It dawned on me after a day of playing basketball with teenagers, that maybe I am a bit more unique than would commonly be understood by most other human beings. My gay father and I had dinner together that evening.
I think that our experiences shape us, but we also shape our experiences. Sometimes I wonder if no matter what I did, the same things would’ve happened in a different way, and I would’ve still come out the same. “Our experiences are created by ourselves, and no matter what occurs, we ultimately will become ourselves in spite of everything.”
Would I have had the same grief if my mom hadn’t died? Would I have had the same zest for life if I hadn’t experimented with marijuana and psychedelics? Would I have been just as confused about my sexuality if my parents weren’t gay? I don’t know.
There are certain things I don’t need to worry about or make sense of. Freud is good at that if I’m interested. But there are some things that, although I wouldn’t want to go through again, really did make me a good, albeit, odd individual.
I don’t want to be an uber individualist like it that is all I am – unique to death – because I’m not. I love finding common ground with all the beautiful people. But at my old age, when marriage is on your mind, you start to wonder if you’ll ever find someone as weird as you. I’m not too worried. But there is only a percentage of people who would understand – the good, the bad, and the ugly – and I wonder what percentile of people like that there is.
Because in love, above all, I want to be understood.
There is some stuff that is fundamental to the human condition that everyone understands and knows. But then, there are some things I’d really like to feel understood that not everybody does. People can’t fake knowing what certain feelings feel like – it’s something you feel with someone, or they can’t.
It’s no fun talking about grief with someone who’s never experienced it. Or addiction for that matter. And I don’t think the pinnacle of human intimacy is meant to be in a therapist’s office, or on a page for that matter.
There are things I don’t need to explain or talk about if you’re not asking, or even if you are. Because there are things I want to share with only certain people who know why. My love doesn’t deserve to be counterfeited. A muse isn’t artificial. You are either inspired by the person or not.
Some women are physically beautiful, but as ugly as sin in my eyes. And it’s taken a long time to be able to see that much more clearly. But sin is enticing, and I’m no saint. But I am very grateful to be single at this age, because you can start to see people’s souls much more clearly rather than just their hair, tits and ass.
When you are young you are blinded by the appearance of things; you can’t contextualize all that you are unable to understand, so you draw conclusions instead. Many that are inaccurate. Life isn’t black and white, unless you’re Freud and sex is everything.
It’s been wonderful to be wrong. It’s been wonderful to keep things safe, but to allow myself the chance to look at the world differently than my adolescent perspective. Not all is lost, but more is gained each day. The less I think I know, the more I learn.
So I’m happy to fall in love for an hour, a day, a year with someone I’d like to know. And if we weren’t so held back by social conformity, we’d admit that we all see 10-20 people a day we’d kiss if nobody was watching. Love doesn’t deserve to be limited by the patriarchy, nor by capitalism. It shouldn’t be wrong to want to learn from someone without having to make it a life sentence.
I’ve been attracted to Joyce Carol Oates lately (she might be reading this). When I was eighteen, I took a sixty-year-old woman home from my church and we played cards and made out on my bed. As well, my editor was an elderly dame, but at the end of the day, we had to accept I wasn’t attracted to her, even though we both tried.
Every dirty bookworm dreams that he’ll end up like Cormac McCarthy, and some young beaut will just fall for him in his old age. So I can’t imagine that a woman would be much different, but I just don’t know, and I’m afraid to ask.
It’s just the body and I just happen to be young now.
So what if people aren’t long-lost lovers, it can still be a symbiotic loving relationship – healing, helping, nurturing, romantic, intellectual, beautiful, patient, kind – just passing through until tomorrow.
Because even though I can admit that I might like to kiss her, or you, reading this. I just want to share my soul with someone. I would want someone to acknowledge that our souls don’t need to know what they are looking for, but maybe there is something to find in one another.
Love is not for me to decide what it is, and if I stop trying to tell someone who they are before I know them, maybe our souls can touch.
Ben Bonkoske 