it's the unacknowledged force you don't face that will destroy you.

One of my own flaws is honesty and I know it --  I will always err on the side of too much honesty rather than a lie but you should hear the truths I say when I get angry.  You know the truths that people aren't ready/able to face yet? The things that you know but you also know you must wait to say until a time where they can heal rather than tear down. Those are the things I say when I get angry -- I say them deliberately not caring how much damage they cause in being said. If you piss me off intentionally, I will say them with the intention of breaking you by making you face everything in you and that you have ever done or will do on your current path that you just can't face. That's what I do when I get angry, I turn brutally cruelly honest. Like justice without mitigation by mercy that turns la revolution into Le grand terreur. Virtue untamed turned into vice. It's why I work so hard at controlling my temper this life -- because WHILE I'm angry, I don't care what the fuck I burn down and destroy with truths people aren't ready to hear or face. Also, even if my not angry self didn't get upset over what my angry self's untempered honesty using truth as a weapon destroyed, constantly having to replace/repair electronics and lightbulbs gets really fucking expensive. REALLY fucking expensive, lol.

It's okay to acknowledge that a virtue in you can be turned into a vice and that you fucked up because of it -- not acknowledging it is HOW you end up destroying things with your negative traits. Acknowledging them and pruning them is how you keep the virtue without getting overgrown.  But it starts by acknowledging the way it's growing to choke out your other good qualities. It STARTS with the facing it and acknowledging that it has turned negative and toxic in you and needs to be pruned back into the virtue it originally was, and still could be if you just prune it back to being healthy instead of overgrown neglected.

 Also. if you want my admiration and respect, you have to earn it. You don't get it for nothing. It's only worth something if it's true and honest admiration. And if you want that, it requires you choose to be a version of you that's WORTHY of being admired. Love is something else -- love is something beyond admiration, love is... even I don't know exactly what it's woven from, but it's interwoven from spirit and acknowledging the spirit of others in you and of you in them... Even if you don't necessarily like them, let alone admire them, you may still love them...love is something other than admiration. My admiration? That's born of respect. You must earn my respect and I only respect those who CHOOSE to be good and honest and beautiful and true and don't leave their messes for other people to clean up. You can't earn my respect by power or money or popularity or force  -- you can only earn my respect by your choices and actions and a genuine desire to work toward being the best version of you possible. It's that easy and that hard. A child can earn my respect and the person who most desires the spotlight of admiration may be of no interest to me. it's the quality of your character and your courage in facing your inner demons and your humility in acknowledging your fuckups so you can clean them up and be better than you were before that earns my respect and admiration. And that's the only path to my admiration. Ever. For anyone.

 For the record,  when I say I want a healthy relationship or nothing at all until we've grown into versions of ourselves that CAN have a healthy relationship,  I'm not saying I don't love Eric more than I can words or that I don't WANT that healthy relationship NOW growing ever healthier and better.  Because I do love him and want that.  More than anything else,  I selfishly want a healthy good for us both relationship. 

 I just recognize I can't make his choices for him or do his shadow work growth for him or draw his boundaries over third party interference in his life (mis)  representing him as being onboard with what their choices do/have done in his name. And those are the things that NEED to be done to heal the poisons making this such an emotionally draining toxic mess between him and me when it should be natural and easy.   

That's where the change has to happen to get this unstuck and to heal away the poisons.  And I can't do it, not for him and not for myself.  Even if I could clean up THIS mess,  if you're honest with yourself about the good and bad within personality types,  can you say that this same pattern won't happen again as soon as there's a chance to try to assert a third party power dominance move? Because I can't say it won't happen again from any evidence I can see.  This is the product of repeated behavioral patterns and it will happen any time defensiveness happens on her part over being told a truth she doesn't want to hear or whenever she tries to assert her way as better than mine for me and my needs and runs afoul of my stubbornly independent refusal to be forced unto the master-slave dialectic with anyone.  You can take from me things I love to try to punish me or intentionally act to hurt me or even kill me,  but you cannot bend me to enslave my free will. That's simply not in my nature. And trying to assert queen bee dominance over me will get you stubborn refusal to play that game AND my honesty calling out the behavior to everyone,  whether they listen or not.  

So even if I could wave my fairy wand to magically fix this mess of poisons and return everything in my relations to the band back to how it was in 2016 before they signed to try to fit in at country radio,  it would only be a matter of time before it happens again over something else when my stubborn insistence on honesty and forming my own independent opinion makes her feel insecure so then she feels she needs to try to make others follow her way. Which makes me dig my heels in deeper that truth is truth,  right is right,  and ethics are not subject to whims. And since I have never yet found reasons to choose moral relativism or enslaving my own mind to another's whim, there are only two ways that recurring pattern of defensiveness that this leads to ends if our personalities are to interact at all - she chooses to learn and grow so as not to try to dominate me or he insists on firm boundaries of not putting him in the middle of her petty power games.  And neither of those ways of breaking her repeated behavioral patterns in this life so they don't poison his life are within my powers to make happen. 

*shrugs* I acknowledge I am powerless to do any of what needs to happen to heal the poisons of the past and prevent her planting seeds of noxious poisons in the future.  And that means my relationship with him will be toxic for as long as she continues petty girl bullying tactics with me to try to force a hierarchy on someone who refuses to enter into any master-slave leader-follower dynamics.  

So.  As to what I want,  in the order of my preferences?  

1) a healthy relationship with Eric,  in this life

2) Nothing at all until there has been enough growth in both of us to allow option 1

3) a toxic emotional rollercoaster with third party interference poisoning any seeds either he or I try to sow. 

If I am denied a means of reaching option 1, I will choose option 2 of the options remaining.  I won't LIKE option 2, but I'll choose it and see it through because it's better than option 3. And the only way you can stop me and change my choice is to find a way to put option 1 back on the table. 

It's not that I don't love him which pushes me to leave in the current poisoned stuck place we're in.  It's that I love him too much to allow us to keep damaging each other by falling into the the undesired worst possible choice of option 3.

And so it's in that spirit I tell you that I'm neither unfollowing nor opening up further to him - and if he chooses persisting in toxic patterns that create poisons killing anything good he or I try to do,  then in the right time I will let him go in love and I will dance my wandering path from joy to joy without him until he's grown enough to choose differently and thus bring option 1 back into the realm of possible....  

That's my choice if you persist in choices that remove option 1 from the table.  It is and always will be my choice of these 3 options if I can't have option 1 which is the option I want.... I'd rather nothing for as long as it takes than to perpetually damage each other with toxic poisons.  

But for now I'm choosing no further action,  I don't think that I am done yet keeping myself in the still point of the center to observe what he wants, what he'll choose for himself,  and the paths his actions may create if I give him that chance. So I will continue to strive to keep myself tranquil instead of reactionary and to stay in the still place at the center of nonaction until I see what he wants enough to choose and what may unfold from his choice.  I can't promise how long I can rein in my reactionary impulses when provoked - you poke the bear at your own risk. But I wish to find out what he would choose if given an opportunity, so I will strive to hold myself in a place of doing nothing for now to see what changes may come - but even in non-action I won't lie to myself or anyone else about how fucked up this is and the deep work of other people's choices/actions required to provide an antidote to the poisons destroying everything that could grow in this life between Eric and me. 

I'mma go shower right now though.  I need it and I have fresh bedclothes (including my fair isle polar bear and snowflakes flannel duvet cover!!) so want to be clean when I head to bed.  And my long curls take hours to dry,  even with sitting near the fire that's still burning in the hearth.  (I'll close the glass doors on the fireplace while in the shower though,  just in case sparks of shifting wood + fur babies getting too close = a horrible accident in my absence. Better to avoid that possibility.)

 So I have decided not to do anything, to grow or diminish the connection, because Eric is not currently enough in my life for me to be giving myself such heartache and worrying my pretty little head over like this.  He can play along with the asinine juvenile head games and power tripping that the girls have made of the band's instagram account (and for all I know other socials to other people who were honest that the country radio was a no go red line) while getting off to whoever hot girl of the moment he finds on tinder or insta or wherever or was introduced to by his sister trying to play matchmaker throwing her friends at him in the hopes her brother will give her a sister of her choosing not his.  That's no part of my life path and he can pursue such a course as long as he damn well likes, he's completely free to make that choice if he want - but without me being any fucking part of that hot mess.  I'm not here to control him, no more than I am here to follow the will of anyone else - I am here to serve truth and justice faithfully, to love and to be loved as I am, to fight demons of all varieties, and to  heal whatever I find that deserves a chance and my gifts can help give that chance.  

I'll just go on soaking in the joy of my hygge life in my hermitage flat that's like a cabin/treehouse/library/art gallery/tea shop dancing through my time in this life with my menagerie of animal friend familiars and collection honest empath family/friends who don't play games and who love me gor me qua me.  As long as bullshit emotional manipulation strings are attached to having him in my life,  he's better off pursuing whoever or whatever else he's tempted by. I don't belong in a relationship with anyone who will ask me to accept toxic behavior patterns they refuse to even acknowledge. I want a healthy positive relationship with him wherein we help each other be our best versions of ourselves or I want nothing at all from him.  When he grows up enough that me qua me, with all my sparkly warmth and overflowing ideas and intense emotions and strong gifts, is of enough interest to him to choose me instead of playing middle school popularity clique games,  then he can try to find me.  And maybe at that point there will be a space in my life he fits in and maybe there won't - I guess that depends on his timing and luck.  But it starts with him deciding the version of himself he chooses to be and what matters to him personally in how he constructs his life and the future he desires for himself.  

A toxic half relationship codependent karmic bond is not on the table moving forward.  Something healthy for both of us or nothing at all until such a time as the connection can be made healthy. 

That is my choice and my joyous epiphany this morning while my soul is full of sparkly snow giddies and firelight. 

It actually is right now.  It started snowing around 4am so I planned to get out of bed when I awoke for sunrise then romp with my dog onas long a frolic as we desired in the fresh snow until coming home to change into fuzzy warm pjs, warm up with a cuppa twa while I light a fire in the hearth and then coffee/brunch. And then spending the rest of my day/night feeding the fire,  getting my linens washed for snuggling down under clean fresh bedding tonight, tidying up things around here so I can put up my tree/holiday decorations on Thursday,  and reading.  Oooh and Dave has a live stream on their Patreon (so unlisted youtube livestream linked from their patreon)  at 7:30 tonight - gonna have some dinner and whiskey and enjoy his songs by the crackly fire in my hearth! 

But I definitely woke the dog up from a VERY sound sleep just a bit after sunrise by excitedly whispering by her ear,  "Guess what?!  It's snowing!!!" she started wagging her tail then snorted in disbelief closed her eyes again.  So then I started hopping up and down excitedly told Audrey Anne Pupburn, "But it is!!  It is!!  It IS snowing pupkin!!!! A real snow!!! A frolicsome perfect snow!!!  Just look!!!" Then I bodily picked her up carried her to the window and as soon as she saw it, her tail started thwacking me full speed and she started yipping in excitement.  And THEN I asked her,  "You wanna go for a walk? Play in the snow?" and she started scrabbling yo be put down and ran to the front door where she began excitedly spinning in circles like she's a puppy not a 13.5 year old lil old lady.

So then we went on a 3 hour frolic walk in the fresh falling snow,  skipping and dancing and throwing snow for her to catch and me making snow angels with her making dog wallows rolling and snorting in a soccer field and catching snowflakes on the tongue.

And that level of exuberant joie de vivre to play in the snow for 3 hours then be all productive zen by the fire is probably why I'm single.  😂 At least my dog and cat love me! Even if Spock thinks that the cold wet white stuff we bring in 4.5 months of the year is an illogical abomination he must hide from until it has all melted or else chunk of it will be tossed at him by the ape child in this household.

Mmmmmmm,  brunch and coffee o'clock now!  I'm ravenously hungry after all that time playing in the snow with my doggo.  Maybe some snow and fire pics later.  Maybe not.  On verra. 

 In case you were wondering what it looks like right now on my instagram feed since Eric shared to his story what I presume was a Delta Rae official account post (where I am still blocked for having been honest in 2018 that the country radio music would keep me from attending further Delta Rae shows - AFTER trying 6 times at 6 different "we're country artists now" concerts and having to drink heavily throughout each of those shows to be able to endure without obvious flinching the pain to my synesthesia from the opening artists and the music before/between sets.) 

This is the top of my insta right now: 

And this is what I see as I scroll through posts: 

And there is no way to turn it off or stop being reminded of the injustice of the girls and the indifference of the boys to the ostracism and wrongs done in the entire band's name on the band's official account. My options given their unwillingness to even respond when it's been brought to their attention are waiting 24 hours for the story to disappear (though the memory it happened will not disappear so easily) or unfollowing Eric so it won't happen in the future or living with the perpetual reminder that he doesn't give a damn about being complicit in an unfair system of injustice and intentional cruelty that is how the girls defensively reacted to truth they didn't want to hear.  Which makes me lose respect for him at an ethics level for 1) disappointment at him not having the ethical core to deal with it when confronted with it since it's a wrong done in his name and 2) disgust at him openly being complicit and taking part in their created system of "let's celebrate with all our fans - except you,  you're not allowed to sit with us because you gave us honesty" every time he shares from the band account or he goes live there.  Which feeds back into me concluding that I want nothing to do with him so long as that's the sort of person he would choose to be.

*shrugs* this reaction from me won't  ever change unless you make changes to show you have the ethics in actions not just words that you claim to have when it comes to issues of bullying and injustice.  Until then,  every reminder of it and every time someone in the band says,  "find us on instagram" is an overt act of cruelty and hypocrisy against the ideals you sell songs claiming you stand by.  It just is. 

I'm going to go make breakfast now.  And then I'm going to do some laundry while rearranging books and bookshelves til the Packers game at 3:25. I can't put up my holiday tree until the new to me bookshelves are where they belong.  This failure of ethics and my anger born out of disappointment over it isn't worth the time and energy and heartache they cost me. I have more important things to invest my energy into than hypocrites with bad ethics who refuse to grow or change when confronted with honesty and truth and instead prefer defensive systems of injustice they create and perpetuate and control.  Such southern white supremacist style controlling bullshit as a reaction to being called out on their choices causing pain and having consequences for others.... Which makes it particularly ironic and telling that it originated from Britt (under the influence of Jessie) in reaction to tough truths given the incredibly public claims to be an ally against acts of bullying and systems of oppression. And yet being guilty of creating and maintaining such systems when given even the smallest amount of power and a chance to be better than their ancestors.... 

But that is another issue.  That's the karma of the girls. And it's for them to make right or suffer the consequences of their choices and actions.  Eric is simply guilty of participating in and perpetuating the system of injustice by bullying via ostracism.  He is complicit in it and it exists in his name representing his ethics, but to my knowledge he had no part in creating it and no intentional cruelty in him.  Just indifference to his cruelty from his continuing to stand by and take part in the system others created. Which is still ethically wrong,  but a different level of guilt.

There is no healing or lasting forgiveness over past/present injustice without the guilty party acknowledging the wrongs they committed, making things right by those who were victims of the wrong, and seeking to be better in the future.  That's basic ethics of justice and how not to be a bully 101. Anything else is simply condoning it as "they"re really a good person" rationalizing the abusive,  bullying,  unjust behavior patterns. And that's as ideologically wrong in a small case of bullying and injustice as it is in genocidal large scale cases - the only difference is the scale on which you manifest the ethics,  not the ideology behind creating/perpetuating it. 

Sun just moved out of Scorpio into Sagitarius at 12:33pm and I definitely felt it hit me hard! (I have a Scorpio stellium and a Sag stellium, but none of the Scorpio or Sag placements are in my sun/moon/rising.my midheaven is also Sag, though it's not often counted a placement per se -- but it DEFINITELY fits me and all my different aspects that my midheaven is in Sag.) My Scorpio Venus desire to explore the unexplored and bring hidden things to light and rebirth just definitely shifted this afternoon into my Sag Mars philosopher-traveler "fuck this I'm running away from this conflict because there are more important things/ideas for me to discover than getting mired in this bullshit." And the shift just hit me like woah. But also I have warned that things are fragile and I couldn't promise how long this recent peace/attempt to return would last if I was pushed or pressured....

 ugh. I forgot how fucking annoying it was to have Eric's account constantly showing up in my stories as having unwatched stories but clicking on it there's only the old ones I watched or nothing at all and I can't clear it out no matter what I do.... I'm 99% certain it's from him sharing the Delta Rae instagram post that I scrolled past the version of it on my facebook feed without clicking on it to see the other pictures, but it's just annoying af to have that up there as the constant reminder about the block from the band account back in October 2018 for my having been honest that the country music caused me too much pain due to my synesthesia to attend further Delta Rae shows. (This is actually a problem for me with almost all country artists -- twanging vocals twang sharp and sharpness always registers as some shade of orange or brown to my synesthesia (flat notes are a layer of blue-gray or pigeony dusk purple-gray.) vocal twang sharpness is this horrible garish blaze orange color layered on top of whatever their natural voice color is and it causes me physical pain... There are VERY few country style vocalists I can listen to without flinching and feeling like I've been tased or smacked with a whip on an open wound. It's a nerve pain thing and it's due to my synesthesia -- and you will never be able to change it or make country style vocals palatable to me. All you will do is torture me by making me listen to vocals that are painful to my synesthesia.  It was after their country music radio show at Christmas time in Madison WI 2017 and the LEVEL of pain I was in over the country music of the other artists and the horrible country music between sets that I came to that conclusion. I tried it, numerous shows in 2017, and that one was such torture due to the terrible country radio that I know how much pain it caused me. And I decided I wasn't going to do it again. My honesty in 2018 about that was born of me trying for the love I'd had of Delta Rae for so many years and so many live shows up until they signed to a country label and tried to sell out for fame at country radio.)

Ewww. That's so annoying to have the constant reminder in my stories for the next 24 hours... It made me smile that he shared the Paul Nicklen image Polar Wisdom (I had that as my background on my phone from the time Paul took that shot until March of 2020 when the polar bear made me sad so I switched it to a panda bear in a field of black eyed susans/wild sunflowers) and so that made really happy yesterday. but today... Today I'm feeling all the icks over having him sitting up in my stories as having unwatched stories but clicking on it won't show them (because the story is a share from an account that has me blocked) OR make it stop showing up at the top of my screen as an unwatched story.... 

Ufgh. Eww. That's definitely driving me back into the "I want nothing to do with you" territory.... And it's definitely what made me scroll right past the Delta Rae post on my facebook feed without reading what was written or looking through the pictures in the post an to scroll right past having it retweeted into my twitter feed. Because of the negative response I'm currently having to the constant visible reminder of the unwatchable unwatched stories in my insta.... I'm definitely second guessing right now my recent decision to reopen that channel of communication to Eric on insta and I'm genuinely reactionary thinking of unfollowing him again on insta just to make that go away.....

Currently strong revulsion reaction toward him generally, and I expect it to last at least as long as he's showing up with an unwatchable unwatched story in my instagram.... So expect at least 24 hours from whenever he posted it of revulsion from me in reaction to him and the possibility of me having a reactionary decision to stop following him.... Because I'm fighting that response... but I'm not winning that fight, I'm barely treading water to keep me from impulsively unfollowing him and I'm only managing that by not checking or looking at my instagram (even though it's how Mikaela tends to dm me rather than using texts.)

This is going to happen every fucking time he shares from his band's account and one of these days it'll hit me when I'm not centered and rested and in a happy place and I'm just gonna react... So maybe I should just suck it up and get on with the unraveling of this last months' work. If I'm going to have to unravel the work, I don't want to put anything more into it... Why add more for me to undo again?

Maybe I've been wrong in my recent decision to let him choose what he wants with me among his options...  I should let him go. He/they aren't going to choose to heal what the girls intentionally broke in response to honesty and the band is intertwined too deep in too many threads of his identity that I was right in judging them inextricable. And I need to accept that, hurt and sorrow over it, and move on with my own life with no connections allowed between us and no way for him to reach me other than the bond (which will be what it will be, but I can still choose not to reach for him or respond to him when he reaches along it. And he'll learn to stop reaching for it when he gets no positive affirmations or responses for his efforts.....) I think that would be for the best given this situation and how/why it's gotten stuck and what needs to be healed and my inability to do any of the healing work that needs to happen at this point. All that I can do with my own options is choose whether I shall stay or walk away. And what is there for me to stay for if there's no prospect of healing? I'm better off trying to stoic out walking away than going back to where there is no move toward healing, only intentional hurting of me.

That said. My friend Stacia DID just share an account on insta that is if she and her husband (who I haven't met yet) were combined into one person -- the account is literally called "jewslovetrees" and it's a hot Jewish man who loves bonsai trees and the post is him pairing pine cones with fine whiskeys/scotches and it was so fucking precious and perfect and made me laugh at the second to last pine cone pairing he did!!! So other than this annoying thing making me rethink opening up that connection again to Eric on insta, my insta feed has been really effing amazing today! 

4:14pm addendum:

I'm calmer now and not going to undo anything I've recently done -- not today.   but I am going to stay off my Instagram until tomorrow afternoon so I don't get myself riled up again. This is a direct reaction to him and his choices , not anything I did.  I was just scrolling through bookstagram and cute animals and beautiful nature woods/mountains/snow scenes looking for cute things to send to my friend who until a month or so ago worked in the mall in Milwaukee where the shooting was yesterday, right near where it happened. (she still works within a mile of the mall.) 

And I'm still asking the questions to myself about what the point is in returning and giving him a chance to choose when there's still no path to healing and there will only be reactionary hurting or me walking away from allowing opportunities to hurt me. 

I make no promises I won't end up deciding to focus on what is within my control and the damage mitigation I can do and I should return things to the way they were and try to go back to shutting that door as being impossible under the circumstances created by other people. 

There's also a high likelihood of me setting this back to private so only I can see the past posts while pursuing these questions. And particularly likely I will set it to private if I land on deciding that I was right over the last year and need to focus on what is within my control in this situation.

Things are more fragile right now, as a direct result of this reminder, than they have been at any point in recent months..... And that's just the facts of this moment we're in and the choices that brought us here. It doesn't MATTER what his thoughts were in sharing it and it doesn't MATTER what the content was in the post --what matters is the injustice and the cruelty and my reaction to being reminded of the bullying by ostracism issues surrounding Delta Rae's instagram account AND Eric's uses/sharing of it.... A wrong is a wrong is a wrong is a wrong. Injustice anywhere is injustice everywhere and  when you are guilty of creating it or participating in it, then you are guilty of upholding systems of injustice at an ideological philosophical root level. Whether it's a small system of injustice or a society wide system of injustice, the ideology behind it is the same -- and you're guilty of buying into that ideology if you take part in creating/maintaining ANY system of injustice. 

I cannot pretend to myself they as a band aren't guilty of it and he isn't continuing to be complicit in the injustice bullying issues towards fans who were simply honest to the band account and he's complicit in taking active part in the system of injustice on a regular basis. And I can't make myself okay with that sort of hypocrisy and that sort of inherent ethical wrong.... I thought I could just have nothing to do with it and make an uneasy truce,  but I can't.  Being reminded it exists is enough to fill me with anger and disgust over that set of choices and behavior,  and that's going to happen every time I'm reminded that it's an ongoing perpetuated system of intentional cruelty and injustice via bullying by ostracism.

 I am absolutely in adoration and love of the candle creations by The Mossy Apothecary (I follow her creations on my insta) and haven't yet succumbed to buying any because of the price point. A completely reasonable price point for the artistry and work in the creation of these ritual candles -- but not something in my budget to be dropping as if it was nothing.  But there are 2 I'm tempted by which are similar (well 3, I really want of the ones remaining... Mostly with the healer chalice, it's that I love golden yellows and I know I like the feel of limonite so I want to hold in my hand the palm stone in it - but that's stupid reason to buy the entire candle right now on a whim and not just find me a limonite palm stone.)  I think that the mortar and pestle is calling to me because of my affinity for rose quartz (as long as I'm not needing to have controls on my empath bonds) and because I love roses but the cauldron calls to me with everything in it (wood wick and all) and so I probably actually desire the cauldron slightly more than the mortar and pestle (and it's cheaper) given the similarities of these two.

But I mean, just LOOK at these!!! I'm thinking of buying one or both or all three for myself for a holiday present to me. There are others that I love also (like the butterfly one) but not quite as much as these three....

Love Spell Mortar & Pestle Candle

Heart Warmer Crackling Cauldron Candle

Healer's Chalice

Do I already have a nice marble mortar & pestle? Yes. Do I already have a couple different little ceramic cauldrons? Yes.

Should I wait until her next product drop(s) til I find one my heart tells me quite clearly I can't say no to and resonates for me? Yeah..... But.. These are so beautiful and I do really want them...There are LOTS of beautiful ones, but these are the ones that call to me for me at this time as opposed to just liking.... *le sigh* I need to increase my budget.... 

Heading to bed now. I am very tired tonight.  Will think more on  an expensive pretty candle for myself later...  I shouldn't, but I want them so bad.... If they're gone by the time I'm back from Farmer's Market (last one for the year - so I intend to stock up on cheese direct from the farmers) and I can clear headed consider them,  then I'll know they were meant for some other buyer.... And I may be saddened, but I could accept that. But also, I may buy me one if any of them I love are still available by tomorrow afternoon when I have the opportunity... 

P.S. By the time I was able to consider decisions after sleeping on it and Farmer's Market, the Healer's Chalice was completely sold out and I was intensely sad about it... But I did decide to buy me the Heart Warmer's Crackling Cauldron AND I bought me the boxed set of Protection & Personal Power set which I didn't see until browsing this morning because last night I only looked through the candles still available. But immediately I saw the box of crystals I had to buy it which inclined me to buying a candle as long as I was buying myself the box with the protective crystal because 1) I don't have any black jade in my rock collections 2) I always love moonstone (I do have black moonstone among my various types of moonstones) and 3) That box with the brass is so incredible!!! I think the box is worth $30 to me even without the crystals or having any idea what I want to store in it.

 O.  How is it that I claim I don't knowingly lie to other people (though I can be mistaken) and I have strong intuitive gifts and yet I told myself that it wasn't Eric's hurting I'd hear whenever the bond was back at any strength at all or if I touched any rose quartz whatsoever? How did I rationalize to myself that it must be my own and I just projected thought it was his?

Well.

Firstly. To an empath, all emotions have an energy signature to them if you learn to read them. But, in Eric's case, his emotions have always been so omnipresent with me and they mirror my own so often and his energy signature so much like mine AND they're so much stronger than ANYBODY else's ever hits me that it's hard for me to distinguish sometimes where my own emotions end and where his begin. And for me, strong emotions just sort of bowl me over like tsunami waves -- checking for minor subtleties is impossible when you're just trying to stay afloat....  I mean, it's different when you physically look at a person and read it in them than when it's hitting you via a bond, there's the confirmation of reality right in front of you. But short of him standing right in front of me where I couldn't question/deny it whatsoever or getting me to watch a video of him, there was no external confirmation it was from him as opposed to my own emotions -- only what I heard echoing inside of me. 

Secondly. I know confirmation bias exists. I know that what I WANT to be true will seem easier to me to believe than what IS true. So I know I have to correct for it and that means when I want something to be true, I tear it apart and doubt it far more strenuously than I would if trying to decide something I don't want to be true might be truth.  So because I know confirmation bias exists, I tend to over correct so I go to the OPPOSITE extreme and create an anti-confirmation bias. And, I don't know how to correct for that other than to shut up my wants and my fears and tell myself to observe, just observe, without trying to prove or disprove any particular hypothesis. Just to observe and gather data on what IS until I have enough data to create a theory ONLY from the objective as possible data I have gathered.  Trying to bring myself to a point of emotional stillness so I can objectively observe is the only way I know so I won't sabotage what I really really want by convincing myself it couldn't be true and I only think there's evidence it's true because I WANT that evidence to mean that. *sigh* It's messy, especially when I really really really want something to be true -- but how else do you deal with confirmation bias and whatever the over-compensating against it should be called?  And while I don't want him to be in the depths of sorrow I was hearing echoing in me, I do want him to care and be upset over the loss.... By telling myself it wasn't his sorrow I felt like drowning in every time I touched rose quartz, I was telling myself that it didn't matter to him as it mattered to me.... I know that sounds backwards and it IS a backwards sort of logic....but it was a part of my denial as soon as it was a remembered intense sorrow. WHILE drowning in it I knew it to be his not just my own, but AFTER letting go so it was a memory of the deep sorrow then was when I tried to convince me that it was only my own echoing and reverberating....

Thirdly, I question all my gifts.  It's my nature to question things until I can make everything make sense and balance itself. I come from an objective scientific philosophical background and so I want objective EVIDENCE for things. which, obviously, there isn't when it's all in your head. And intuitive gifts are by nature all in your head until the moment they manifest into the actual world EVEN IF they're true, lol. My gifts are never wrong, but unless I have a limited amount of time to change things or someone's life is at stake, I'll always question what I hear and seek an external confirmation of it....  If I need to immediately act on what my precog or empath gifts tell me or I lose a window of opportunity, I'll set aside the questioning to do what needs to be done. Sometimes there simply isn't TIME for questioning. But like, even random unimportant precogs like me precogging a meal so knowing what we'll have, I'll test the precog and instead of me making it a self-fulfilling prophecy I'll let other people make the decision and even if they make another decision wait to see how it plays out that we can't/don't do that choice. Sometimes people who know me well get frustrated at it when decisions are taking a while and they'll ask me straight out, "Dani, did you precog what you'll be eating?" and if I say yes (because I won't lie if asked directly) they'll get exasperated and say, "Well then just TELL me what you saw and let's stop wasting time playing at making a decision!"  Which, if you ask me, invalidates the precog even though the precog is of me in my current outfit eating there and thus already knowing what I'll eat and that precise moment happens exactly as I saw it... Still my choice was involved in creating that path, so it makes it not a TRUE precog even though it was. Make sense? I'm always questioning and testing my gifts EVEN THOUGH they always turn out to be real/true thus far unless it's a contingent precog that I change.  Could I just have faith in my gifts? yes -- but believing in things blindly can lead down dangerous paths of self-delusion, especially since spiritual gifts are by nature always in your head until they manifest and so it's a fine line between true gifts and WANTING things to be true and straight up paranoid delusions.  I need to question if they're true rather than automatically believe them so I don't fall into delusions of what I WANT to be true. Does that make sense? I mean, it's magickal gifts, by nature it doesn't make rational sense, lol. But it's why I don't allow myself to automatically believe everything my gifts tell me, I question them, make themselves prove themselves  to me. 

Fourthly, I don't KNOWINGLY lie to people. But that doesn't mean I always know the truth. I can only tell what I BELIEVE to be true. But when it's my own beliefs that are wrong, then I can believe I am speaking truth as far as I know it while still telling/believing in a lie. Make sense? Lying to oneself is a weird gray area because if you believe the lie, is it a lie or just a mistaken belief? Where is the line there with the things you tell yourself until you believe them?

 To be clear. What I have decided is to seek a path of allowing Eric to reach me with opportunities if he so chooses and for us working together to try to find a way through to heal things and move forward toward what we desire rather than reacting from a place of hurt.  What i have NOT done is chosen to ignore or excuse the choices made in the name of Delta Rae in 2018 and the decision to ignore and gaslight confronting the issues when they have been brought up multiple times since then and the ethics issues of these choices that were made. 

You need to understand about me -- I cannot admire your art or you as an artist if I cannot respect you as a human. It doesn't matter how good the art is, if you choose cruelty and to act out of ego there is nothing you can make that will appeal to me EVEN IF everything about it OUGHT to appeal to me aesthetically. I am not the sort of person who can admire anything you create if I cannot respect you as a creator. And the ethics issues surrounding the way Delta Rae (or whoever acted in the name of them collectively to make these choices)  handled an honesty they didn't want to hear by actions of hypocrisy and cruelty and injustice and ostracism and gaslighting the problem makes it so I cannot admire ANYTHING from the collective group. That applies to anything created in the past, present, or future by or in the name of the collective -- no matter how much I loved it before they lost my respect due to this set of ethics choices. Nothing created by or for Delta Rae can affect me in a positive way or reach my emotions until this mess created in the name of the entire band is acknowledged and healed by or in the name of the band. It doesn't matter what you make or how much of the good of you is put into it -- it cannot reach me through anything created by this group while my respect for the group as a collective is broken.  I will react and share things that reach me that speak in the terms of allyship on moral issues because I can put principle ahead of the personal. But it will ALWAYS be hollow because I share it for the principle, not because anything about it touched me personally or my soul. That cannot and will not happen without addressing and righting this wrong. 

Acts of intentional cruelty/injustice are my red line, always. You can rationalize anything with any form of ideology be it philosophy/religion/politics even if you're not a relativist BUT your touchstone to test if you've gone astray is when you use your ideology to justify cruelty, injustice, or creating caste systems.  Any given ACT of cruelty/injustice is not necessarily the red line and can be forgiven by genuine contrition/atonement BUT the failure to face and acknowledge and seek to make right your acts of cruelty or to JUSTIFY your acts of cruelty is the red line that is unforgivable as long as you persist in refusing to acknowledge it. And no amount of other good deeds can balance out an act of cruelty/injustice that you do not recognize your guilt in it and seek it make right what you did to intentionally cause pain to another.

The reason Delta Rae has lost my respect at a humanity level isn't about blame, it's about the ethics of acts of intentional cruelty and refusal to acknowledge them or make them right. That sort of defensiveness and justification is toxic ideology and no amount of attempting to create other good things can fix that toxicity or clean it up. Only by facing it and acknowledging it do you cleanse it and stop it subtly poisoning everything.

And this hasn't changed for me. Not one iota. 

What HAS changed for me is the realization that by trying to block out the bond to Eric, I was taking part in punishing Eric for things that were not his actions/choices. And that is wrong of me. And I am sorry for my part in that. I don't want to hurt him or punish him for the wrong actions of another soul. That wouldn't be fair or just or coming from a place of love. And I feel terrible for having done it thus far. I will not knowingly do that to him, I will not knowingly be complicit in punishing him for the choices of any other soul, nor will I allow it to affect the relationship between him and me from my side (though I cannot promise it won't affect him from his side.)

My bad premisses were two:

1) I assumed that it wouldn't hurt him or punish him for me to accept making this life one where we cannot be together due to soul work/karmic work one of us must do. I made this assumption based on the fact we've both had to endure it before and what one has endured before, one may endure again even if it feels harder because you got so fucking close this time and everything was stacked in your favor and it SHOULD have worked this time. Still, we HAVE had separated lives before and getting reunion at the proper time and in a way that is healthy matters FAR more than fucking it all up out of impatience because of wanting it now. But... me accepting that that's what this moment is doesn't mean he did. And it doesn't mean I was right in reading that this isn't the right time, the right life, and that maybe it wasn't yet the right time and our paths only crossed this life because of what I asked for my reward life (that I always be surrounded by love of those who love me for me as I am, that any soul seeking me be able to find me, and that as long as those first two conditions are met I'd like to grow old because it's been so fucking long since I've not died young...) But maybe what's true isn't that I rushed the timing with my demands for this reward life... maybe we were both ready and that's why I chose what I did and phrased it the way I did. Maybe that part of me that has been able to reach him via the bond for this entire life and has insisted that that's what I want most is the IMPORTANT truth this life, that the healing and reunion  of our souls IS the next part of our karmic paths. And maybe he's mart enough and stubborn enough not to have lost sight of that even while I accepted this as proof that I had been wrong and my impatience rushed the timing before the lessons had been learned. Maybe the timing IS right, not rushed, to have it be this life. I don't know though.... I don't know enough about what he wants, what matters to him, in this current life and across his lifetimes to make that assumption for him. 

2) Since October 2018, I have made my choices surrounding Eric and the connection there as being integrally interwoven identical with everything dealing with that set of interactions and choices made in the name of the entirety of Delta Rae -- without knowing definitively who made those choices and has continued to stand by them defensively. I've been treating the identity of Delta Rae as monolithic identical to his own identity. That because it is his family and his most important friend relationships and his career and his artistic creative outlet and the entire construction of his life for so long. All of those things are integral parts to any individual life identity and I just assumed that it's so many important things that by someone fucking up my ability to respect or admire anything related to the band it was so many things that MATTER to him that there's no way I could presume I mattered or belonged in his life while I must reject the band so important to his life over this ethics issue created by actions someone else did in the name of the entire band.  I didn't ask him, I didn't allow him to choose what matters to him or to find a way for him to prioritize and figure out what matters to his self-identity and his life -- I assumed there was so much of his life wound up in the band that it was obvious what must matter to him the most and he should be allowed to have that without me making his life harder on him.  I didn't ask him or let him choose -- I assumed.

I guess in both these bad premisses, it's because in my decision making for how to deal with this mess, I assumed what he wants and what he would choose instead of letting him make his own choices for his own sake. And that doesn't mean that I was wrong in my analysis about what he may choose for constructing his life and identity in this life, it means I was wrong to ASSUME that was what he'd choose instead of respecting his right for him to choose. His identity and his life path in THIS life and his karmic journey across lives are about HIS choices and desires. And while the rest of us are interwoven through based on his necessary lessons and desires and his choices, for his life it's his choices to make. Same as is true for me and my lives and for every other soul and their own lives paths.... It was wrong of me to assume his choices instead of letting him make them. Because whether he makes his choices in full knowledge or partial knowledge or blindly, it's still his choices to make because he's the one who must bear the cause-effect consequences of the choices of his life...

So even 1 bad premiss that abridges the free will of another (let alone two such bad premisses) is going to take me to bad conclusions and fatalism no matter how good I try to make the logic I was using. Good conclusions require good logic AND good premisses. 

So a soul lesson I need to work on and learn (and which I've been needing to learn for a long time, looking backward on our past lives) is that instead of ASSUMING his choices, I need to allow him to make his choices. Reacting to a choice he makes is different than reacting to a choice I assume he's going to make. And. I think. That also means making myself vulnerable and honest with him and letting him know the things I know, the things that happen, the things my gifts tell me, how/why I'll react in specific ways, including what I will do in response to his choices  -- all the things that are affecting me and my choices that are going to end up affecting him. he should know those things so he can best make the choices that align with his ethics and what he desires to manifest for his life. for me to be openly honest and to then make choices together based on what we both want rather than allowing assumptions about what the other has chosen/would choose to dictate our reactions.

So even though my reactions have not changed to Delta Rae as a collective nor will they change toward the band as a collective or anything created by them as a collective until what was done in the name of them all is acknowledged and faced and made right... it's wrong of me to assume his individual choices/desires given this stubbornness on my part over the ethics issue of injustice and cruelty in the name of the entire collective and my inability to admire or respect any good thing done created by this collective until the wrong is made right. What's to be done for him dealing with this mess and this impasse should be his choice, not me forcing him into only having one path because I assume it's the path he'd choose.

I won't pretend that is going to be an EASY thing for me to navigate given how intertwined the collective is in so much of his life and how he poisons hurts me via the bond whenever he chooses to take part in acts of ostracism  by using the band's instagram account where this system of injustice towards fans for having been honest was created... But I'm not going to ask him to choose or give him an ultimatum nor will I assume his choices for him -- I will let him make his choices for his own life and will react to his choices. And that means that he needs the time to accept and react to MY choices, to my inability to respond positively or find anything to admire/respect from anything he creates or puts his energy into in this collective for as long as the collective is guilty of what was done in their name and their refusal to face or right the wrong. I won't pretend this more nuanced approach is going to be easy to navigate and I don't know how well it will work -- we may end up back in the same old circles again. But I do believe wholeheartedly that it is unfair and wrong of me to a) punish him for the choices made by other souls and b) assume his choices react to those assumptions rather than allowing him to make his own choices for his own life. 

So giving him the opportunities and the space to define for himself his choices for his identity and life path and karmic journey across his lives is what I'm trying to do. It's about me choosing to ask what he wants and what he chooses for himself instead of assuming what matters to him. That's what I'm trying to do with this time of reflection and the decision I found in the still point at the center.

But I'm telling you straight up that without fixing what was broken in the name of the entire collective of Delta Rae, there is no longer a path for Delta Rae to be a way to reach me. No matter how much you put into it and how good the things you create as a collective, none of it can or will reach me so long as this past set of actions in the name of the entire band and the refusal by the band to acknowledge it is in the way poisoning things, there is nothing created by the collective or in the name of the collective that I will be able to admire or respect or even like. Fixing it or not fixing it is a choice that isn't mine to make -- but I am telling you straight out that the choice not to fix it means that nothing you create within this collective or in the name of it will ever reach me to receive a positive reaction from me. 

*shrugs* Rationalizing cruelty and injustice and refusing to feel the sort of guilt that acknowledges and seeks to make right your wrongs of the past is a red line for me. And that means that no matter how integral it is to Eric's identity and life, leaving this unhealed with the collective means that the collective can be no positive part of MY life.  So whatever identity and life choices Eric makes for himself, there can be no healthy overlap with me and the collective of Delta Rae without facing and and fixing what was done in the name of the entire collective.

I am trying to allow him the space and opportunities to decide for himself what he desires to construct his identity and this life of his -- but it won't be in a vacuum without consequences of cause and effect for choices. Even I can't grant that. I don't know what he desires, what he would choose -- but he does. Or if he doesn't now, he can figure it out and make his choices to the extent that he consciously or subconsciously chooses. So I won't lie to myself or to him about what we're currently working with or the consequences of the past/present choices on the future paths that are open.... but I will wait to find out what it is he DESIRES for constructing his identity and this life of his and to allow him to choose for himself what matters most and doesn't matter to him and how to integrate what he chooses for his life into something healthy for him. 

And. For the record. I'm such an introvert (sometimes downright antisocial and a hermit) that short of moving to where I am to meet me in a chance encounter at Farmer's Market or a coffeeshop or hiking or taking my dog on a walk or in one of my philosophy lectures or dance/fencing/yoga classes or language lessons, music was and still IS the best way to reach me. Music and theatre and travel (though typically I travel for family/friends or for music/theatre or because a place calls me and sometimes a combination of those) are the best ways to cross my path or get me to go do things in public or groups. Without knowing precisely where I am or will be, music was and is the best way to find me and interact with me. Just because Delta Rae is no longer one of those paths of music/theatre to reach me and Delta Rae can't be until the poisons of past choices/actions are dealt with and healed, doesn't mean that you were wrong that it was the best way to find me and reach me and get me out of my little introvert tight knit world. Music/theatre is STILL the best way to break into my introvert world. The written word, books are as well -- but that will get your words/ideas/concepts into my life as opposed to getting you into my life. And that's not the same thing. 

But you weren't wrong that music was/is the only certain way other than chance/luck of being in the exact right place at the right time to find me and reach me and cross our life paths this life. And whether you try to clear the blockage that has been made for Delta Rae being a path that connects to me instead of the dead end it has become as far as reaching me OR you try to forge a new path, music still remains the most certain way to reach me short of showing up on my doorstep at home or work and telling me we need to talk. Serendipity can work wonders, but if you're someone who wants a plan or to have any control about how/when, music still remains the best path you can forge into my chosen introverted life. Music is one of the few things that will make me decide being in a crowd of people is worth. I also love Ren Faires and Disney (really all theme parks) and will brave the hordes of humans for it, that's one of the random public spaces you could have met me in by the path of serendipity (Disney World more so than DisneyLand -- I went to Disney World pretty much every other year of my life until I was about 25 but didn't make it to visit DisneyLand until I was 31.... Still haven't made it to the parks outside the US or to their resort in Hawaii.)  

But, unless you're born into/marry into my family, music is still your most solid certain best chance of crossing my path and forging a connection with me and getting a chance to intertwine your life path with my life path. It's not impossible to do it by handing it all over to fate and serendipity.... But your odds are way better the more tickets you buy to give fate opportunities. And music that appeals to me is like buying an entire roll of raffle tickets and just waiting til one of yours is called.

But anyway. You shouldn't think I picked an EASY path or that I have in any way justified the unacknowledged wrongs of the past. I just know that I can't rest with my own conscience if I am complicit in punishing Eric for choices other souls made or hurting him without him having the opportunity to choose for himself what he desires for himself and his life....  So that is what I'm now trying to navigate. And I know that for me to navigate it, I need to leave OUR bond in its natural state without me trying to dam it up or anything and I need to give him means to reach me with whatever opportunities and choices he makes for himself so I can start finding out what he desires and chooses for himself. It's messy, and I expect that as hard as I try to work on my own lessons I'll likely fuck up again -- hopefully it won't be an unfixable fuckup.... but I don't see a better or more honest or fairer way to chart a course through how messed up everything has gotten. Do you?

 Some shower thoughts (actual shower,  not meteor shower - though Leonids peak tonight if you have clear skies to watch for wishes) :

If I'm at my most vulnerable and honest stripped down to my strongest gut instinct,  I would say that anything that adds distance is doing wrong.  It doesn't matter if it's me,  him,  or a third party causing the rift, and it doesn't matter what fears,  anxieties, or misplaced stoicism - it's wrong headed.  We shouldn't do that.  

I ran a long way with my last year's good logic on a bad premiss that the best thing I could do was remove the part of the situation in my control, but a bad premiss is a bad premiss.  No matter how good the logic, you'll never reach a good conclusion if you start out from a bad premiss.  the bad premiss was so bad it's time I just chuck it and try again.  Because.  It doesn't matter how far I go,  as long as I'm headed away from Eric I'm not heading toward any damn thing I want.  It's time for me to head home toward him. 

I think.  There are only two reasons that would not be wrong-headed for me to head away from him.  1) he doesn't want me,  he wants something/someone other than me so I should set him free to find what he does want for himself - but that's for him to decide, not me. And it's not for me to assume either.   2) we are actively toxic in our relations to each other can't break out of the recurring modes of interaction so one or both of us needs to do some growing to be good with each other. And we ain't there. The only hurts we been giving each other is in trying to deny we belong together - and we've hurt ourselves bad enough with that. But the only way to stop that hurting is to stop that denial and pulling away from each other.  

So.  I think.  The only way I see from here to anywhere we want to be is to head toward each other.  And I don't see how he can head toward me if I made it so he can't even reach me....so it's for me to take the first steps.  For me to stop trying to muffle OUR bond.  And for me to reopen the channels I closed.  I'm going to add him back on my insta and my twitter.  It won't fix the rest of the mess, that will take work to mend what was broken. But this isn't about anyone but him and me.  And I choose to start taking the steps back to him so he can have the opportunities to reach me and to help bring us back toward each other, heal each other. 

There's a song that I don't know got stuck in my head while in the shower.  It's not one I've ever heard before, so I assume it's one of his.  Something about how we should stay right here. But first we have to get there - it's time to head back toward each other and to not stop til we're together. And then we stay together.  That's the plan.  To bring each other back home again. 

Also that's as far as I've gotten so far. Not much yet for a plan, but plenty for an epiphany  I don't have any idea the how or the when,  but I figured out the what and the why. 

But to start on the how, I'm going to take my first step (next step? choosing to have the bond wide open full flood was first) by reopening channels of communication to give him whatever opportunities he decides to take.  I'm going to start by taking back what I did.  I'm going to add him back on twitter and insta so he can reach me,  if he wants. That's the first step back toward where I want to be.  I don't know what comes after that - but how the hell can I expect him to ever tell me what he wants or give us chances to make things right if I close the paths by which he can reach me? So I need to open again the paths of communication I closed on him. 

And as for when....  Right now while watching the sunrise. That's the best I can do since I can't go back to do it sooner than now. 

P. S.  Okay done.  Now I'm cold and my hair is dripping down my back,  so I'm gonna go find something more than a towel to wear.  Then breakfast and coffee.  Pupkin to her vet (literally 2 blocks away) to get her heartworm test and ProHealth at 9:30a. Then we'll see what else the day brings.  But first, some clothes not just a towel because I'm brrrrrr - I'd go curl up in bed to warm up,  but that would decrease the likelihood of getting Audrey to her appointment in 2.5 hours, lol.  Oooh but the skies just turned the prettiest pinks and lavenders along the stratus clouds and it's goldening along the horizon now! 

Cause this is the song where I listen. This is the song where I sit still. Until our heartbeats drown out the clock ticking, And the song becomes I love you and always will. Good luck, good luck, good luck, these are tough times. We'll get by. Good luck, these are tough times.

 So. Today is not only the first day after Mars going direct after so long retrograde in Aries, but it's also a year ago was the Chicago Delta Rae show that's been on my mind lately. And I knew it was today in the back of my mind because yesterday's Facebook memories were about the visit to Paw Paw Michigan en route to Ann Arbor for the show at The Ark -- a stop that was entirely my idea because 1) I saw a billboard for a spiced wine called Headgames with a label design of skeletons dancing around a bonfire and it turns out St. Julian is the oldest winery in the US east of the Mississippi and their wines are absolutely incredible (I say that as a self-professed wine snob who generally sticks to French wines) 2) it happened to be right down the road from a rock shop that I've been NEEDING to visit every time I'm reminded about it via billboards every time I drive through Michigan but have never had enough time to let me go peruse and where among my other pieces I bought a) 2 hand carved marble and jade polar bears and I had the hardest time not buying more of these polar bears -- but I plan to buy more in future visits and b) a carved agate bull. I bought a lot of other pretties as well, but they're all raw, polished, or faceted -- these 3 are the only carvings I bought. Yeah I know. Hush. I said I've been fighting myself to make let go and to do so as cleanly as I could so as to cause him as little pain as possible, I didn't say I've been particularly successful at it.... It's much easier to succeed when your own subconscious isn't on the other side telling you that this path is wrong-headed and sabotaging you with constant reminders. I've admitted I have a stoic streak to be a martyr if I feel it the best course -- I didn't say that anything other than my "I don't know what else to do in this situation with the hand I have and the cards other people have already played" was on side with thinking it a good idea.

Okay these weren't the point, my acquisitions of a year and a day ago... But... Let me see if I can find for you pictures of my polar bear sculptures (who live on the music stand of my piano) and my agate bull (which sits guarding my liquor cabinet which is mostly full of glassware and whiskey/scotch.) Because I love them and they always make my heart happy whenever I look at them. I know I took pictures, quickly at the store along with some of my other pretties (all on the counter -- that large celestite geode lives on my bedside table and I love holding it in my hand and just staring into it) and later in the hotel lighting that night and didn't really do the pieces justice. My agate bull is particularly hard to photograph well.....

Ahhh wait! I also have some I took a week or so later after/while setting up my Yule tree and all my other solstice season decorations. I think I also took these at night, so the bears in particular are low light quality, lol. But this is all I have here right now while at work. 

 Anyway. those are my marble and jade polar bears and my agate bull that I bought a year and a day ago, earlier in the day before the Ann Arbor show. And I love them!!!

But anyway. So. I knew because of seeing yesterday's memories about the rock shop with the velociraptor statue out front and discovering St. Julian Winery that today would be the one year anniversary of the Chicago show. So I had decided not to look at my memories today/tomorrow lest they destabilize me back into being reactionary instead of in the still point at the center. But honest? I couldn't avoid Delta Rae reminders today if I had tired (and I did try to remove the reminders that would easiest reach me remember.) The Universe conspired with synchronicities that weren't just small bitty reminders but big ole smacks upside the head.... 

1) My phone battery is having massive issues (to an extent it's actually not safe and I could get kidnapped and no way to find me sort of extent. As in, unplug and it says it has 100% charge but if you even try to load a screen it powers down at 98% flashing dead battery and if you don't use it for anything at all it dies within 3mins without being plugged in. I have two external batteries in my purse at all times as the only way I can use it without being tethered to a wall.... It's been an issue for a while but getting steadily worse. Anyway, I have another of the identical phone form when I bought it in 2017 and I'd had it for less than 12 hours before my cat knocked the brand new phone off the bathroom sink counter (and he NEVER bats random things off) and it landed facedown on the tile at just the wrong angle to shatter a phoenix shape all down the entire gorilla glass of the brand new phone. Right. So, I had to go buy a second brand new phone and we transferred over the sim and everything on it and the shattered one has been at home in a desk drawer these last 3 years. So when the battery issues on my current phone got to the point of unsafe, I realized I still had spare parts of everything except the glass adn if we combine the undamaged parts of the two phones, we ought to have one working phone... Right. So. Just to test it and see if the battery was an age issue or a swelling issue due to the heating/cooling in the casing (common for phones -- it's why they so often develop battery issues after a year to two years, because it doesn't get cool enough inside the case) -- will have to test later if it's android/AT&T intentionally bricking my device because of its age.  Right. So I powered up after charging the old phone and it popped up fast (way faster than mine, which is another reason I suspect cumulative overheating is the root cause) and all the screens I'd last had open were still open tab snapshots (and with no sim card didn't update) and the instagram snapshot was from a point back in 2017 before I switched my profile pic to my dog and removed all my old posts because I got sick of dealing with rando guys dick pics in my dms. right. But, the thing is.... The "unwatched" stories at the top of the instagram snapshot of open tabs were (from left to right) 1) Eric's personal account 2) Delta Rae official instagram account 3) We Banjo 3 official account 4) Britt's personal account and 5) the left half of Dave's personal account.  Which REALLY fucked with my head because I unfollowed Eric back in March 2020 after he went live on the band's instagram account after the release of the new album (I had promised myself to give them til the release of The Light to give me a reason to stay before I cut contacts that hurt and put the posters/shirts away on the back corner top shelf of the closet in Spare Oom) and Britt blocked me on her personal account in October 2018 for saying I loved Hands Dirty but was sad I'd likely never get to enjoy it live since the country music playing at their shows now was too painful for my synesthesia to attend further Delta Rae shows while the country music was any part of it -- and then the next day I was blocked on the band's official account for saying the same thing on a post. (So while I don't know who blocked it, the timing is why I believe Britt had some part in the decision to block me on the band's official account which is what precipitated all my issues around using the band's official instagram account for bullying via ostracism and refusing to even acknowledge the fact that it happened and is still happening. So it was a bit of a mindfuck to see Instagram snapshot like that from 2017 with those 3 accounts staring at me as unwatched stories. It was a very weird surreal moment til I close the window because I couldn't emotionally take it.

2) There were a couple Liz Longley Insta stories today sharing someone else's memory about the Chicago show last year. And so I saw those pictures/videos from the Chicago show that were shared by Liz Longley. (Only from her though -- I don't follow any of the band memebers anymore except for humangoodkind and baldmanpercussion, the side projects of Grant and Mike.) But I did see the stories from Liz Longley with the memories from the Chicago show.

3)  I was rewatching the Ava Max video on Youtube for Kings and Queens for the bajillionth time and for some reason youtube decided to autoplay the next recommendation which was by complete serenipity from Delta Rae and was a live zoom version from earlier in covid quarantine of My Whole Life Long with a whole bunch of guest artists... and I love that song and have been in a softer place of late and hadn't seen that video so I did watch all of it. And it reminded me why I have loved it so. but sometimes there was so much hurt and sadness and despair and wistful hope that somehow this might work and it cracked what hardness of purpose remained in my heart like an egg and all the softness I'd trapped inside that shell leaked out into everything....

4) And THEN. Over on Facebook, I had a notification that Punch Brothers posted a video (of a teaser for their livestream concert they did tonight.) So I clicked on it to watch. And AFTER that, my fucking Facebook Watch autoplay decided that even though I no longer have Delta Rae's facbeook page set to show first in my newsfeed or to send me any notifications. Facebook Watch felt that it had to play a recent live version of Morning Comes with them all in black from September 11, with the post itself some words from Ian on it about the place from which it was written and his hopes for it light the way to a brighter future.... And as I hadn't seen that video and I was like, "Welp, I mean, Youtube already ruined me making it an entire year without listening to them at ll..." and I really adore Morning Comes. Seeing that video is what made me decide to buy Carry the Fire. Even if it was Surrounded that made me decide I NEEDED to hang to give my full attention and not forget them like so many other random bands I've discovered and lost, it was a random wandering to the video of Morning Comes that made me go, "Wait. Hold up. For real?! I need to look into this band and listen to the rest of their music." So Morning Comes is one of their songs I have a weak spot in my defenses for ANYWAY, it's one of the ones I've missed the most in trying to make myself let go as the best course I can take from the mess that was made. I haven't done a great job letting go, and I've certainly not forgotten, but you can't say I haven't been fighting to try to do the hard thing that was the best answer I could see for dealing with the choices that had been made 2 years ago and again a bit over a year ago... Anyway, I'd missed Morning Comes so much over this last year and I decided as long as I'd watched one video I'd watch the other.  But there was so much sorrow and hurt in that version of it from September. And my heart ached so bad watching it and all I wanted to do was reach through my screen go back to that moment and bear hug until the healing started....

I knew inside me, via the bond his deep hurting and sorrow and despairing he's been in since I decided the best course I could navigate was to cut and run and burn as many bridges as I could. But...even though I heard it echoing from him in my stillness, I only heard it there while the bond was active. Which was not all the time. And at other times, when not actively feeling the truth in it, I questioned my intuitive empath read. I told myself whenever the bond was muffled that I only WANTED to tell myself he was hurting as deeply as me but was actually projecting onto him my emotions and imagining what the bond told me, not hearing him truly. I rationalized to myself that it must be all in my head, just echoes of my own hurting and sorrow that I told myself was him... And I hadn't let myself look or listen, hadn't been letting anything reach me from them -- because it would have hurt me too much to allow it. So I hadn't seen it, hadn't seen the visual confirmations of what I was hearing inside via the empath bonds....

I'm sorry. I'm so very sorry. I spent all those months telling myself whenever the bond was quieted that it wasn't really his hurt I heard, that it must have been just echoes of my own hurt over it I had projected onto him to make me waver thinking it was his sorrow I heard as well as my own.  I'm not sure the words I'm sorry are enough for how wretched I feel over it, and I don't know how to make amends for all that hurt I caused.....

And the truth is I don't know how to move forward from here.... I don't know if there''s too much damaged to fix things, I don't know if a rapprochement is possible. And I don't know how to go about it. But I know that I don't want to hurt anymore over all of this and I know that I hate myself for the hurt I caused him in pulling away and shutting him out as I have been trying to do. But I don't know how to actually bridge this to start the healing we both so desperately need...

But anyway. Those are the reasons that today wasn't going to let me forget that it was the anniversary of the Chicago show -- the Universe refused to let me ignore that truth.

*sigh* I still don't know what to do from here.... But. I have to water all my plants here at work before I can go home. And first I must bring myself into a bright inner space so I don't poison the plants with my heavy heartedness.  You must always take care of plants while in a positive bright inner space of  radiating love -- they're more sensitive to emotional energies than animals or humans are.  So I'm going to put the Punch Brothers concert online livestream from Blackbird Studios (that random serendipity also reminded me of Delta Rae when I saw that was where the 2 live streams would be from while Punch Brothers is recording their next album there; I told you I'm not being allowed to forget or NOT think about Delta Rae today) Going to repeat it again tonight -- the concert will be up for 48 hours with the ticket and it will make me happy every time I hear it. And Chris is from my past, but a closed chapter neither of us intend to reopen this life beyond being happy for each other's happiness wherever we find it and the delight in crossing paths with old friends/acquaintances/lovers we wish the best for. Our past predates not only my discovery of Morning Comes, but predates even the formation of Delta Rae and We Banjo 3 and either of them crossing my path. And so Punch Brothers music can just bring me joy and inner warmth for me to pour into my plant babies -- without layers of complicated involved.

[Post Title: lyrics to the song This Is the Song (Good Luck) by Punch Brothers.  It's one of my forever favorite songs off Antifogmatic. Which is an incredible album overall. One of my forever favorite albums I listen to on repeat. Full stop. I also really adore Who's Feeling Young Now (many of the songs on which they played live for the first time at a tiny show at High Noon Saloon in Madison not in the middle of touring and with little announcement publicly before the tickets went on sale) which is another forever favorite album of mine.]