Orpheus and Eurydice

A few weeks ago, I hosted L and her boyfriend C in Ostend. Her other host had just cancelled, and if not for this I would never have met her. When she talked to the other guests, she was very involved and asked deep questions to find out what lives within them. From what she told me of her travels she appeared to be extremely adventurous, improvising based on what she felt like doing at the moment and often depending on help she asked from strangers. Giving or asking help every day (her "daily deeds") was a goal of her travels and the theme of her blog. She'd done work for stay at families and on a ship. She based where she was travelling entirely on what hosts she wanted to meet and went around a lot of little villages which no traveller would bother visiting otherwise. We showed our tattoos, both on our chest: my infinity symbol in the center and her fermata ("hold me") and rest ("let me go") on either side felt to me like they spoke of a similar message, of ambiguity. From her tattoos it was no surprise that she was polyamorous, and even if she'd been single I'd have been glad to hear it. The women I fall for always turn out to be polyamorous, and it can hardly be otherwise, because for me to fall for them they have to be absolutely free.

Before they went to bed, I asked her if I could give her a hug, something I'd never asked any of my hundreds of guests in the middle of their stay before. She swayed me softly back and forth as she held me, and I stroked her back. Later, she told me she couldn't sleep from that hug that night, that it felt electric. She said she wanted to see much more of me and that she hated the traveller's attitude that takes connections like these for granted. I thought it was a strange thing to say, and looking back it seems like she was projecting. We'd both written each other references that made it clear how much we liked each other. I said she was "incredibly sweet" and the best experience with hosting I'd had, and she said I was "1000 watts warm" and staying with me was a "transformative experience."

We wrote each other for some time afterwards. She said I had "an amazing ability to make my heart feel like it's wrapped in a warm blanket made of purring cats" and I said she was "the sweetest girl I've ever met." Her gentle energy made me feel very peaceful. It was the opposite energy as that of S that I still felt inside me, and as it grew as strong as hers, the combination felt perfect. After my experience with S, I felt it was needed that I told her right from the start that I'd accept everything and needed nothing from her. She said the same, that love hurt and she was a masochist. I was very skeptical and so was she, both saying of the other that they were too good to be true. She told me to pinch her, or better yet, let her dream a while longer. I told her she'd better pinch me very hard, because this already hurt. 

At first we were going to meet up for swing dance in Gent. I had guests that night, but was about to leave the door open for them and leave without ever having seen them. She then cancelled because C wanted her for himself that night, as it was the last night they were going to be together before they'd start to travel solo for a while. She said she was tired of feeling upset with C for no apparent reason. I told her that if she felt upset with me she could express that too, because I wanted every part of her.

We met a few days later in Namur. She was late because she had trouble hitchhiking, and eventually took the train. But our host had changed the location and neither of them had let me know. I did tai chi for a few hours on the square where we'd arranged to meet, and I enjoyed the attention I got, especially because most of it was mocking: it was a nice challenge to be authentic, because I have to be very focused to do it right and if I cared at all about what they thought of me, I'd have been too distracted.

I had no phone. This was only the second time in almost a year that I'd needed one, so I just ask one when I need to — but I didn't know her number. She'd tried to reach me on the landline I given her. So I asked in a pharmacy if I could borrow their Internet. I had to ask three times: the first time when she was late, the second time when she was at another location, and the third time when she was late again because she'd just ordered a beer. I'd had a little snack but didn't eat until I knew she was coming from another location. I didn't mind the wait, but it confronted me with my skepticism. It felt like she couldn't possibly be real, and now it was as if she'd disappeared, as if she'd just been a hallucination all along.

I was a little weak from having eaten so late, but when she showed up I instantly felt better and my frown turned into a smile. We hugged and she said how sorry she was and how I was infinitely patient, but her expression was one of joy. With our host we went for a walk along the Meuse, then to a café overlooking the valley, then cooked dinner at his home. Our host was interesting. He made sociological maps, often using illegal data, to study the human superorganisms of cities. He'd been working for politicians to aid their election campaigns but was fed up with this kind of world and had just quit. It's such a specific field that he's probably the best at his field in Belgium. He had an interesting collection of dark, obscure music.

After dinner, we went to a new wave concert on a hill overlooking Namur. Under a little tarpaulin by the precipice in front of the club, our host ordered some food. While we waited, L and I shared a beer and started hugging to a point where it soon came to feel like it would be considered inappropriate if more people had been around. We entered the little club and the music was the best I'd ever heard in a club. It was the kind of intense music that I can actually dance to quite well. Before this I thought I couldn't dance at all with someone else, but now I started to dance with her at once and it felt very natural. Our bodies tortuously writhed into each other's curves. We were all over each other, and she melted into a swaying kelp in my arms.

She said she wished everyone would just disappear, but I didn't care at all about anyone watching. I said I could easily get an overdose of her and she said she felt the same way. She said she was going to explode and had another drink to try to calm down, but I said I was never going to calm down again, ever. It felt painfully intense, and yet it felt better than sex. It was the most memorable night of my life, and I thought back of it later many times, fondly, but also still with something like disbelief.

On the way back, our host was a little drunk and I wish I had a driver's license just for times like this. There was only one seat belt. I felt very protective, and wrapped it around us both and held her tight. We snuggled up in the couch that night.

The next day, we hitchhiked to Durbuy, a complicated route which after all turned out to be very fun to do with L. She's looks extremely cute when she's hitchhiking and it's impossible for anyone in their right minds to not pick her up, with her little dance and radiant smile. I was touched by how well she could connect with the people that picked us up, how her voice was full of love as she asked them those probing questions. I felt deeply humbled being around her and I wished I was more like her.

That night, we went to a carnival party. This time I didn't feel the vibe. but she did, and everyone was all over her. I was jealous not just of her ability to connect, but, for the first time in my life, I was also jealous about her. The music at the new wave party had been pretty dark and I felt in my element there, but here it was all gaiety. I felt like she was slipping away from me as she moved into the light and I was struggling to keep up.

Our host and his friends kept offering drinks, and I, trying to follow L in her vibe at all costs, kept accepting them until I lost count. For a while, it was great, and I began to dance. But then I attracted a lot of attention, and now strangers were offering me more drinks. I hadn't seen L for a while, and there was a certain malice in the way I drank more, a desire to break some barrier no matter what. I looked around and danced with another girl, but there was no warmth in the way we danced, more out of vanity than for fun. I turned away abruptly and got another beer, but spilled over my shirt. I put it down and got out of the tent and hid in a corner to sob like a child, unsure what it all meant or why I was feeling this way.

I have a lot of trouble connecting with a crowd. Perhaps I still have a hate for average people because I know that most of them could easily be persuaded to kill an innocent on command. I feel most at home in counterculture like in the new wave concert, and the counterculture arose in the 50s in protest against the crowd mentality that gave us the holocaust. I could not love these people the way L loves everyone, not after all they've done to each other and to me. The superficiality felt fake to me because there's no deep connection between these people, and it confronted me with my skepticism about whether L was real, a skepticism that only grew stronger as she went along in the superficiality. I wish I could follow her, and I went back in the tent, but I didn't feel anything. When I saw her dance with another guy, the jealousy felt so intense that, in my drunk state, it made me nauseous. I decided I'd drunk too much and called it a night. I told Laura and our host that I had drunk too much and I was going to run back to Durbuy. I ran for 8 kilometers without stopping. I felt a lot better. I love running when I'm drunk. Whatever value there was in the carnival party, this meant a lot more to me, and I couldn't help wanting what I wanted. Jealousy isn't a bad feeling, but it gives a lot of energy, more so than any emotion, and it was good to be able to do something with it.

Back at our host's, I couldn't find the apartment and washed my feet in another room. Afterwards, I did find it, possibly because they'd just arrived. It turned out L had tried to call my landline number again. She'd smashed her phone when she couldn't reach me, and now it didn't work. It later turned out that she'd blacked out and forgotten that I'd told her where I went. She said she'd thought she'd lost me forever and I was never coming back.

The next day, we were both badly hungover. I could hardly follow a word the guide was saying at the brewery. It didn't interest me very much right now, and I just felt the urge to hug L, but didn't think the moment was right. Our host was a buddhist, married to a buddhist monk, and we spent much of the evening discussing the rules of buddhism. Whenever he hugged his wife, she had to confess, and sex was forbidden. The conversation made me feel very claustrophobic. I told L that I didn't know when the time was right to hug, that I had to guess when she'd feel like it and if it were up to me I'd hug her all day. I said I was just going to just do it whenever I felt the urge and she should push me away or slap me if she didn't feel like it — then I'd enjoy myself either way. She said it depended on what people were around, as some might take offence. I joked that in that case, slapping would be a bit much, as they might ask if they should call the police. That evening, her phone worked again and it turned out she just had to charge it for 8 hours to calibrate the battery.

The next day, I was still a bit hungover. In the station and on the train, I told her how I felt, how she terrified me because I'd never felt so strongly about anyone before, how I wish I was more like her and how the way she could connect to people brought tears to my eyes (not just at the party, but also once when hitchhiking). I told her how much I was in suspense and would only start feeling relaxed once she'd have really hurt me. She was too good, and just like S' brutality made me feel invincible, her goodness made me feel very vulnerable. I later showed her this video to illustrate how I felt. She told me how, the first time she'd shouted at an ex, he'd responded by laughing and she'd asked him what was wrong with him. He'd replied "you're human after all."
She said she was glad we could have this conversation and she liked me because I'm so passionate. But by now I saw the contempt in her eyes and it made me feel a little more at ease. Everything cycles through opposites, and positive emotions turn into negative ones, and now that had happened for her it felt like they were more in balance. But something still wasn't right. Her expression was negative but her words were still positive, as if she was still trying to hide it.

I told her I'd felt jealous at the party, and that I enjoyed the feeling, but I had to find an outlet for that energy by running, which was also the only way I knew how to get the alcohol out of my system. We agreed it was rather overwhelming to be with each other all the time, that it was a lot to take in when we got to know each other and we needed time to process it all. She wanted us to split up in Berlin, which was fine by me. I didn't think either of us was really going to enjoy themselves in Berlin anyway. It wasn't her usual way of travelling. She tended to travel much more slowly and stay with each host for several days, travelling for the road rather than the goal, and this way of travelling was stressful for both of us. She said she was only doing this to be at Burning Bär.

I didn't want her to think that I hadn't enjoyed myself at the party, and felt ashamed that I'd failed to enjoy myself as much as she had. It was alright, but the intensity of my feelings for L drowned out everything else. Whether I could be with her or not, those feelings would come to surface. I see now that I should have channeled those feelings towards others the way she had, because we're all humans, all living beings, all part of the universe.

On the night bus to Berlin, she moved to the front of the bus to feel better. I assumed she meant she was getting carsick and was about to follow her. She said I could stay there, but didn't get the hint until I asked "unless you'd rather be alone?" I rarely cry more than once a year, but this was the second time in as many days. It was very cathartic, and when we took a break in Köln, I'd become so purified that for the first time, I didn't have any tremor at all when I did tai chi. It was perfectly smooth. We went in the airport for some food, and then I went out to find out where the bus would stop. I felt her distance, so I left her alone in the airport while I ate and did tai chi. She came out to find me and I went back inside with her. She didn't find an outlet and hoped to find one on the bus. I asked a janitor and he pointed me to an outlet. I told her asking for info is also asking for help and I did it for her today, but she said she really didn't like asking for help, and that's why she tried to do it. I watched her edit some pictures on her laptop.

Back on the bus, we tried to sleep, but the seats hardly reclined. She could curl up on two seats, but my legs were far too long and I had to stretch my legs across the aisle. She said I should leave the aisle open in case someone went to the bathroom. There was no way I could sleep that way, and the bus would take 10 more hours, so I attached a paper to my leg saying "WAKE ME". She thought it was silly, since people would still be embarrassed to do so, but I told her the world would be a better place if everyone was authentic and learning to do so was worth any setbacks along the way. She explained later that she was very keen on following people's rules. The next day when we were at a food fair, I'd get to make a point of how breaking rules isn't always bad when a friend of our host dirtied his suit and a dry napkin didn't clean it. I took a napkin, took the flowers out of a vase, dipped it in the water and cleaned his suit.

When we arrived in Berlin, while I was taking my warm clothes out of my backpack she went in the station to ask for directions. She seemed to have disappeared and when I couldn't find her anyway, I was sure she'd decided to split up right here and now without telling me. It seemed like the kind of treatment I deserve. I was already on my way to the city but changed my mind and ran back, just in time for her to come back out of the station. We took the subway to our host, a friend of L's and the first person she'd hosted herself. I tried to sleep, but couldn't. When she got up, I still hadn't slept, and my heart was racing. My heart stopped racing when she came back into the room, and I realised I was hysterical. I took a cold shower and tried to masturbate.

L asked if I'd just taken a shower again and I explained. I told her I needed her to be herself, because I felt like she was withholding her negative emotions. She told me she was sorry that she'd brought me here and now became distant but that she just needed to travel alone. She met a lot of people in the few days she'd been travelling alone in between C and me. She'd told C not to go with her to Burning Bär for that reason, but it was no different with me. She said she felt responsible to make me feel good and she'd felt that for C too, and that if she failed to make me feel good (whatever that means) it felt like a failure on her part. When she brought this up later, I said there was a reason I was here, that she had to face her anxiety because it was her insecurity. I told her it was alright, that she couldn't help what she felt and she just had to accept it. She showed me a video of a depressed artist and asked me if I could relate. I said yes, but I hadn't had a clinical depression since 2008. She'd also compared me to an ex of her, one who'd said he'd accept everything about her only to realise later that he didn't.

I felt better after this and thanked her for the talk, and said that she could talk to me as well at any time, that there was nothing she couldn't tell me. Soon after, I tried masturbating again, and this time it worked. Later we talked about her travel plans and one possibility she considered was going to Africa, but was afraid to be alone there, and C couldn't be with her there the whole time. I said I could come with her, but she said that she felt anxiety with me and that our energies clashed. My own anxiety came back and I had trouble accepting it, knowing that she couldn't accept it either. By the evening the anxiety had become very strong. I hadn't experienced much of any anxiety for many years, since I converted into strength, but L made me feel weak. I didn't want to burden L with it, so I considered taking memantine and at dinner I asked our host and her friend for advice on this, explaining that L felt anxiety because of the intensity of my feelings. They agreed that I shouldn't take any pills and should learn from the experience by now the anxiety had grown worse than any I'd ever had, even in my major clinical depression in 2008. I felt like if it got any worse I would get a fever. I felt like I could either take memantine or go back home, and L said that I should go home. She said again how I was too intense for her and she only felt like flirting with pain before kissing it goodbye… like she kissed me goodbye. At this point I felt like I had nothing to lose and the anxiety went away, and I felt much better. I wasn't afraid to hurt L anymore and was going to go to Burning Bär anyway whether she liked it or not. I hugged our host's friend. L warned me that she'd be around others who might hit on her.

That evening they went to the house of a friend of hers, and they agreed on who would seduce who. I wasn't sure if I should go with her, as the jealousy might make me feel worse, but I found that I'd really let go this time, and in the intimate atmosphere of someone's house I didn't seem to mind at all. The guy she wanted to hit on was really nice. I liked him too and could totally see how it would work between them, but I didn't mind. After all it seems like perhaps it was really just the superficiality that made me question the validity of her feelings for me. I was jealous not of the people she was hitting on, but jealous of the superficial as someone who identifies with the profound.

I went with them in the subway but said I was going to run back since I didn't like subways. She said she could understand, what with "all the frightening noises." It seemed like such a contemptuous thing for her to say that she must've been trying to hurt me without realising it, because it should've been clear enough how strong I was. I told her I must've made myself seem like a wet blanket but that was just with her, and before I met her I'd felt indestructible. At that point it could've also been that she still compared me to the depressed artist she'd shown me a video of earlier, but later it became clear that she really did want to hurt me, even if she repressed it. The next day we went to a bar. I was expecting they'd go on until 3 AM like the night before and wasn't going to risk losing any sleep in the state I was in, so I was about to leave early. The tone in which L gave me directions said "go and get out of here then", but I doubt she was aware of it. I relished in her inability to contain her darker side any longer and cast her a devilish look when I was about to leave, but it turned out they were about to go back to our host's bedroom too, so I went with them.

We played games until the small hours. One involved taking turns adding a few words to a story, which became a very psychedelic story. At one point, a "friendly wolf" came up ("perhaps a bit too friendly" someone added), and whenever it was L's turn she violently hurt the wolf (pokes his eyes out, dropped something in the sockets, made him drown in blood). I realised later that if everything we come up with comes from somewhere and the wolf has to mean something, it would be me, with my wolfish manes and wolfish eyes. I got tired before they did and tried to sleep, but every time I heard L's voice I woke up, fantasising that they were playing the "dirty game" that our host had made.

The next day, she began making breakfast. I felt awkward and at first didn't think of asking if she wanted help. Later when she cleaned the entire kitchen, I forgot altogether. Dishes don't take that long anyway (I'd done the dishes the day before) and she was so ridiculously thorough, cleaning even the walls, that I assumed she just wanted the excuse to be alone. When she seemed to be gone for longer than I expected I asked her if she wanted me to help, but it was too late and she was finishing. She said I didn't have to help if I didn't want to, but her tone said otherwise.

The day after we went to Burning Bär. I was a bit disappointed that she'd gotten a ride without me or without even talking about it. I didn't find a ride and had to take the bus, but in my dazed state I enjoyed the ride. I had the best view in front of the bus and the weather was sunny. Whenever I closed my eyes I saw L, and from the corner of my eyes everyone looked like her. In Halle, close to the festival, I met a few other Burners on the way there (one had a bear hat, so it wasn't hard to tell). I told a very chill woman, R about L, and she said maybe I'd find someone else. There was chemistry in the way she spoke. Her tranquillity seemed to click with my intensity. It was sensual and her voice and eyes caressed me. Yes, I could imagine I'd find someone else — I'd said L as much, that each time I fell in love made it easier for it to happen again, for my shell to break further and further apart with each impact. I'm not as casual as L and my love doesn't spread onto just anyone, but R made a particular impression on me.

I hadn't expected much from the festival, but even if I had, the festival would've exceeded them. It felt like coming home. The people were extremely approachable on a very deep level and we all got a welcoming hug. The festival not only had music that was stimulating to me, but also had places that were really relaxed, among which a room with NASA recordings of Earth's magnetic field and transitioning NASA images mirrored in a circle. Everyone felt like a friend and there was such a relaxed atmosphere that I didn't feel the need for more than two drinks over the whole weekend.

L would actually arrive much later, since her ride had lost a lot of time with makeup. She seemed a lot happier now. I later saw her kiss another guy and she looked blissful in a way she never had with me. There'd always been a tension in the way we'd kissed and hugged. I felt jealous of how she could feel better with someone she'd just met than she ever had with me. Maybe I meant more to her, but to hell with meaning: I didn't make her as happy, and that's all that matters, and perhaps I didn't make her as happy because I meant more to her, and she can't deal with that because she feels like that's something to be responsible for rather than something to enjoy. Once again I felt like some essential part was missing from me, something everyone had and could give her — and with it, L was missing too. The expression of her blissfully closed eyes keeps haunting me. I sat in a couch and a Finnish woman who just casually passed me saw right away that I didn't feel alright and walked up to me to console me. I just love these people.

I went to a shiatsu workshop, which for the teacher soon turned into foreplay, but I went on massaging the middle-aged man next to him with my own massage based on tai chi. After some dancing, I went to bed relatively early at 3 AM to be at the yoga workshop the next morning, but kept waking up when I thought I heard L's voice, eventually realising that it wasn't hers. There were only two other people but it felt very refreshing and, once again, I had something of a catharsis, and for the third time that week I cried. I told them about how I felt. During the meditation she told me to think of my thoughts as balloons floating away, but I told them L was more like a zeppelin, or like my breath itself, something that's always there. The yoga teacher told me I was lucky and that I had something really valuable.

When I next saw her, I told her how I felt and how the day before on the bus, I'd seen her face whenever I closed my eyes. She said she was sorry. I smiled and said it was enough for me just to love and that I expected nothing in return, and that I just said it because I wanted her to know that she was loved and I hoped it would make her feel appreciated. The next time I saw her, she brushed me gently over the back with her fingers, and it was enough to make me drop my food and sit down in a chair with a drugged smile. There were a lot of times that she made me smile like a goof. When I was alone I'd let her name roll from my lips like some sweet intoxicating fume to float like a prayer to heaven.

That day, I was hoping to go to a lot of workshops, including some I'd planned, but most were cancelled or moved, including both of mine. I did go to a voice experimentation workshop, which was hilarious: everyone sat in a circle made random sounds, and once in a while some joker added a random word.

I went to a hug party that day. Everyone was to say a few words in introduction. I told her how I was in love, how I'd hallucinated L in other people's voices here because the same kind of energy is going around here, how we're all variations of the human being and I came here to be reminded of that. If L didn't want it, I wanted to pass on the love I felt to others. A dozen people all intertwined with me on the bed, and forming their own kind of bed. It's amazing that no one felt any discomfort. It was an amazing experience. My hands wandered from one person to another, men, women, young, old, and it all felt just as natural. There was a very cute older woman who I felt particularly partial to. I was high and asked her if she knew the golden spiral, said that the way our limbs are proportioned, we're basically a bunch of twisted golden spirals intertwining with each other. At one point I was caressing an attractive younger woman. My inhibitions were gone and I said she was really hot. She stared at me, perhaps trying to determine what to think of the comment, if I was objectifying her or complimenting her, but I held her gaze until she seemed satisfied that I was treating her very much like a person, and I was referring to her expression and body language more than her body.

I'd shared a hit of acid with L and had been looking all over the place for her to check up on her, as it was her first time. When I didn't find her by the evening I felt a terrible knot in my intestines. The trip had gone well so far. I'd reflected on how we are all energies trying to interface and there's no way any of us can help whether we can do so or not, it's just a process that takes time. Maybe there's nothing I could do to connect with L. When I talked with A about it, he said he'd had a similar story with his ex and that he realised now that it was her problem, not his. I knew this. She has trouble with close connections, as she'd written on her profile.

When I had nothing to do, I looked around for someone who was on their own to give a massage and eventually found a Latvian girl. She really enjoyed the massage in the cuddle room, and we'd probably have cuddled hadn't a workshop begun in the meantime. I asked if maybe we could do so later. It turned out later that she was an artist at the cabaret. There was nudity involved. When I saw her afterwards, she was flustered and a little tense, possibly because she was still bare-breasted, possibly because I was high and my intensity shone through more than before. I said her performance seemed BDSM themed — she said "Oh I could never tell" and her tone was incongruously flirtatious. But with the cabaret was still ongoing and her bare-breasted, it certainly wasn't the right time to hug, and I didn't know what to say. Besides, I didn't feel too great. I'd finally seen L across the room and when she glanced back, she turned away in disgust.

The knot in my intestines became worse, and I went to lie in bed for a while. At that point she came up to the dormitory and lay down in his arms. The jealousy flared up again, and I thought about how fake it all seemed, what she called love. She was a liar. She didn't accept everything like she said she would. She doesn't accept me, because she doesn't accept herself, and she won't accept her anxiety to be with me. I felt the urge to shout at her flare up within my belly, and the knot was gone. I accept my emotions, therefore I express them. But because I don't cut off my emotions, they're also all connected, so the anger was balanced by compassion, and I didn't know just what I was going to do when I got up from my bed.

I just lingered behind the closet, and a girl from the hug party noticed me and told me how she liked my little speech about the girl I was in love with. I said she was right there around the closet and I'm not her girlfriend. "Friend?" "No." "Just met?" "I don't think either of us know how we feel." I told her how the knot in my intestines was gone when I felt like shouting at her and I didn't know what to do. She told me I could love everyone and love is just a projection. I said I knew that. Someone said I'd sulked enough and offered me MDMA, but I refused, saying it gave me a 3-month hangover.

I went to lie back in bed for a while longer, then got back up and walked towards L. I asked if either of them could hit me. I knew they wouldn't, but I just needed the emotions between us to be expressed somehow.

The guy asked what was going on. She said contemptuously "he likes me." I said, "No, that's not it" and told her about how I felt like she'd avoided me, how, even though we had barely spoken all day, she'd turned away in disgust when I gave her one glance. She told me I was projecting, but the look in her eyes had been unmistakeable. I don't mind negative emotions, they're the effects of positive emotions and just as valuable, just two sides of the same coin, both forms of love: she herself had said so. But those emotions have to be expressed or the whole mechanism just stays stuck, and she just didn't have time for that now, because it would take all her energy to go against her inhibitions to do so. So she told me I should stop making things awkward and give her privacy.

I said I wondered what would've happened if the girl hadn't stopped me, that I wouldn't have shouted at her because I didn't want to make her feel like she was doing something wrong, but somehow I'd have had to express what I felt. She said I was making her anxious and she was already tripping, so I did a bad thing. That was enough for me, I was satisfied. She'd hurt me as much as I needed her to, and once again I felt like I had nothing to lose. She told J how she'd been having a really bad trip and had been nauseous all day, how she'd seen death and might give in: after all I did make her express her negative emotions, something she hadn't done to the guy she'd been cuddling. The strange thing is that she still said these things in her usual cheerful voice, and while I believe that she is a cheerful person, it makes me question how much of it is real. At least, I have no reason to envy her: she's not . I regretted that I hadn't found out before, because now I had no chance of supporting her as I'd been meaning to do anymore. Someone offered her MDMA, and she accepted.

Someone offered her kava kava, a calmative root, but she refused. I said I could really use it. I drank the burning liquid in one gulp without wincing and crashed in bed at just 10 PM. This time I felt totally empty, and everyone and everything in the world seemed totally empty, meaningless, fake. I was out like a light. There was an orgy that night, but I doubt it would've interested me in the best of moods. But thinking of L on MDMA I could imagine her being there, with a combination of arousal and jealousy (but I insist that jealousy is just a very overwhelming form of arousal anyway).

She herself had said hate was a form of love, but the most any hate had been honestly expressed between us was when during our first night, I'd pushed her away before catching her again and pulling her close. I should've done more of that. I made the same mistake as her. I was way too gentle with her and should've been much more firm. When she drank to calm her down, I should've taken her drink, thrown it behind the boxes, entrap her tightly in my arms, looked at her sternly and said she wasn't going anymore, that she had nowhere to run and was going to stay right in my arms where she was, as herself. Why didn't I listen to my intuition? I had nothing to lose from the start because it was too good to be true, because there's no good without bad. Next time, the more perfect someone seems the nastier I'll be to them, right from the start, no matter the consequences, and when it's about to become too much, I'll balance it with love. But hate has to be added to the mix right from the start, otherwise it'll soon be too late.

The next day, I gave the yoga teacher a back rub when we were queueing for food. I gave a workshop for massages later that day, training two people how to massage and massaging two people. L went in to collect the glasses from the orgy last night. She gave me her usual awkward smile and I said I was sorry I wasn't more helpful during her trip the day before. She said nothing, but I didn't even notice and I seamlessly went on instructing the girl on how to massage her boyfriend. I asked her later if she wanted to say goodbye, and she gave me a cold hug.

Because of the workshop, my ride to the Netherlands didn't find me and left a note on my bed. I'd had enough and just walked out the door, thinking of hiking and trying to hitchhike on the way or camp somewhere nearby. I just wanted to leave. I was stumbling and felt a catatonic attack coming on, but resisted it and moved on. A burner passed me and I asked if he could give me a ride to Berlin. He said he could. I asked if it was alright if I wasn't very sociable, my chin twitching. He asked if I was alright, and I somehow gave a genuine smile and said I was. He said he was going to get his other hitchhikers first.

When they came, R was among them, and it felt once again like fate was doing its best to connect everything in the most unlikely twists. I talked about L again and this time tried to really make sense of it, until I came to the conclusion that she just hadn't had enough time for herself her whole life and needed time alone to face herself until she'd be forced to accept herself. Superficial connections alone won't keep her distracted forever. Meanwhile, all I can do is wait.

I asked R if I could stay at her place. She said there wasn't really space, but I said I had a sleeping mattress with me anyway. It felt as if there was a reason she of all people was here, and wanted to know if anything would happen, but even if there didn't, her proximity would be enough. R and I made exquisite eye contact that night, but she said I should spend the night at A instead, as he had more space. I said I was actually hoping to spend the night with her, and she said she had to make it clear that that wasn't going to happen, even when I said I just wanted to cuddle, as she was exhausted after the weekend. But her tone was very kind and when I spaced out for a bit, she asked me if I was alright. When we said goodbye, I told her I wasn't just randomly reaching out for consolation and that I liked her more than anyone at Burning Bär, just for the record.

A turned out to have been one of R's lovers at Burning Bär. He'd felt a lot of jealousy too but didn't find it a nice feeling, even though he later admitted that it's good to feel jealous because it means you're alive. He lived in a community of about fifty people who voted on who to let in. It was nice to be there.

On the bus ride back the next day, I felt a lot better to be finally at a safe distance from that burning sun that is L. I felt like my stomach was replete with her and now I needed time to digest her energy. "When you part from your friend, you grieve not; For that which you love most in him may be clearer in his absence, as the mountain to the climber is clearer from the plain." I began to feel all fluffy inside. My energy had become smoother, less abrasive, more like hers, and I was glad to keep something of her inside. I stole some of your energy, and there's nothing you can do about it, because you have no copyrights over it, and the same energy flows everywhere. I'd felt before how her energy vibrated through mine like a rippling that liquified the hardness in me. At one point I'd even found that for the first time ever, industrial metal had become overstimulating to me, although as I worked my way through this it passed soon enough. If she's experiencing the same, then it'll be a lot rougher for her.

The day after, even though I had a cold, I felt strong again. I cycled to my parents' other house through the rain, took some psi, took a freezing cold shower while it was kicking in, and spend the rest of the day in ecstasy thinking about L and S until I felt like it was just about driving me mad. Go wherever you want, but you'll always be with me, because you're just an energy, and if your ego is controlling that ego in yourself, it will not do so in me, so you live more freely in me than you do in you. Someday, you'll regret your cowardice, and I'll be the one to reject you when I form my community, to send you on a mission of self-discovery until you truly accept every experience and submit to infinity. But you'll figure it out — I believe in you.
I think you were just afraid to be alone once you'd split up with C, as it did get quite difficult at first, and you needed someone to hold on to. I was the perfect person to guide you on your way to solitude, because I'm so introspective and our innermost is so similar. You're welcome. Anytime. If you need to use me again, let me know, because I'll do anything to guide you to a state of authenticity, as it will bring you to me.
I took a walk in Berlin to the wall. The actual wall turned out to be quite mediocre, since it was outside and the graffiti wasn't original, in fact, it was very new because everyone wanted their graffiti on the wall, so that there wasn't any that was any good. But on a crossroads on the way there, I found the best graffitis I'd ever seen, of Orpheus and Eurydice. I'd been thinking before of how I am like Orpheus.
Orpheus, you fool, why did you look back, why did you doubt her? You knew she'd be gone, but you couldn't bear the suspense, you just needed a resolution. Knowing that she was gone was easier than the uncertainty whether she was there or not. You lured her out of dreams through your calls, but when you could not believe she was real, she faded back into dreams. Will I never learn that honesty can be the most deceiving thing of all? What undertones did I neglect to observe in what I said? Was I holding too tightly by trying so hard to let go? I was still trying to prepare for the future by saying that every possibility was allowed, but it'll happen however it must anyway without my help.
I was trying to make her accept herself, and in that I didn't accept her inacceptance. I thought that once I'd accepted myself I'd never have to deal with inacceptance again, but I was wrong — it'll always be a part of my life because I'll be faced with it in others, and I need to accept the way it feels, the claustrophobia of it, and not just feel pain for others but actually suffer if needs be. I will suffer for you, feel your suffering, your inacceptance, your repression. Anything to be with you, even being set back in my own life, because to be free without you is worse than captivity. I'd rather join you in your cell, and just enjoy being there because I'd be there with you. With anyone else I'd tell myself they're beneath me if they're not themselves, but with you I can't do that — you've become more important than anything else, even my beliefs.
All I know is that I felt the need to express myself, but perhaps I should've stored up the energy until whatever time you wanted it, even if it would have driven me insane. Or else perhaps I should've expressed it more towards other people, since there was only so much love you would take from me when there was so much else going on. I will never abide by any rules and I will express my emotions to whoever I desire, but after this experience there will be a change in how I want to express myself, and it'll be more balanced. There are no rules, but I don't need them to grow. I did the best I could and I can only rely on my intuition, but with any luck, my intuition has become that much stronger now.
I finally see now what I should've done that night when you were lying in another man's arms. It only took me several weeks and somehow I was supposed to realize it that moment. It's so perfect. If I'd felt it then I would've been in a trance. I would've walked past you, said, "Excuse me while I make the skies fall on our heads," climbed the stairs next to your bed to the little roof, and sang heavy metal at the top of my lungs. It's not my fault that this happens to be the loneliest place in the castle. It would've made my point perfectly that when emotions are there, they cannot be sidestepped and will find their target sooner or later. They flow around in a circle, like the pulse of our blood, like the wind, like solar flares, because the only way we can contain them is if they always arrive back at the same point — just don't interfere with their flow. And I would've completed the circle. It's not our place to judge them as good or bad. What, you think they actually mean something?