Uncommon Curiosity

I am a cave person. My father is also a cave person, as was his father before him and, I assume, his father before him. Coming of age around physicists, engineers and mathematicians, I was surrounded by cave people in my formative years, and now I work in a field chock full of folks who breathe, think and speak fluent cave. For decades, I had never felt the need to think much about life in the cave – it was what it was and it suited me fine.

The rules of the cave are simple – you are responsible for your own feelings and for never inflicting said feelings on anyone else. If you cannot keep composure, you must retreat into your cave, alone, until you are able to fix your internal error. Cave people do not share feelings or discuss revelations, unless they revolve around one of Fermat’s theorems or the best way to get a good look at what electrons are doing when no one’s watching. Cave living is simple, detached, clean, and, most of all, it’s what I’m used to.

However, in the past few years, I’ve suddenly and inexplicably been drawn to building relationships with sun worshipers, those folks who rip open their own hearts and dissect them out in the open for everyone to see. They cry and laugh and carry on in full view of other people, exuding emotions all over everything. The whole thing is fascinating and horrible, like some strange emo version of Halloween, except that Michael Myers is running around crying at sweet young coeds and holding them down while he makes them listen to his feelings until their half-ripped bikinis are dripping with understanding and shared experience.

Let’s be honest – for a native-born cave person, talking about emotions is hardcore edge play.

Two years ago, Catherine coaxed me out of my cave and, through months of epic emails, slowly taught me the beginnings of how to express what I was feeling inside. The blogs that I’ve kept have been testaments to my sometimes haphazard journey towards being able to expose myself, although I still find it much easier to write it out than to ever speak the truth. From early on, I was taught that I don’t have a right to my feelings, that they are shameful and awkward, and it’s best to hide them and not admit to such horrible internal errors, so the path is very difficult. I admire people who can be so open and honest, and I do hope to get there someday.

However, I frequently find myself in conversations or situations that are far beyond my feeble tools, and so I have to retreat. Sometimes I’ll use an excuse – thank goodness for kids who seem to constantly need my attention – or sometimes I’ll honestly explain that it’s just too much for me. Sometimes I even just yell, “CAVE!” and then run away to do some gardening or take a shower or pound some weights so I have time to regroup. For someone who has spent a lifetime denying my feelings, actually experiencing them – on purpose – is more intense than trying to stand on the sun.

The difficulty I’m experiencing of late is that the sun worshipers do not know the rules of the cave. They see me run in and they RUN IN AFTER ME. You see, sun worshipers believe that everything is best solved by talking. To other people. Out loud. Where they will hear you…. This is incomprehensible to cave people – how would telling someone about your feelings ever help to make those feelings go away? And the sun worshipers are wondering, well, how do you express your feelings if you’re just trying to deny them?

From the beginning, the two groups are destined to frustration because they’re not even aiming for the same goals. The cave people want to get rid of their feelings and the sun worshipers want to celebrate them. So what hope is there?

Well, I’m making small inroads with my own beloved sun worshipers. First, I had to explain about the cave and remember to explicitly tell them when I’ve gone inside. (Apparently sun worshipers think a momentary lack of communication is just an oversight, and they can be very persistent with the doorbell at the mouth of the cave.) Second, when they come back repeatedly to bring flowers and chocolates and a new lamp and a rug for the cave, and to tell you that they saw a rose that made them think of you, or that their cat has started doing that thing again with its tail…I am learning to thank them and gently walk them back out to the door, and close it firmly behind them. The trick is to forget some of my formal WASP training and let myself have a little space without trying to entertain unwanted visitors, while also making sure to see that all that attention is the way sun worshipers show you they care. For a sun worshiper, walking away is tantamount to leaving you to die in a desert, bereft of emotion.

And so it continues, the education of the cave people and the sun worshipers as we try to find a common language and some common ground. It’s certainly not easy, but it is worth it, because we have so much to learn from one another. I still speak fluent cave, but I’m getting better at speaking sun worshiper, even if I do have a funny accent. I’m coming closer to a balance where emotions can be acknowledged, felt and then embraced or discarded, depending on what’s best for me in the moment and in my life. I still suck at crying in public and tend to look angry when I’m scared, but I’m getting there, slowly, thanks to the lovers and friends who have been so patient with me.

Thank you, my beloved sun worshipers, you dazzle me with your brilliance and humble me with your patience. I love you like the crow loves the midday sun.