Red Rockin' Rubdown / Let('s) Go
Coconino National Forest
Schnebly Hill Road, East of Sedona, Arizona; September 21-26, 2017
Forest Service 152C Road, West of Sedona, Arizona; September 27-30, 2017
“Individuation means that the human creature has to oppose itself to the rest of nature. It creates precisely the isolation that one can’t stand—and yet needs in order to develop distinctively. It creates the difference that becomes such a burden; it accents the smallness of oneself and the sticking-outness at the same time. This is natural guilt…The problem becomes how to get rid of badness, of natural guilt, which is really a matter of reversing one’s position vis-à-vis the universe.”
~Ernest Becker, The Denial of Death
Will you touch me? Sorry…I know it’s forward. It’s just been so long since I felt the hard press of fingers. My skin is starting to tingle just thinking about it…the soft warmth vibrating all over me, enveloping me in a mind-shattering stupor…your hands pulsing all over, trying to crush through my frame but only able to grip me tighter. My skin engorged, flushed an agonizing red. My body aching to get deeper. To seep through your pores. To become a part of you forever. My one. My rock…Oops, did I just lose another layer? That’s the issue with letting my mind wander…it goes right to caressing and petting, rubbing and squeezing…then, if I remain untouched, a layer of me crumbles away, leaving me to feel small and vulnerable as I lie in the dirt and wait. For what, you ask? The pieces of me that have been stripped away? The missing block off which I was chipped? No. Just the touch of your skin against mine; one moment buried in your pink flesh…please…that’s all I need!
Until you let me go, that is. How quickly things can turn. I feel big and strong when clenched in a fist, but I never get to linger there for too long. I’m cast away. Tossed out. Used. Reminded of all those who made me feel powerless…It always starts the same: I’m heatsorbing watching shades of gray mixing through shades of blue. I catch a glimpse. From out of nowhere, a shadow engulfs me. Hovers. Leers. Then, the hand of God bursts from the shadows, resting on my flesh and squeezing my body tight. This is it! My excitement and desperation mingle. Have my prayers been answered? Please help me find protection from the harsh, lonely nights. A hand to call my own. Hope bursts out from my craggy core. But, no such luck. Almost as quickly as I’m hauled up, I’m smashed down. Burned. Buried. Used so hard it breaks me to bits. Before I can even collect myself, it’s all over. I’m thrown away till the next shadow reaches for me. Don’t get me wrong…it’s not that I don’t like when things get a little rough—it is within my nature. I just don’t see why that’s the extent of the pleasure. Why after testing my body’s limits, I’m left behind. Dropped. Just another drained tool disintegrating into dust…
You wouldn’t do that to me, though, would you? You look powerful, like you might have the hands to put me back together. I’m not sure how many more breakups I can suffer through and still feel like myself. As tough as my crimson exterior looks, I’m quite fragile; at least, I think I am. I’m not sure what part of me is “me,” anymore. So much has broken away. My life began much bigger, stronger; “I” was part of a powerful team. It’s hard to explain…For the longest time, I was fused together with many others, working as a collective to serve the Earth as a foundation. A platform. A mountain. I was content I suppose, but I always wanted something more. Something different. Something sexy. That wasn’t possible with the collective, though, so I pushed my desires out. I couldn’t disrupt my companions, afraid of letting my growing needs outweigh the many. I was convinced it would weaken our steadiness.
Geez, you probably think I’m crazy, that I’m some blabber slab. No wonder no one wants to hold onto you…you’re pebbles! Why don’t you find a stone like you and call it a day? I wish it were that simple, as if I can just connect with any mix of minerals and feel whole. I need you...your skin penetrates all the places rocks can’t touch. Every seething nook. Every forbidden cranny. No rock can do it like you. Besides, I’m not sure I even belong with a rock…I’ve tried to fit together with my share of boulders, stones, and cobbles. None of them make my skin burst like you. Your hands are my home. The only other touch that felt more complete was when I was with the collective, but there is no way I can go back. Have you ever been chipped off? Blasted away? Fragmented? When I was with the collective, I had a place. I fit in. Sure, I wasn’t myself, but I was still a part of something. Then, I wasn’t. I was detached without any possibility of reconciliation. Dropped from the highest peak. Tumbling. Crashing. The collective didn’t reach down and pick me back up, they refused to hold me any longer. I lost my home, my sense of belonging. I was broken off, a mere shard. To this day, I still don’t know why they dumped me. Maybe I was too needy. Whatever the case may be, I got what I wanted—to have a mind, body of my own—but I was the furthest I had ever been from a comforting touch. From the perfect fit. How much further can I fall?
Ever since, I have been trying to find the one being that can make me feel complete again. The one who makes my skin quiver and quake, who protects me from falling to pieces. Is this too much to ask? Now, here we find ourselves: me, reduced down to practically nothing, a measly stone; and you, the wondrous hands that can set me free from this crumbling path. I hate to put this much pressure on you, but this could be my last chance. Can I trust you? My desire for you is eating away at my jagged flesh. Mutilating me. Breaking me. Please…I’m begging. Just take me in your hands and make me feel something, anything again. I promise it will be good for you too. I will make you feel powerful, like there is nothing on Earth that can stop you. You would like that, right? You will be big. Strong. My everything. And I will be yours.
OOOHHH YES! YEESSS!!!! YEEEEESSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!! You have me. I can feel you in every crevice of my skin. Wow…you feel so good, better than all the others. Better than any collective. Your heart beat is throbbing. Pulsing. Exploding all over my flesh. You are searing hot. I can’t believe this is happening. Press here…YES!!! Rub there…YES!!!!! You know just how to make me squirm. Please give me more. Ohhhhh! Your squeeze is my sanctuary. I want to tear through you, pierce you deeper. I need to be embedded in you. Hammered. See me. Beyond the weathering and erosion. Down to my core. Come on…don’t let up now, it was just starting to feel good. Look at me! You’re distracted. Your hands are getting cold; you’re losing your grip. What happened? It can’t be over that fast!
Wait a minute…where are we going? Why are we getting further from the dirt? This isn’t right. We are heading up…towards where? The collective?! Please, no. I think we can make this work, you and me. I thought I could trust you. Are you really this cruel, to make my wildest fantasies come true then throw me out like a kidney stone? Why won’t you look at me?! If I return to the collective, I will never be my own rock. I will never be free to roll. I feel you throbbing around me…I know there’s a heart in there somewhere! I won’t ever fit back in, not like I can with you…
Your heart is really racing…you can’t deny that you enjoy my touch too. How my skin pushes and pulls at yours. Biting you. Breaking you. The harder you squeeze, the stronger I become. I fill your fist. I fill your mind. Your grip weakens. You are mine. I own you. You are under my control. Take us back down, and I will fulfill all your desires. I will make you feel complete in spite of your fleshy weakness. I will be your missing piece. Your diamond in the rough. Your muse. Your God. Everything…just take us back down. Now.
No. No. No. We are still climbing. Higher than the collectives. Where my crushing plummet towards the dirt began. Why are you doing this to me? Your heart beat is deafening, crowding me. Ugh..I need space! I’m trapped, but I can’t jump out. If I drop from this high, I will shatter into nothingness. You’re not going to throw me out, are you? Is that why you picked me up, just to destroy me? We’re getting so high…I’m shaking. I can’t believe I fell so hard. Betrayed. Banished. You cannot let me go. You cannot separate from me that easily. I feel your heart roaring. We were made to be together; you’re just refusing to see how we fit! We are too high…please don’t let me go. I can’t go back into the shadows all alone. I’m scared…
Woah…did you feel that? Things were getting shaky for a moment; I was expecting you to drop me. I didn’t think I could trust you. I panicked. But your touch just now, it was different…I felt you beneath my skin, and I could feel beneath yours. It went well beyond my burning desire to feel your touch. It gripped deeper…I was able to pet your heart; I rubbed your soul. And so much was revealed. Just like me, you tumbled down into the darkness before too, far away from ever feeling whole again. When you fell from the sky, all you wanted was to feel a warm touch when you closed your eyes and submitted to the darkness. You came up here to let go of the fear that has controlled you. Crumbled you. Broke you.
You held me not to fulfill all of your fingerful fantasies, but because you believed you could heal your heart through my touch. That my mountainous strength would grant you some magical powers and immediately resolve your frantic search for bodily connection. I’m sorry, but I’m just like you. Afraid to hold on too tight. Afraid to let go too soon. Even though I can’t be the entire foundation for your climb up into the light, I can be there to hold you close when you feel alone or scared. To remind you to let go of the small stuff. And by holding me close and not letting me crumble away, you help heal the chips along my edges. I find my own path toward being whole. The truth is we both want to be touched, and as good as it feels to flex against your grip and squeeze your tender flesh, our contact has to dig deeper below the surface. I don’t really have much coming up, so I guess, if you’ll have me, I can just be a stone’s throw away from you at all times, prepared to move the mountains within. Finally…it feels so good.
How’s that for a headline, handsome?