An end and a beginning
This will be my last post on this blog. I know this story continues, but a new chapter has started and it’s time to archive these thoughts for a time in which I need to remember the journey that brought me to this point in life and love.
I started this blog when I made a break from serial monogamy and attempted to get out and understand what dating and courtship was all about. I think I failed for the most part until just recently. I fell into crushes, into intense friendships that held the promise for so much more but never delivered, into quick-fix high-chemistry hook-ups that most times turned into something more than they should have been. All this in search of a partner, a companion, and an ever-further and more and more unbelievable idea of a man that blended all the pieces I’d found in separate people up until that point. In recent years I know I stopped believing he existed. I stuck to my pattern of picking people for a certain beautiful quality they put forth, be it patience or compassion or simply the sort of hug that made me feel everything would be o.k. But I held back the core pieces of my heart, my deep desire to find a partner who shared my faith, my desperate wish to find someone who I admired but wasn’t intimidated by, who had ambition but little ego, who saw the world and sought to serve it as I try to. And in the process, I let go of romance. I stopped being excited by little favors for someone dear or being touched by a song that so perfectly captures love at its best. And I stopped writing here, because all the little jaunts and dates and back and forth started to seem so silly if they weren’t leading up to something real.
And then of course, I found him. And he may not be the one – it’s still early after all. But the promise of all these things I had let go of as they replace themselves in my life so effortlessly – mix tapes and love letters and care packages and sweet texts with no fear of overstepping boundaries or being the only one that is this excited. It’s all come rushing back, but in such new, vibrant colors that I find myself literally doing a happy dance, or smiling widely to myself at odd moments, or simply unable to calm my rushing heart before I sleep. I find myself immersed in innocence and honesty that I was sure couldn’t exist in a relationship starting just as I entered my 4th decade on this earth. And this person, this unbelievably radiant person is a cliché to the max in that he is everything I ever wanted, period. Every bit of strength alongside humility, music without pretence, family with depth and imperfection, travel for the sake of knowing a place, service for the sake of returning the most glorious gift we know we have received, justice and equality for all, honesty, openness and more to be discovered each day. It is almost too much for me to possibly believe I could deserve it, or command a return interest. And yet I do, and that is a reflection in part of growth and the product of experience. But I think it is more about grace, about understanding what love is and can really be, of making peace with not being the one in control. Because once I passed the innocence and beautiful awkwardness of first loves I entered a long period of logic as I tried to control my heart, tried to mature enough to steer it wisely, to learn from my past, to not lead myself or others astray.
Now I know that with love logic can be cast aside – not as a brash conceit to potential but with the knowledge that if you let it guide your search it shows you’re not yet ready to find what you have always hoped existed and have finally grown into.
I started this blog when I made a break from serial monogamy and attempted to get out and understand what dating and courtship was all about. I think I failed for the most part until just recently. I fell into crushes, into intense friendships that held the promise for so much more but never delivered, into quick-fix high-chemistry hook-ups that most times turned into something more than they should have been. All this in search of a partner, a companion, and an ever-further and more and more unbelievable idea of a man that blended all the pieces I’d found in separate people up until that point. In recent years I know I stopped believing he existed. I stuck to my pattern of picking people for a certain beautiful quality they put forth, be it patience or compassion or simply the sort of hug that made me feel everything would be o.k. But I held back the core pieces of my heart, my deep desire to find a partner who shared my faith, my desperate wish to find someone who I admired but wasn’t intimidated by, who had ambition but little ego, who saw the world and sought to serve it as I try to. And in the process, I let go of romance. I stopped being excited by little favors for someone dear or being touched by a song that so perfectly captures love at its best. And I stopped writing here, because all the little jaunts and dates and back and forth started to seem so silly if they weren’t leading up to something real.
And then of course, I found him. And he may not be the one – it’s still early after all. But the promise of all these things I had let go of as they replace themselves in my life so effortlessly – mix tapes and love letters and care packages and sweet texts with no fear of overstepping boundaries or being the only one that is this excited. It’s all come rushing back, but in such new, vibrant colors that I find myself literally doing a happy dance, or smiling widely to myself at odd moments, or simply unable to calm my rushing heart before I sleep. I find myself immersed in innocence and honesty that I was sure couldn’t exist in a relationship starting just as I entered my 4th decade on this earth. And this person, this unbelievably radiant person is a cliché to the max in that he is everything I ever wanted, period. Every bit of strength alongside humility, music without pretence, family with depth and imperfection, travel for the sake of knowing a place, service for the sake of returning the most glorious gift we know we have received, justice and equality for all, honesty, openness and more to be discovered each day. It is almost too much for me to possibly believe I could deserve it, or command a return interest. And yet I do, and that is a reflection in part of growth and the product of experience. But I think it is more about grace, about understanding what love is and can really be, of making peace with not being the one in control. Because once I passed the innocence and beautiful awkwardness of first loves I entered a long period of logic as I tried to control my heart, tried to mature enough to steer it wisely, to learn from my past, to not lead myself or others astray.
Now I know that with love logic can be cast aside – not as a brash conceit to potential but with the knowledge that if you let it guide your search it shows you’re not yet ready to find what you have always hoped existed and have finally grown into.
posted by Mood Indigo at 4:09 AM
18 comments
