Dances with Scorpions
The first time I heard the tale of the scorpion and the frog, my synapses fired like a pinball machine, neurons flying everywhere. Music played, alarms blared, I scored a win. I got the lesson in a way that landed, even though the lesson had been presented to me again and again in my real life. Sometimes you need to imagine you’re a frog for a thing to make sense, or maybe that’s just me. If by some twist of fate you’ve never heard this tale, here is my current rendition:
Once there was a scorpion sitting by a river bank feeling exhausted by the last person he had stung, and the way she’d felt victimized and shocked. The way she’d sobbed and asked how he could have done something so awful to someone who had been nothing but kind. Blah blah blah, he thought. How many times would he have to say I’m sorry you feel that way and wow, this is why everyone says you’re sensitive before people would get it? All these people with all their emotions were just so draining.
Suddenly, the scorpion heard splashing, and looked up to see a happy frog, happily swimming in the river feeling happy and minding her own fucking frog business.
“Oh, hallo! Hidey ho, little frog, it is I, the handsome and very smart scorpion! Could you please give me a ride across the river? I have to be somewhere important because I am important and important people are waiting for me. I am very talented, but alas, I cannot swim!”
The frog, being no fool and no stranger to tales of the scorpion, laughed easily. “I’m not giving you a ride! If I do, you’ll sting me. I’m not an idiot!”
“Oh, but maybe you are,” said the scorpion, “for if I sting you, we will both drown, and what good would that do me?”
The happy frog thought about this. It was true, there was no denying it, and in that case, why not give the scorpion a ride? He was charming and witty and handsome, albeit a little conceited, and it would only take a couple of minutes. Sometimes the frog found self-absorbed, charismatic creatures fascinating. Maybe it would be exciting, something to tell her sister about later, back at the Lily Pad.
“Okay,” she sang out as she swam toward the riverbank, “hop on!”
The scorpion hopped on, and halfway across the river, he stung the frog. With her dying breath, as she splashed and sputtered and they both started sinking she said, “Why have you done this?”
And the scorpion, just getting his head above the water enough to eek out one last sentence, gasped, “Because sweetheart, I am a fucking scorpion.”
I hope pinballs are going off in your brain if you’ve never heard that before, but I’ll bet you have. And I’ll bet you’ve been stung by a scorpion somewhere along the way, and maybe more than once. It might even be the case that you’ve been drawn toward scorpions, that you’ve seen their hard shells and thought, I know, they just need love! Then they’ll be soft and they won’t feel the need to sting people anymore. I know how to love people who’ve been hurt and hardened, time to get to work! Or maybe you’ve simply been in the wrong place at the wrong time, or you’ve had a scorpion boss, family member or colleague. If you’ve ever been stung and wondered how someone could have done something so heartless, chances are there were signs.
It’s the same thing when someone cuts you off on the freeway. You can allow it to raise your blood pressure, you can honk and yell and stick your traffic finger out the window, but it has nothing to do with you. That’s the way that person drives, and they’re going to be cutting people off, speeding and weaving in and out of traffic, all day long. Or, if you’re feeling charitable, maybe there’s an emergency they’re racing toward, or they have a sick kid and were up all night. Whatever it is, it isn’t about you.
My dad was a scorpion, so I’m kind of an expert on them, but if you think that means I knew better than to head toward scorpions you’d be wrong. Scorpions come in different shapes, sizes and colors, so it isn’t always easy to recognize them, although it becomes easier as you get older. That’s why scorpions like to date women half their age, they’re less discerning prey. My dad was the kind of scorpion who sleeps with lots of women and then cries when they find out they’re not the only one and are upset with him. He was the gaslighting kind, the scorpion who stings and feels victimized when his victims are hurt, heartbroken or angry. Poor me, cries this kind of enraging scorpion, why do these women have to be so emotional and possessive? Why can’t they just share in my scorpion greatness?
There’s also the kind who have decided looking out for number one is the only way to go, and anyone who hasn’t figured that out is weak. Survival of the fittest - if you didn’t get the memo, you get what you deserve. The remorseless breed are easier to deal with because they aren’t pretending to be anything other than who they are. When you’re hurt, they shrug, or look at you like an animal at the zoo. Why are you crying? They never hid who they were, this is your own fault. You need to toughen up.
The main ingredient a scorpion is lacking is empathy. And believe me there are male, female and non-binary scorpions. Straight scorpions and queer ones, monogamous and polyamorous, short and tall, scorpions with doctorates, scorpions working at the drive-thru - everywhere people exist, there are scorpions. They even run for president and vice president. If you’re paying attention, you’ll realize they don’t care about you, they just want a ride across the river to the White House. If you end up bleeding out in a parking lot on the way there, don’t blame them, they told you who they were. They’re the remorseless breed I mentioned earlier. One thing you can count on - if you get involved with a scorpion - you’re going to get stung.
I used to think people like this were compelling. The person who is all up in your face at first, can’t get enough of you, thinks you’re amazing. Once you’re in, things get a little sketchy. They leave you “on read”, they’re busy this Friday night but don’t say who or what they’re busy with, they’re feeling down right now and are going off the grid. The tortured, charismatic person who is just out of reach enough to seem mysterious, and is only intermittently interested.
If you don’t run at that point, you’re screwed. You’re a play-toy. You’ll only be interesting again if you lose interest - then that person you met in the beginning will show up, maybe with flowers. This time they’ll tell you about their childhood, their distant mother, their rageful dad, the way they’ve always questioned their worth. You’ll realize you were right! That hard shell is covering a kind and tender heart, a scared little kid who just needs some love. And they know it, too, that’s why they’re here with the flowers, opening up to you this way. They’re letting you in, which means you’re special. This is everything you’ve wanted, to be special to someone.
The next day, just as you’re relaxing into this new level of intimacy, maybe sharing about your own childhood or your own fears, they’ll sting you. They’ll announce halfway through your sentence that they really have to go. Or they’ll tell you to consider changing your skirt, they’re just trying to help. Something that cuts you to the bone. Then they’ll leave and you’ll replay the whole night, wondering what happened, what sign you missed, what you did wrong. You’ll get yourself together for the day and try not to stare at your phone, hoping for an apology text, or any text. You’ll tell yourself not to reach out, no matter what. You’ll make plans with a girlfriend that night so you aren’t tempted. You’ll go to yoga.
By 11pm, your strength will be gone and you’ll be struggling not to hate yourself. You’ll be holding your stupid phone wondering if that’s it, if you’re just never going to hear anything again. If you give in and text, you’re really done for, because now that scorpion knows they can treat you like crap, and you’ll ask for more. If you’re in a space where you have any self-respect you can scrape together, you’ll get ready for bed, turn your phone off, and read a book. You’ll fall asleep that way, and wake up at some point to turn off your reading light.
The next day you’ll get a text or you won’t, but you will eventually. And the cycle will repeat and repeat until you’ve had enough of being stung, or until the damage is so bad, you have no choice but to crawl away and try to recover whatever is left of you.
There was a time, years ago, when I got stung by two scorpions at once. One I knew for years and years - I’d thought he just needed love and to be coaxed out of his hard shell - no matter how many times he stung me. The other was someone I’d known less time, but thought she was a friend. When two scorpions go behind your back and mate and then sting you together, their poison is four times as strong and it is hard to survive. It’s so hard, it takes your breath away. You might find yourself sobbing in the shower in the early morning hours, trying to get yourself together before your kids wake up. You may have a hard time understanding this as anything other than an act of anger and betrayal directed at you on purpose. It will be impossible not to wonder how the fuck either of them could be so void of feeling for you. But it isn’t you. It’s them. It’s a reflection of how they operate and think and feel…or don’t feel.
This next scorpion thing is harder to accept but just as true - this applies to your parents, too. Whatever happened when you were born, however you were loved or not loved, guided or not, comforted or not, cherished or not…that is a reflection of where your parents were at the time you showed up in their storyline. Where they were emotionally, how able or not able they were to receive you as the tiny and miraculous little being you were. It’s on them, not you. If they couldn’t do it, maybe they were too young, too selfish, too exhausted, too caught up in their own stuff. Whatever it was is not something I can guess at, but what I know for sure is that if you weren’t loved well, it wasn’t because you didn’t deserve to be loved well. And maybe they weren’t scorpions, either, maybe they were just kids themselves, perpetuating a cycle of abuse. Or maybe things went well, I don’t know, I wasn’t there. But you, you’d only just arrived here with your particular spark.
Talk to anyone in their early 50’s and they’ll probably tell you things haven’t turned out exactly the way they thought. Life is complicated. Things happen that you couldn’t have predicted and probably wouldn’t have asked for, and other things happen that are better than anything you could have anticipated. But it’s very likely there are some scorpions in the mix, somewhere. And chances are, you’ve had to figure out how to manage them.
There have been too many times in my life when I’ve allowed people to take advantage of my good nature. And I do have a good nature, I’m not going to be shy about that. I’ll offer you my trust until you give me a reason not to, and even after that, I’ll probably forgive you if the betrayal isn’t too terrible and you can look me in the eye and apologize. I’ll hope when I screw up, you’ll give me the same grace. I know it’s hard being human. We’re all just doing the best we can, and sometimes we’re going to blow it.
But there was a time when I was too trusting and I got burned for it. And there were plenty of signs, my god. Waving, wild, blazing red flags that I excused or ignored or explained away. Times when I took less and accepted less than I should have, to make things easier or better for someone else. And I guess I’ve reached a time in my life where I’m just not willing to do that, and I think that’s a good thing. I’m very late to the party when it comes to making decisions that protect me, my safety, and my well-being. I’m still working on it, but I’m getting stronger all the time. And these days, when scorpions people show me who they are, I believe them.
If you’d like to meet me in real time to talk about scorpions, frogs, and not taking things personally, I’ll be here 10/18/24 at 11:15am PST, or you can wait for the Come As You Are podcast version. As ever, I am so grateful you’re here, and your comments and re-stacks make my day. Thanks for being so awesome.
Ohgoodgodyes. To all of this. Hard-won knowledge, for sure.
It's a party that you're better off showing up late for than never at all. I wish for so many of us that we had felt like we belonged there sooner than we realized we do.
What gets me about people who are scorpions is the second-guessing and self-doubt that they sow in their victims. They make you doubt your intuition and perspective, which helps them convince you that you're the problem, not them. I feel like I have been down that road with a select few people too many times and have also finally reached the point where they are just a big nope for me. I learned that fairly recently with someone who I started to get major yuck vibes from, but I convinced myself I was being judgmental when I had actually picked up on something very real. I hate the way people can burn you when you decide to give them the benefit of the doubt, but I guess the fact that there was doubt at all probably says a lot. Trust your gut. It's them, not you.