There are five more sleeps until some strange and magical, albeit chubby man wedges himself down my crumbling, ancient chimney to leave token gifts for the children under our Christmas tree. I wish him luck. What a busy night, what an insanity of a holiday we perpetuate.
It's fun, isn't it?
Giving out bonuses was great fun yesterday. People are always surprised and humbled as their emotions play visibly across their faces like a movie on a projection screen. First thinking there must be some mistake, to disbelief that they now own that much extra, to wondering what they might do with it. And true to form Caleb's investment in the most desperate of charities this year left everyone all around with good feelings and gives him a good foothold in this city and a good foothold up in his ascent from the bitter hell he's existed in my entire adult life. He slides as much as the rest of us, but in his eerily Cole-like perfection, I daresay no one notices him even climbing.
I put my money where my mouth is as well over the past six months, tying up virtually all of it in the children's trusts and then giving a whole bunch of it away because it gives me more in the end.
Not more money. Less. I will return to a simplistic life because it's less crushing pressure somehow and less of an avenue of escape for me. But that's not for you to worry about.
In any case, the family meeting was a frustrating symphony of emotional noise last night and I'm left fairly certain that some of my closest friends no longer have a clue, and so this morning I boiled it down and what's left is this. So read carefully. I think I've condensed it nicely.
Ben is not perfect. We argue more than any other people I have ever met. We each contain more human defects than any other people on earth and we couldn't be less or more alike. Seriously. For every mirrored facet we have there are ones that carve a line between us in black and white.
Our love will be different and it will work. Why? Because I need to keep him safe and you need to see that his selfishness isn't the same. For everyone else the ownership lies in a sheer and simple need to take something away from someone else. To be on top. To have that upper hand. With Ben it is different. He wants me, wants us, because he is childlike and he wants what he wants when he wants it.
Because it is pretty and fun to play with and suits him perfectly.
There are no ulterior motives with him. Ben's life is different. He just is. Life just is. Take what you want to explore and don't worry about anything else. Wake the fuck up. Let it be. Hungry? Eat. Tired? Sleep. Stressed? Escape. Bored? Do something cool.
There is nothing else. Nothing hidden, nothing underhanded, nothing complicated.
I figured it out finally, why can't you?
I accepted and embraced it. Why can't you?
It's fun. Almost as much fun as waiting for Santa Claus.
There is no more Bridget-army. It's been disbanded. The base is closed. Go home and wait for Santa, you've all been good boys this year.
