It can only end in two ways...

Much like what I would imagine it takes to convince Lady GaGa it's a bad idea to go through the remaining food groups with future outfits...so is getting over us.  It's a process.

I have no idea what stage I'm at in said process.  This is harder than I thought it would be because you seemed to understand me and really know me on a level few people ever have.  Okay, only one other person.  And it makes me wonder how many men out there can really "get me" on such a level.  And so...the process continues.

Even though I've been through break-ups before, I somehow feel like I'm in new territory.  I wasn't married to you after all.  Truth is, I tried to imagine that once...and oddly I really couldn't see it.  Not really truly see it.  I wanted to see it.  I could see the day to day stuff that we had already done together, but I had a hard time imagining some of the things that are intimate beyond a physical level, beyond cooking dinner or hanging out on the couch watching Everybody Loves Raymond.

Don't get me wrong.  I loved you.  I still do, if I'm being honest about it.  But I can't help but think that deep down - in that core instinct I seem to have - I knew that kind of intimacy, that kind of future was never going to be a possibility because you couldn't offer all of yourself to me and so...I couldn't really see it.

And that's a strange concept, considering that I am fully aware of how relationships work.  Every person you date is going to have one of two outcomes.  You're either going to break up, or spend the rest of your life with them.

Yeah, I know, it's a sobering thought.  But it's true.

I guess I knew which one you were going to be, but...to use your own words...I wasn't ready to let you go.

Maybe I'm still not quite ready.

Letting Go...

There comes a moment in every life situation when you just know.  You know it's time to walk away. Time to just let go...

That time has finally come.

"Walking Away"

It was one of those times
when tears filled my eyes
and all I could do was walk on.
In that moment my heart
was falling apart,
walking away felt so wrong.
“Don’t look back,
stay on your path,”
a quiet voice whispered to me.
“You can’t act on a whim,
you can’t run back to him,
you just have to let this one be.”
So with pain in my chest
and shortness of breath
I fought against the impact
of walking away
of wanting to stay
of wanting to just run back.

A smile deeper than the surface...

I feel closer to you than I ever have.

I don't know what has happened. I'm not sure if something has changed within you, but you have been more attentive to what I want.  You've been more attentive to me..and I appreciate that so much.

I do think something is different. With you.

Last night, you whispered something in my ear that has been resonating with me ever since.

You said, "I've missed you."  

I know...it isn't some profound earth shattering statement...but it's definitely a step for you.  You don't talk about how you feel. Remember? :) It made me smile...on a deeper level than just the smile on my face. Hell, I'm smiling right now thinking about it.

What level does that put us on?

We seem to reach different levels in life without ever realizing it's happened.

Relationships are no different.

Love isn't either.

It's taken me a while, and an insane amount of life experience, to be able to see the variations.  Truth be told, there is no way I'd have been able to see it when I was 20 years old.  I didn't have the experiences to compare.  I couldn't look back and see how one level was different from another. 

It's crystal now. 

When I was 20...actually, even 5 years ago, if you'd have asked me what real love was about, I could have given you a deep, profound response.  A writer's response.  One influenced by the media, love stories I've read, songs I've listened to.  In other words...a skewed, manipulated response. 

That was then.
Then it would have been about how it felt.  How it made me feel.  I would have  described it in a way that really would have been more superficial than in-depth.

Today, I see it differently.  But even with my penchant for words, I'm not sure I can explain it in a way that will give it life or do it justice.  Today, I see it as being about the connection.  And it isn't the physical connection, at least not the sexually physical type.  Don't get me wrong...that is amazing with the right person.  But in order for that aspect to amaze, you have to connect on other levels first. 

I realized this recently and somewhat by accident, really.  Isn't that how it always happens?  When you're looking for answers or epiphanies, they rarely ever show themselves...but try to clear your mind and fall asleep at night and suddenly you're inundated with a writer's equivalent to Einstein's Theory of Relativity.  Answers.  To questions you probably didn't even realize you had.  But there they are.  Staring you down.  Daring you to acknowledge them.  So I did.

What I acknowledged is this:  When I'm not with him, I miss him.  And I can honestly say that I miss him.  Not the idea of him.  Not how he makes me feel or what he does for me.  Not just the idea of having someone in my life, but HIM.  The person he is.  Even if I don't get to see him, I want to talk to him.  I want to laugh with him and hear about his day.  I just want that interaction with him.  When something happens during my day, he is the first person I want to tell about it.  Even if it's something ridiculous.  Okay, that's not really a fair statement because if it's something ridiculous, I especially want to tell him.  Ridiculousness is kind of our thing. :)  

The point is this...looking back over other relationships I've had, I can see the difference.  I can see that before it was all about feelings.  But that's just one level...it's when you move beyond that level that things get real.  Things get interesting.  And they can get scary.  I admit, he scares me a little...mainly because I don't want to imagine my life without him.  Even if I could never kiss him again, fall asleep with my head resting on his chest, be entangled in his embrace...those wouldn't be the things I missed most.  It would be our conversations, the time I get to spend laughing with him, just being with him.  His friendship...that's what means the most to me.  And because of that level, every other level of connection I have with him is that much more amazing.