they slipped briskly.
“They slipped briskly into an intimacy from which they never recovered.” - F. Scott Fitzgerald.
This quote is one of the most beautiful things ever written. I’ve not read the novel from which it is from but oftentimes if you scour the internet for quotes regarding love or romanticism or relationships, this is one that commonly finds its way onto your screen. And one night it did that for me. I can’t remember if someone found it for me or if I found it for someone but no matter, it found me.
When I first read these words I thought it meant solely one thing. I thought it meant that the love you find, if it is true, shall be truly intimate. And in some cases, brisk. It shall be naturally full of life and splendor and every word will be meaningful. Full of vulnerability and hope. And in all of that, there would be no it would fail, for if it would fail, that would mean it was never true. And so you may never recover, because there would be no other option but to continue to slip briskly into an intimacy you may never recover from. Perhaps that idea is circular, but isn’t love just that? A circle?
This is going to be the most vulnerable piece I’ve ever shared, but I think it’s needed now. I’m not here to bash or go at anyone in this piece, I’m simply sharing the life of a sentence through my eyes as heartbreak has changed me. And changed me perhaps for the better. Hopefully, for the better.
I came to this realization while writing something for a novel I’ve been working on. A story, funnily enough, whose spark was the person who this piece is partially about. And there’s something beautiful about that I think. There’s something beautiful about knowing the spark of a story, and understanding that the entire story is not just theirs. It isn’t just the sparks that cause the fire to burn forever and eternally, there must be other lights, there must be a foundation upon which the story stands. And with that in mind, sometimes I must stumble backwards to stumble forwards, which is exactly what happened here. So let me let you in on a short excerpt, and use that to expand upon the quote by Fitzgerald to which I have found myself a well.
I meant it with my soul. I felt it in my fucking soul. When I said I loved you, always, I meant I shall never waver from that. I shall always love you. Not in a way of obsessing over the fact you are not mine and never shall be, but understanding that the humanity within us. The intimacy from which we shall never recover, is too strong to bear now. To which I cannot have it fade without pain. That quote makes more sense now. We slipped briskly into an intimacy from which we shall never recover. I thought it meant we fell quickly, deeply, and vulnerable. And we did, or, at least I did. But perhaps that's the thing about never recovering. You can’t recover fully from giving your soul to someone. And maybe you will never recover from holding my soul, an endeavor I wish you never had to bear.
Now mind you, this writing was not a journal entry, it was an entry written from the perspective of a man(I am not a man even though I did just turn 18), whose lover has left him at this moment. Stranded under a bridge with rain spackling the cobblestone street as a painting by Pollack. That was not me, and I do hope to emphasize that fact. But, in understanding the whole point of this piece we must understand that inspiration strikes at the most inopportune times. And this was one of them. A glimpse into what I felt was here, but this is not the whole story, and I do wish we understand that.
The quote used to mean an intimacy we fell into quickly. Maybe too quickly, but it didn’t matter because that strength of the bond that was formed was never going to break. Perhaps that is a bit of the hopeless romantic within me talking, but I think it’s our own humanity talking in that moment. We don’t want to go through life with a multitude of people whom we are unable to be true with. And that’s what scares me now. Was my past ever truly “true” with me? Was I ever truly “true” with them?
When I find myself attracted in some regard to someone it’s often because I see a darkness in their soul. A darkness to which I connect to. A connection not of evil, but of pain and chaos. A mind splintered by the idea of being something you are not, or you don’t believe you are able to become. And perhaps that is my issue. I find broken people and instead of attempting to fix them, I want to share their pain, if they are willing to share mine. Obviously I’m speaking in a bit of a melodramatic manner, but I think it serves the purpose here. My own inhumanity breeds an ideal of humanity, and in that I find myself struggling to ever be the person I want to be. And in that, I find myself surrounded by people who are quite the opposite, people who have this ideal of humanity, and believe themselves to be that, all the while they are truly the inhumane. But that is not what happened when I slipped briskly into an intimacy from which I may not recover. I found someone who I thought was like me. The same. Searching for life beyond our now, and would not stop at anything to be shackled by that. Perhaps I was wrong to go in so headfirst, so unbelatedly. Perhaps I was wrong to assume they were like me, searching for something to grab hold of and never let go. But that doesn’t truly matter here. What matters is that I speak to the quote in which tears have fallen.
I found myself able to give my soul, to pour my soul and my mind and my ideas into someone, and they seemed as if they were willing to take it. Not they seemed, they were eager, at least to me. And I felt I was the same for them. Briskly, quickly, without avail we slipped. I found our conversations to be the only reality in which I saw the world as it was. Even if my life was full of pain and depression, I knew there was someone standing there listening. And I didn’t attempt to make this a pity party for them, and I pray that was not how it felt for them, but I worry it was. And that was never the attempt. I simply thought based on all of the feelings of someone who you might never recover from connecting with you, allowing you to be yourself, and putting forth all of yourself to, would never see it as a pity party.
Perhaps I was wrong. But then I got to thinking, I was not wrong to believe I had someone in which my own briskness had followed. I had found someone willing to fall quickly with me. Someone whose words I thought meant the same, or were of the same value as mine were to them. Perhaps they weren’t. And that saddens me. It’s not anger that protrudes from me anymore, it’s sadness that the weight of my words and the weight of the feeling within my soul was not the same weight as the words and feelings of theirs. It saddens me because it is exactly what has caused me to reevaluate this quote. And rather than it be this hopeless romantic tale of hope for love that is quick and hopeful and powerful, it is this tale for a love that is quick and hopeful and powerful and unable to sustain as it is only a piece of the story we are a part of. Perhaps that’s a more realistic telling of the quote. And that is where I fall now.
The intimacy from which I fell into is not something I think I will recover from. And I don’t mean love is something you can never get over, at least not romantic love as that is something that waxes and wanes with the tides, but rather love that is hopeful and powerful. The love you have for the people you care about the most. Even if you don’t speak to them, or you aren’t on the best of terms. Or if their actions anger you as they disintegrate the very person you thought they were, no. It’s a love that is just there. Unable to recover from, as the intimacy from which you slipped briskly into was too great to climb out of.
That’s the story here I think. The intimacy I shared was not one that would lead to a life with that person even if the pain of losing that idea was great, there is no greater pain than never feeling as if the walk you have gone on would have never happened. And so, with all that said. Or felt, as that is truly what this was. With all that felt, I shall never recover from the intimacy I fell briskly into, but not because I am never getting over it, but because there is nothing to get over. It is truly “true”, or at least what I thought we had was. Even if that is not the case anymore, or it never was. For me, it was “true.” My side of things, was true.
The danger in that, in those words I last said, of my side being “true” is that the fear of it even being true is only there because of a fear the other side of things was not. That you(me) caused a falsity in how the intimacy was drawn. It caused the other person to feel as if that was the only thing that could happen, when in reality the love and intimacy was not something that happened because one person thought it to be so, but rather because the words and actions of two people were there and “true.” But perhaps that is not the point, maybe there was some sense of failing yourself as this encounter grew. There is a true fear in that idea. And if it is a valid fear then maybe all of this writing was for naught. And if so, please do tell. But if not, then I’ll know I shall not be the only person who slipped briskly into an intimacy from which I shall never recover.
To finish as all things must, the intimacy of the past cannot be recovered because you cannot recover from giving something so precious to someone else. And while that doesn’t mean you mustn’t ever give it to someone else, it does mean a part of yourself will be left in the past. And with that, the feeling of dread whenever the person who holds that past with you begins to become the person you hoped they never would be. That the intimacy they shared with you only failed because we couldn’t survive the hardship, not because our own morals and decisions would become the very opposite thing of what you thought was held. That, that is a true fear that must never become actualized because if it does, it truly shatters any hope of who we actually could be in the future. Not as with each other, but on our own.
And with that. Peace. For there must be no more war if we take this written piece briskly, slipping further into thought. Peace. Once more.
