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CDS: email exchange

I was surprised to find this in my Inbox. I didn't expect anything from Cliff for sometime.

Thinking of you and how you are doing. Transition back for me has been rough at first, but not as rough as I expected and got better with time. A lot of grief over losses. Was a hoot, though, if you could have seen me in the storage locker rummaging through my stored clothes and toiletries, changing my pants and shoes, repacking my suitcase, wondering if anyone would think I was nuts.

I think I spent the last night I will spend in my old apartment. My wife was away when I got back. From now on I am rootless or a guest.

Seriously... How are you?

Write back. I won't be on Skype till Friday morning, your time at the earliest. How is the WH report coming? Let me know if it is too much.

Ciao,

Cliff

My response:

Dear Cliff,

It's good to hear from you. I dind't really know if you wanted to receive anything from me at this point.

I still have to start on the WH report but I'll have it for you by the end of the week or sooner. I don't think I'll have to add a lot to it, anyway, just titles.

I've been thinking of you, too. Wondering what you'll come home to, how you'll manage. But I suppose we all have to learn and re-learn many things over and over again in a lifetime. That doesn't make things easier, I know, but the point is, others have gone through things just as bad or even worse and survived. I suppose that makes it easier for me as I keep worrying about you. I do so want to make things easier for you.

After my class last Saturday, as I was standing on the platform waiting for the train, a wave of emotion suddenly washed over me. I was missing you badly. The feeling was so strong and so unexpected. I didn't know what had hit me or where it came from. I've never had that feeling before in my entire life.

That was scary.

And just this morning as I was in the shower, my mind went back to our last night together. You held my face in your hands as I sat on you. It felt so good, I remember now. You were so gentle yet I could feel the strength in your hands. I felt like my face was so small in your hands.

I felt secure with you at that moment, Cliff.

But you know what? I buried that emotion. I got so scared of the feeling and the realization that I buried it and ignored it. So when you said that that was the best lovemaking we've had so far, I said we've had better. I didn't get the point. I focused on the phsyical and ignored the emotional.

So I did exactly what you've been doing all your life. I walled in my feelings because I was scared of them. I didn't want to fall in love with you because I'm scared that you'll just leave me sometime in the future.

How did I develop this fear? I think it was because of all the moving I did with my family. You moved a lot, too. But the difference here is that I moved with my entire family and I enjoyed it. I enjoyed it so much that I preferred it over developing long lasting relationships with anyone outside my family. And this got replicated in my adult life. I kept hopping from one job to the next, from one career to the next. I was without fear, I told myself smugly.

In reality, though, it was because of fear. I wouldn't commit to a job and leave because mostly, I didn't like the people I was getting to know, the job was becoming too difficult and I saw no reason to invest time and effort into it, or I just got plain bored. It was so easy for me to just up and leave and so the fear was never addressed.

I am scared of getting close to someone and getting hurt.

How do you get over it?

Just like any fear, I'm thinking, you have to face it.

I don't know what that means for me. Your situation is more complicated, I know. But I don't think that you can't face anything if you close yourself from loving other people in the fear that you might hurt them. You know this. And I know that you know this. It's a chicken-and-egg question.

Just something to think about.

Anyway.

I miss you a lot.

I wanted to say that since he knew what I knew he knew, then he was simply just waiting for someone better to come along. But I thought better of it. There's no point in putting any more pressure on the guy. Not right now.

State of things: email to Myles

My dearest Myles,

So sorry for being unresponsive.

My excuses:

1. Depressed over Cliff's situation
   
   He is undergoing a divorce. Actually, they are still to discuss things with the lawyer. Since this is an amicable settlement, it is not going to be complicated. Still, they need to file in court.
   
   Cliff is in a very depressed state. It's going to take a few years before he gets straightened out in this.
   
   His main problem: Fear of getting close to people because he fears the pain of loss of people he has invested his feelings in.
   
   His mindset about primary relationships: He is incapable, at the moment, of maintaining primary relationships.
   
   His strategy: Will not get into primary relationships until he is capable of doing so.
   
   Our present relationship: Primarily as friends, no commitments beyond the here-and-now, with an eye on developing into something more long-term.
   
   Our strategy: Learn together (in both professional and personal life), have fun together, work together, help each other make a lot of money.


2. No energy to go online and email updates.
   
   Thursday and Friday, went with Cliff to his interviews. My job: take notes on the replies. considering that the subject matter was very touchy and philosophical (the interviews elicited information needed for a visioning session), the answers were very serious and required a lot of reading between the lines. And considering also that the interviewees were top executives, the job required all my focus and attention. After two days of that, I was bone tired.
   
   Not to mention that I got my period on Thursday.
   
   Saturday, I went to class, which was also very tiring because I participated actively, engaged actively, and was just very active despite my period. Not to mention that it was very hot. The difference in temperature, from an aircon room to the hot and humid air outside just drains you of every drop of energy you can muster to produce.
   
   When I got back to the hotel, all I could do was crash. No energy even to lift up my celfone and check messages. So I just put my fone on silent. But then, I forgot to turn it back and never changed it till this morning.

OVERALL STATE OF MIND: SAD.

I was a fool to think that I'd have something, finally, with Cliff. Of course, going through this pain in his life, he cannot at the moment see anything positive about anything. When he goes back to the US this Saturday, he has no home to return to, whether the family he's been used to or a physical dwelling. He's going to be living with friends; he's going to worry about his younger daughter who's going off to college and his dog. On his birthday, he and his wife are going to face the lawyer and discuss things.

In all, it's just a mess for him. And I can't do anything to make it all work out right for him.

So here I am, once again inventing diversions, deluding myself that things will turn out okay for me.

I've been given permission by my boss to go off a couple of days at a time to join Cliff in his projects. I explained that Cliff has been coaching me in OD and now wants to take me on as an intern. There will be no salary, just allowances to cover bus fare and meals. Fiction, of course, as Cliff intends to include my services in his payment scheme.

I'm hoping that this working relationship with Cliff grows into something profitable. If it does, then perhaps I can change my present full-time employment to a consultancy arrangement. But that's thinking too far ahead. In the meantime, I just have to put my emotions on hold and proceed on logic, just as before.

Be well!

Cliff's back: email to Myles

Dearest Myles,

I'm in a state of suspended animation. I have two very strong emotions tugging at me simultaneously: one, the chance to have a very animated and busy personal and professional life with Cliff; and two, a very sedate and frustrating life working with Freddy.

The only reason why I keep Freddy on my mind is the potential for romance, something which is very absent with my relationship with Cliff. Cliff isn't just a romantic guy. He is very scared of true and deep emotional intimacy because of his fear of loss. His childhood trauma has scarred him deeply but he is seeing a therapist about it. It has been only recently that he's realized that he has been suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder -- from the abandonment of an alcoholic and abusive father, to the emotional abuse he received from his mother, to the decisions he has made in his life, including the choice of the woman he married.

Now, as to the last one, regarding his wife, he has finally admitted to himself, and to her, that the marriage was a mistake. He'd known his wife since they were in high school together. He married her because of his mom. In his own words, Cliff chose to marry his wife as a reaction to his mother. Cliff's wife was everything his mother wasn't. But the wife was extremely co-dependent on Cliff to the extent that she never took on the responsibility to end the marriage, despite the fact that she was getting hurt in the relationship.

According to Cliff, he realized that he had been the controlling and dominant one in the partnership, if you could call it that. He dominated and controlled with the goal of creating this picture-perfect life that he never had with his parents. It was all done in a state of desperation that, later on, became a state of denial in the face of the fact that it wasn't working out.

It's all very simple really, although the events that led him to this realization were very convoluted. It was a lifetime of complexities and cover-ups and just plain lying to oneself.

After his wife learned about me, she and Cliff discussed the options available: either work on improving the marriage or divorce. It was also decided at this point that Cliff would not come in contact with me until the marriage had been resolved.

A month ago, Cliff and his entire family went to Hawaii for a family vacation. They stayed there for two weeks. In the middle of that vacation, Cliff decided that, although he has realized what the problem was in his marriage, he could no longer stand to work to improve the relationship with his wife. It was as if the discovery of the root cause carried with the sad realization that the marriage had to end.

So they sat down and talked about it and decided on divorce. Cliff said it was very matter-of-fact: they took out a piece of paper and divided that assets between them. While the lawyer worked on the divorce papers, Cliff would stay in the apartment with his wife.

When they got back to Seattle, Cliff sent me an email informing me of this development. (He and I had not been communicating since July 2006.) Here's the email:

I have reached the end of my journey of discovering whether to terminate my marriage. It has been a slow and deliberate process of trying many things and arriving at certainty that some things just can't be fixed and can't be persisted in as they are.

So, I think I can now consider helping you in your own OD pursuit. I am excited for you and glad that you have held onto this vision because I believe it is right for you. There are several developments in Manila since I saw you last, which could lead to some interesting possibilities that I should share with you.

And, I also am wondering about us. I have missed you a lot and really care for you. You might not have the interest after all that I have put you through. I have certainly caused a lot of turmoil and learned a lot about myself in the process. I think I will bring a different set of insights and dynamics to the relationship. But, what do you think?

I will be back between 4/7 (arriving at 11 pm) and 4/21. I would love to see you, catch up and fill you in on the developments I mentioned above.

Cliff

Of course, there can be no denying that Cliff is interested in picking up the relationship with me where we had left off. But I don't think he was manipulating things in such a way as to make me agree to picking it up again. There are two invitations in that email: to a work relationship and to an exploration of the possibility at a personal relationship. He was not proposing; he was asking what I thought.

Why am I dissecting the email? Because his wife got into Cliff's computer the day before he was scheduled to leave for Manila and deliberately looked for emails addressed to me. When she found this email, she of course blew up at Cliff. She was so angry, she kept trying to hit him and shouting she wished him dead. During all this time, their 19-year-old daughter was witness to the whole thing.

To cut a long story short, the wife asked him to leave the apartment. He rescheduled his travel plans and spent the next day putting all his stuff in storage. He checked into a hotel for the night and left for Manila the next morning. Here's his email:

My contacting you released such a torrent of hatred from my wife that I see how much damage has been done for her for the first time in its full scope.

It isn't all my fault, I know. We see the world and the ethics of relationships in different ways. She feels my message to you was bad as the affair to begin with.

In the end, I have nothing to protect. Not seeing you for any type of relationship no longer matters. She is shutting off all further interaction and I am leaving the apartment we have been sharing like roommates tomorrow for good.

I will come into Manila a day later. But I will make the trip and keep my client commitments.

If you would like to see me it is ok now. I would like to see you.

Cliff

The crux of the matter is the interpretation of the resolution of the marriage. For Cliff, the marriage had been resolved as they had decided to end it. For his wife, nothing was resolved until the divorce was final and Cliff was out of the house.

So there you are.

And where am I in all this? Cliff is still reeling from all this loss. He feels terribly guilty that he has caused his loved ones so much hurt. Although he does not love his wife in the way that she had hoped for, he still loves her as his long-time best friend. There is no hate for her in his heart. The reality is, however, that he had made a mistake and had covered it up for as long as the marriage lasted.

The good news is that he no longer wishes to lie -- to himself or to anybody else. So he has decided that when close friends ask him for the lowdown, he is not going to color anything but instead tell it as it is, including the affair he had and is having with me. He's treating this like Alcoholics Anonymous members are treating their addiction: admitting to it, telling the truth to others about it, and making amends. He refers to a 12-step program for AA members. I'm not familiar with it.

I asked him what he now wants. He says that he wants us to be a couple. As to what that means is something that we would have to discover together. He does not mention anything about traditional long-term relationships like marriage. I don't expect him to -- yet. I expect that he will have to get over this divorce and work at settling down as a divorced person. I understand that that will take a long time.

So how am I going about this?

I've nothing else on the horizon. At least, I'd be working with Cliff and learning from him. That's enough for the meantime. I do care for him. Maybe I can even learn to love him, and teach him to be a little more romantic. But the specter of Freddy as the Pinoy counterpart, the one thing I don't have, is just too frustrating. Everytime I make love to Cliff, I see Freddy in my mind. I keep wondering how sweet Freddy would be, how much sweeter, really.

Isn't it ironic? Here I am., finally getting the courage to love and open myself up to someone, and Cliff just happens to have intimacy problems which will take years to get resolved. And there's no one else!

The entire universe has conspired to keep me from loving and be loved by a man.

Maybe I wasn't supposed to have a heart and only be some cosmic accident was I born. Now that is what I call a sense of humor.

I miss you.

Clear & Present Danger

A clear and present danger. No less than the Supreme Court of the United States has so described global warming. The New York Times' editorial on the issue presents a clear reading of the decision. The following are excerpts:

It would be hard to overstate the importance of yesterday’s ruling by the Supreme Court that the federal government has the authority to regulate the carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases produced by motor vehicles.

xxx

The ruling also demolishes President Bush’s main justification for not acting — his argument that because the Clean Air Act does not specifically mention greenhouse gases, the executive branch has no authority to regulate them. The president has cited other reasons for not acting, including costs. But his narrow reading of the Clean Air Act has always been his ace in the hole.

The court offered a much more “capacious” reading of the act, as Justice John Paul Stevens wrote for the majority. The plaintiffs — 12 states and 13 environmental groups — had argued, and the court agreed, that while the act does not specifically mention greenhouse gases, it gives the federal government clear jurisdiction over “any air pollutant” that may reasonably be anticipated to endanger “public health or welfare.”

xxx

The administration had also argued that the states did not have standing to sue on this issue because they could not show that they would be harmed by the government’s failure to regulate greenhouse gases. The court ruled that the states have a strong and legitimate interest in protecting their land and their citizens against the dangers of climate change and thus have standing to sue.

xxx

The decision was unnervingly close, and some of the arguments in the dissent, written by Chief Justice John Roberts Jr., were cause for concern — especially his comments about the “complexities” of the science of climate change, which is too close for comfort to the administration’s party line.

The Bush Administration has never really represented the American people; it has always been American business interests that served as impetus for its governance and policy-making.