The Fool, Winner By Knockout! (12/02/08 Tuesday)

Hinckley, empty-handed, looked lost when I encountered him in Children's on my way back for another load to shelve.

"What's up?" I felt I had to ask him.

"Oh." He sounded startled, though he'd seen me. "Nothing. At least I don't think so. There's a bad vibe back there."

Fifteen minutes later he confirmed it. We had a rare hour on the desk together this morning and talked mostly about what I'd been doing lately, passive-aggressively forcing the issue with the picture and possibly sparking a confrontation. He was cautiously supportive of my what-have-I-got-to-lose attitude. I told him I didn't really want a confrontation, because I'm not good with them, but if I'm headed for one I have to assert my reasoning for bringing it on. Now I think I've declared war without a weapon. Hinckley approached me in juvenile fiction. I had a half-dozen Cam Jansens in my right hand.

"I hate to say this," he whispered, "but that confrontation you were expecting might come sooner than later."

My heart leapt. "What!" barely still a whisper.

"There was a lot of low-level whispering back there involving Julie and a couple other people. They know about the blog."

"The blog! Oh, my god! Not the blog! That's the last thing I want! How do they know about the blog?"

"I don't know."

This was not a hammer. This was a wrecking ball! The blog! Hinckley expressed his reservations about telling me this at the moment I was wishing he hadn't. I asked him who he overheard, and he told me, I think with some reluctance. I speculated on the discovery of the blog, then dismissed it as irrelevant. I worked for a while longer after he left me, but couldn't concentrate. If there was any music to be faced just yet I wanted it over with. No amount of extra time was going to steel my nerves for it.

Julie was at the window. I emptied the cart back onto the main one. The 24/7 cranked up. Julie passed within a few feet of me to retrieve its offering. Though I expected nothing from her, I cringed. Shakily, I opened my desk drawer for a tea bag. Gay Lynn entered the workroom.

"Dion, may I see you in my office for a minute?"

This was worse.

She started by telling me how hurt she was by my breaking her trust. I looked, but there were no holes anywhere. She said she'd heard that the picture was being "seen in several different places." I bristled at the speed and scope of gossip and rapidly protesteth too much , but finally ended saying, "The picture is only one place, and that's on the front fender of my bike."

"Well, please take it off." She sympathized with my feelings for Julie but was concerned with the repercussions of her own indiscretion in giving me the picture.

I apologized again, and again, to what seemed little effect on her disappointment in me, and rose to promptly do her bidding. I unceremoniously took an Exacto to the tape and removed the picture without rancor and no small amount of shame.

There was an hour left of my day to consider what I'd done, what I'd allowed to happen. The more I thought the broader the implications seemed to stretch: My friends there are now co-conspirators, to start with. And though I am personally more mortified than I've ever been to know that uninvited people are all but reading me naked, I'm sick that Julie could be looking at herself through my pathetic eyes.

Oh, god, I didn't want this to happen! Or did I? I told Hinckley later, "I didn't get what I wanted, but I'm about to get what I asked for." And I did ask for it. Why? Why didn't I consider what would so obviously happen if I so broadly broadcast my feelings--especially at work? All this thinking, all this reasoning, to justify what? Hurting and embarrassing people I care about. All because I couldn't cope with my own feelings. I've often speculated on Julie's capacity for tolerance for my inept solicitude toward her; now I wonder about her capacity for forgiveness. But I don't want forgiveness. I can't believe I deserve it. Oh, what haveI done? Nothing left to lose? If only I'd more seriously asked myself what I had to gain. Dammit dammit dammit!

It will be difficult showing my face tomorrow, but I can't simply slink my way in. I am in no way ashamed of my blog or anything I've said in it. But how will I face Julie? She's bound to have at least sampled the blog. There's no way I can pretend otherwise. With everyone else, yeah, but not with Julie. Thank god it will be a short day with her, but it will still be the longest of my life. How could it be much better for Julie? If I thought my coffee shop declaration made things awkward between us (though I probably overstate that), this could be beyond the pale. (If only I could believe that I was self-flatteringly overstating that, as well.) As tolerant as she's been, she's certainly now entitled to tear me a new one. I've never stopped wanting to know how she feels--as opposed to thinks--and now is the best time yet to find out. I'm not prepared for what I might hear, because I don't have delusions that any of it will be good, but I'm prepared to listen; and, maybe, for once in my life, I can be sympathetic.

Now that the blog is exposed, my candor is compromised. I don't know the extent of its exposure, how many people at work will read it, but if I had wanted everyone there to read it, not only would I have invited them, but I would not have exposed myself so baldly. I wanted to express myself by the only means at my creative disposal, but not everyone would want to know me that well. When I subtitled the blog, I really didn't know what it meant. The second clause simply followed the first. Now I understand it: If my heart is on my sleeve, then my head will be on a stick--cause and effect. How unconsciously prescient. I knew all along, I just wasn't telling myself. I know myself better than I thought; I just don't let myself know it.

But, suddenly, I don't care what anyone thinks of me after reading the blog. It's me, and that's all it is. Who, besides Julie, has conscionable reason to confront me with anything they've read? For better or for worse, this is who I am. After reading this, could anyone say they know anyone else better (or want to)? My speculations on Julie's character will be misread by some as truth, but for all I know about her I don't know her at all. I told Hinckley on the desk today that before the Whole Foods lunch I hadn't truly appreciated Julie's uniqueness. As yet, I'm sure I still don't, fully, but I came away then with a much greater respect for it. What have I done with that respect?