A twist on the Madonna-Magdelene complex
“One of the deepest longings of the human soul is to be seen.”
One of the more interesting nuggets learned in the past couple of weeks is at least one person in this stream reads what I write and then tells my mother. It’s a very strange thing that. That someone would believe they were tattling on Ingrid to the person with whom she’s had no contact in 8 years. Someone here. Interesting, indeed. “As you might imagine, you’re not too popular here” is what followed the above pronouncement. Also included was the admonition to not speak my truth.
It’s a recurring theme. It’s one that Melynnda gave me a name for. It’s a slight twist of the Madonna-Magdelene (or madonna-whore) complex. Every.single.man with whom I’ve had some kind of intimate relationship with, sexual and non, have represented this theme.
They include my past two lovers, my father, and another male friend with whom I’m somewhat close. Each of them loved, lusted, or supported/s privately but has refused to do so publicly; not just shunning but denying my existence and, in some cases, rightness.
There’s the fiancé who got me to Kabul would only introduce me to family, friends and compadres, as ‘a friend’, not the woman with whom he claimed to want to marry. The boyfriend after him was initially open with his children about his relationship with me. Later, though, while asking me to consider living with him (again) and professing the knowing that we were meant to be together and continuing a sexual relationship with me, told his children I was nothing to him, nothing more than a gold-digger who no longer was in his life. There’s the one who will cheer me on, ask questions and help needs be met privately but will not share the magic of thisness with other people who need to be ‘in the know’ because they, too, are part of this magnificence for whatever his own fears are. Then, there’s the father who disappeared for five years and whose recent parting lines included “Make sure you don’t write that you were here because your mother will find out…You are so precious to me…” in almost the same breath.
That’s how I found out that someone here reads what I write not out of interest but as a source of fodder for gossip to give one that has caused grievous harm and that I’m ‘not too popular’. I suppose something like this is to be expected when one lives their life as publicly as possible and whose life includes severed familial relationships. And whose separation from family is grounded in the secrets and silence that family violence breeds. It’s a painful blow, too, to know that in the revelation of this knowing, I also learned that my father, who thinks me so precious, is so afraid of my mother’s response that he would rather me deny my truth of a visit than face her. My father would deny me. Just as lovers and another have.
Want to know what else I’ve learned?
I’m not longer going to allow myself to be a secret. I will no longer allow anyone to deny me as lover, daughter, or partner in the work. If you are not willing to openly respect, honor (and maybe even celebrate) my existence as I am, as I be how I am, and weave the magic into the world in this fashion, I’ll no longer be associated with you. If I include within my match.com profile, “if you don’t think you could tell your minister or mother you’re dating a cool healer-chick we’re not a good match”, why would I expect anything less of those already in my world?
So to the looky-loo who likes to share the gossip, share this: I went to go see the father who walked out of my life 5 years ago for an explanation of why he did so; after admonishing me that blood was thicker than water. (right.) I walked up to him while he was on his tractor three weeks ago and he’s so estranged and disconnected from her, that he couldn’t even recognize his own daughter. And he later offered an explanation for his abandonment that only said so much and skirted the larger truth until he told me how you read and report to my mother as if I’m being the bad little girl again. The one who deserves to be shunned because she speaks the truth.
Shame on you. Shame. On. You.
I’m no secret. I live my life openly and honestly with a distinct purpose so that people will learn truth. A truth that has come again and again and again and again. In the hopes that this time it and we will be heard and heeded. Even just by a few.
You hide behind your own shame. I have none. And will no longer associate with anyone who attempts to perpetuate the notion that I should somehow be secreted or silent.