Peace II

It seems that I have written of late and have covered the when and where’s of life – an important updating and stage setter I suppose, but I have not crawled underneath things very much. Last night I sat with an old friend – dinner and many drinks (no one drove) – and covered much ground, old stories / new events – the gamut. And as we talked I realized an interesting thing: I feel at peace. That is not to say that there are many issues and my plate is not overflowing. Maybe it is because of those issues – let’s face it, there is little you can throw at me to top the father of my grandchild being a jailed pedophile – but I think it goes beyond that. Maybe it is the self-acceptance and no longer fixating on returning to places I can never go. Maybe it is the bond of friendship that Carrie and I have – surviving family issues that either bring you together or tear you apart. I suppose in some sense all of the above.

Phil is dealing with some issues of late – implications of the closet he has so carefully built and finally having told his “other boyfriend” that he really isn’t. What particularly comes to mind is a comment that Stan used to make about his relationship with Phil: he used to say that Phil was his other half. It always struck me as strange, not so much that I had in a way supplanted Stan, but the implications of the comment in general. I think I have spent my life trying to be another half, to girlfriends and wives, subsuming all and defining myself as part of a couple.

Now, there is nothing wrong with being a couple and nothing wrong with a level of devotion but the implication of being someone’s half is that inherently you are not whole. And if they disappear you are left incomplete. I go into a new year with things constantly changing – the things that cannot even be predicted, finding the balance of friendship with Carrie while allowing both of us to personally grow, and the unpredictability of the relationship with Phil as he finely struggles with his own self definition.

And while I go into another year with changes yet to be revealed, I also go into it with a new found constant: a sense of wholeness which begets a sense of peace.


As I was saving this document I discovered that I had already written a post titled “Peace” back in December 2006. Then it was a greeting of Peace to the readers I used to have. Today it is much simpler, a lot less words: my own inner peace.