dear wonderful friend

he finally called - of course. he was at work - duh. he wants to get together - of course.
thank you for your kindness, there is nothing easy about this path I choose. it is made easier for knowing that there are people like you who are willing to be a friend and listen to all of this, to offer words to advice and caring, thoughtful reminders that I have a beautiful life even when he is not in it.

I know that he is well intentioned and honest with me. he would not call and say the things he has said if he did not mean them. there is no reason for it. it is completely irrational for me to think that this is easy for him. sometimes it overwhelms me. I don't even know what to do when my head fills with all the suppositions and unknowns.

i wonder if this will ever heal - will i ever trust him and be able to believe that it is as simple as two people who are insanely in love with each other and uneasy at what that means.
you give up a lot when you decide to love and trust someone. you give up that sense of control, you give part of your life to someone else and no matter how hard you try to be your own person, there is some part of you that they always carry with them and it belongs to that other person. there is some part of him that will always be mine and I have to take care of it, nurture it, care for it - and when you have something that is so silent it is hard to know what it needs.

i guess that it needs love, a lot of it, and without anything attached. that is the hardest thing I think - to love and be there without any expectation of getting anything back.
he has a lot of healing to do and so do I. I can't expect that after 10 days everything will be all better but this past 10 days has felt like an eternity.

i lay around doing nothing, thinking about this over and over again. sometimes that is good and sometimes it is very bad. I spent two hours of my Friday in another universe filled with him and questions about how this might turn out - and that is the most ridiculous thing to do as there is no way I can know how this will turn out.

on one hand I can truly, honestly, see us being together for a long, long time. there is so much love and happiness between us - for each other. so much appreciation for each other, awe for how we feel when we are together. on the other hand, life and personality and all the bullshit that we have to work through in life makes it hard sometimes. hard to be together - hard to face the fact that if we are going to be awesome together we need to face up to and conquer all the crap that we bring into this relationship.

it all comes down to fear. we are afraid of each other and this thing we are when we are together.

how do I explain this. . . .

I cried more tonight than I have in months. He terrifies me.
The things he asks of me are more than I have ever given to anyone else in my life. Complete forgiveness when I would rather hold a grudge. Trust when there is absolutely no reason why I should trust him again. These emotional battles are the most challenging things in my life now and maybe ever. . . so far.
Giving my heart and soul into the care of another, I have never done this with anyone. He brings so much joy into my life and it was a shock to realize I could be so happy with anyone. Dinner with a guy who I have eaten an uncountable number of meals with and I have a million butterflies inside at the idea of seeing him. After everything we have been through - that you still make me feel this way is beyond my comprehension. I was with someone for 8 years who never affected me this way.
When I was 20 years old I met someone who is a truly wonderful person. We started spending time together and really liked each other. Then we started dreaming together, we created all these dreams for our life and what we would do, what it would be. . . then I ended up married to those dreams. When it all fell apart, I mourned the loss of those dreams.
I realize now that relationships are not made of the stuff of dreams. They are made of those tiny, breathless moments and in the best relationships, they happen over and over again. What we have leaves me breathless, over and over again. Every moment with him is timeless and amazing. I have never had this before and I am not sure that I will ever find it again.
Can I walk away from this and live my life knowing that I decided not to give him another chance?
So when he tells me that he is sorry for everything, that he is sorry for being afraid, that he is sorry for being his dad, and wants to do whatever he has to do to be with me, to heal this, to get back to where we were and then keep going all I can do is sit, with his arms around me, and cry.

atheistic tendencies and hedonsitic indulgences.

there are things that i know about life. with absolute certainty. things that are human nature and to deny them would be delusional. i had this great conversation today with steve about practicing non-attachment. that we humans feel pain as a result of becoming attached to an idea of how we think things should be. we expect a relationship to be a certain way and when it is not - we hurt. this is manifested in anger and sadness.

for lessons in the way of non-attachment i must thank a boy I know. you know - seriously man, way to convince me that things are a certain way. getting me to believe something that seemed absurd to begin with. you had me. and then you rock my fuckin' world and it is beyond me to understand how any of it is possible but clearly i became attached to some expectation of the person you are that was not realistic or true. obviously we both have something to learn about life and pain and thinking things are a certain way when they are not.

all of this reinforces my agnostic and atheistic tendencies. on the agnosticism - i don't know. ever. i experience. what is happening now is real but there can be no belief in an understanding that transcends what is happening at this moment in time. if we are walking home together or cooking and eating together, or fucking - these things are real and relevant in that moment that they occur. i can not expect that you want to fuck tomorrow. i can not expect that you want to see me ever again. there is pain in reflecting on this.

the atheistic tendencies tell me that i create my reality - that i make meaning in my life and so this is how i can cope with the fact that i exist. thankfully - you are not the thing that makes my life relevant. you are the ultimate accessory, the thing that sets it all off. there is value in who i am and the life i live has meaning - to me and to other people and so i create this stunning reality that makes it all worth doing. you bring happiness, make it all more intense - to the point that i question if i should spend any time with you.

fuck. you are such a hedonistic indulgence. there is nothing good about becoming so absorbed in someone else and the moments you spend with them that you can not live your life and get the things done that go beyond them. you are so fucking intense man. it is addictive. i want to be with you every moment of every day - even now - with all your bullshit - i want to immerse myself in you. what a totally shitty feeling.

you told me to go out and find someone better than you - someone who deserves me. i have done that ten times over in the last couple of months. my life will move past you. but i will always - ALWAYS love you and that is something that hurts me every time i think about it because i will never be able to give all of me to someone else, you have claimed a part of me that is all yours and no matter how much i love someone else - there is this tiny and significant piece that is all yours.

it is a terrible and beautiful thing.

things i think about you

i think you live in fear of living the life you want and dream. i think you are afraid of loving me more than i love you. i think you are afraid you can't live up to whatever expectations you imagine i might have for you. i think you want to walk away before i might have the chance to hurt you. i think you can't understand that i accept you just the way you are, that i love you for who you are and want to be.

you go out into the world and surround yourself with superficial relationships and then you call me to talk about how they don't understand you or relate to the things you care about. i wonder why you do this. why you chose this path. i accept it but i don't understand it.

What are you afraid of?

That's what it is all about. We manage the fear.
Courage is acting in the face of fear. Life is full of courageous acts. For some people, going out the door in the morning takes courage. Some people never make it out their door.
Death, food poisoning, spiders, failure, goats, what other people think of me, loneliness, deep water - all these things affect me. They are fears that shape my day.
I don't encounter goats too often, but when I do it is pretty tough to stand my ground. I avoid deep water - so that one is not too terrible.
I have to eat, so I think about the food poisoning thing every day.
Spiders - they are tiny so they can be anywhere. I overcome that fear through knowing what the scary ones look like. My apologies to spiders everywhere as any that are unidentifiable or borderline super scary die if I can't avoid them or if I think they might reproduce in my home.
Death, failure, loneliness - do we all fear these things?
Some people claim they have no fear of death - but is it just courage? Is it that they act in the face of death even though it is deeply terrifying? I sure think so - nothing revelatory about that though.
I guess it is interesting to see fear affect my life. When someone is afraid to love, or afraid to try, or afraid to eat out. . . . It is interesting to see fear shape my life.

I find myself wondering it about strangers on the street or new acquaintances - what are you afraid of.

coming up for air

the insanity of enjoying someone
so much that i lose myself in him

one day i come up for air
i wonder, do i give myself over to this?
do i let myself go?

then one day he is out of reach - out of touch

(i think of the night i wanted a bedtime story
it had been a very long day
he read Beowulf - I was asleep in his lap
so sweet - so incredibly sweet)

i struggle to find balance
the joy of being together saturates my life
nothing seems to matter as much as each moment with him -
i am disoriented by it.

(scares me a bit)

like being on a beautiful beach
where the waves are a little too big.
just as i am standing up, the next one knocks me down.
i laugh and keep my head above water and enjoy the adventure of it -
(he does this to me)

conflict and nausea

you just never know
what something will be
until you make it real in your life

all the dreams
the imaginations of educated and experienced souls
can not predict, forsee, or gaze into that crystal
to know what two people might share together

who is there among us who does not insist upon trying
who is it that does not think they know
what will be or might be
before it ever is

this creates all manner of nervous expectation,
fear, excitement, potential for disappointment,
conflict and nausea. . .

when the moment arrives
i am reminded to
delight in things that exceed expectations
i am reminded to set fear aside
for there are much greater things than fear in life