Center

Every now and then a client and I will chat as I'm working with them. Of late, our conversations have turned to me and my life changes, namely the transition out of software and into singer/massage therapist/shamanic practitioner. Some are baffled by this, and others understand it immediately. I simply say that I've stopped labeling myself as an X or a Y, and have simply begun making decisions and doing things which take me closer to my center, closer to what feels like the "real me".

The more I interact with others, the easier it seems to be to find my own center, my own balancing points. I can see so clearly when others don't have theirs, and am sometimes swayed by the moods of others. More recently though, I'm less and less thrown off by being in close proximity to the whimsical moods of others; I find it easier to say to myself, "I don't want to feel like that", and I stick to what is truly my own center.

I thought about this the other day when I sadly reflected that I don't really have a robust "posse" here. I have two very close friends, one gay man and one woman (married, with kids). I've got (well, I thought I had) great friends in the D.C. area who have a wonderful cadre of friends, many of whom I've met, many of whom I've kissed. I yearn for a circle of close men friends here, and have yet to be able to build that, and have frequently sort of pined for my friends in D.C.

Then the other day I realized that this thought, too, was taking me off-center: those boys never contact me. They love me fine and embrace me when I'm there, but the communication is pretty much one-way and all uphill for me. They're not, and never will be, my posse despite the fact that we love each other.

Once I sat with that for a half a day and really let it sink in, my yearning wobble stopped and I was back to spinning on my own center again, if not ecstatically happy, then at least content and utterly OK with the what is of my life and my friendships.

I've longed for a group of gay men to call my own to hang with and call "family". Haven't found 'em yet, but I do keep looking :-)


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