Check your baggage?

"I've got baggage."
Not nearly as cute or corny a statement as "I've got mail" or "I got rhythm" or "I got music" or "I got the whole world in my hands" or anything like that. And while it’s neither a cute nor a corny statement it is true. Baggage. Never really thought I had baggage. Other people had baggage - women I dated, women I wanted to date, women who blew me off .. "she's got baggage man." Friends' girlfriends, ex girlfriends, friends' ex-boyfriends, parents, teachers, criminals. OTHER people. They all have baggage. I thought I didn't.

Mind you, I never denied the fact that I have "issues." We all have "issues." Some of us have "MAJOR ISSUES" some of us "minor issues" and some enlightened folks have only minor issues that are so benign they don't require being contained within quotation marks. But we all have issues and I am no different.

But when you realize you have a lot of issues, issues that have accumulated over the years, issues that you carry on from year to year, from relationship to relationship, issues that you can't deal with, won't deal with or just choose to ignore ... well, you need something to carry those issues around. That, my friends, is your baggage. And I just realized, I have baggage.

I'm not just talking one carry on either. I have a whole set - though it is not a matching set. A couple pieces are new, couple old. A few are hand me downs from my parents, some of which are likely hand me downs from their parents, etc. There's at least one great piece that I got with my former fiancé, she let me keep it thankfully. A couple I thought I'd stop using after college and, I fear, a couple I've forgotten about but are still lying around here somewhere. Baggage.

Something you may not realize about baggage, sure makes it a bitch to move around and do shit. For example, just started dating a couple months ago. Met a fantastic woman. Fantastic, no lie. Smart, beautiful, funny, sexy all that stuff. On top of it, she liked me (evidence, perhaps, of her own baggage? or is this self-deprecating jibe just further evidence of mine own baggage .. yes, looks like a nice garment bag to add to my collection). We started dating, all was well, and all was great. But the more and more we went out, the more difficult it was for me to go out, my baggage was weighing me down. Was I reliving past relationships, making the same mistakes, making new mistakes, was I ready to make new mistakes, was I moving to fast, was I in the right "space" for this, could I give her what the relationship "required"???? Had to stop seeing her. Guess I needed to deal with my baggage.

And I have been, I live in LA and as a condition of residency you must be in some kind of therapy or counseling or whatever, and I do that dance, been doing it ever since the big break up. It’s been good, real good. But I realized something --- you might think, "go to therapy, learn how to deal with your baggage, deal with your issues, lighten your load,” and you might be right. You also might be full of shit. Cause what I'm realizing is, therapy is not quite yet helping me get rid of my baggage, as much as showing me that I have a whole lot more baggage than I ever thought I did: I got a bag full of confidence issues; Couple pieces for relationship issues - got the commitment issue satchel, the trying to hard to please duffle bag, the boundary issues garment bag, a little toiletry kit full of jealousy issues; there's a nice Italian leather body issues carry on; the backpack full of parent issues; and random other pieces packed to the hilt with success/failure issues, youngest child syndrome issues, living in LA issues, being a whiny bastard issues and writing a blog about your issues issues.

But maybe that's all right. If we all have baggage, maybe it’s not that big of a deal. Course some people need a whole hell of a lot of help dealing with their luggage. But maybe that's what we're all looking for, someone to help carry that load. That's bullshit, what I'd like is someone to say, "That bag, that one right there you don't need that one anymore, never really did, but get rid of it." And maybe, with some of those pieces that you just fear you can't live without, maybe that person can just accept it, you know, check it at the door, say "hey leave it here, its not going anywhere, when you need it its cool. I'm cool with it, cool with you, you crazy needy bastard."

So maybe that's what will happen. Would be a whole lot easier though if I could just check it on an outbound international flight and let those airline pricks lose it like they've lost my real baggage before. Of course, even when you loose baggage, you just have to go out and buy replacements. At least with my baggage, I know what I get when I open it up.