I know I ask for more than I should, but don’t I deserve it? I know I can’t have it all, but why can’t I have the things I wish for. Theres a big difference, and its all the fog that has wrapped around it for so long is disintegrating, disappearing and lines look straighter and it all seems so clear. The musk that I let veil us for so long has left everything to be seen for exactly what it is. And I can’t stop it, because the as always, the truth reveals itself. I love you. To define our love in my own words, is only to define one side. My side.

Love is every bone in my body waking up to smile for you. Its the times when something wonderful is happening, and you are the one I want to tell. It is the times when something terrible is happening, and you are the one I need to hear things will be okay from. It is the times I look at you and can feel whatever you are feeling, I can almost hear the words inside your mind. Its finishing your sentences and holding you close enough to keep but far enough to be free. Its always wanting more, pushing each other to do better and nonchalantly making plans about the future because thats where we see ourselves. Its understanding people aren’t always going to tell you what you want to hear, life is going to give you plenty of twists and turns and love is stronger than anything that the world can toss in your direction. Its staying up late when your tired, its sacrificing things, places, people for the one that holds the key to your happiness. 

Lately, my heart is so impatient. I find myself more angry and confused than I do laughing.  If my heart could bear a stress fracture like a bone could, it would have at least ten right now. And I think I know why.

We are growing, and our love isn’t. You’ve never been one for sentiment, never one to tell me i’m beautiful or to write me a note, or to come up behind me to hug me for no reason. Never one to ask me something deep, to suggest a walk down the beach, never to reach for my hand first while strolling side by side. And I thought I accepted that. Because when things were new, and fresh we were so passionate about each other and learning everything, spaces were filled. And then, as we faced diversity our trust was tested, we made distance work and just being able to spend time with each other felt like more than enough.

And now, I’ve hit a roadblock. Our lives from here on out will forever move in different directions, and without the feeling that you want me like you used to, I don’t know if I can find a way for my path to stay parallel to yours. I want to feel wanted and loved more than I ever even express to you because I know its things you don’t want to hear. You don’t want to put any effort into this anymore, because were together and happy and settled and your parents love me and the world is ours and theres nothing thats ever going to come between us. I did believe that. But the world is a big place, and I can’t live with the pressure to perfect coming from all directions. 

What will people say when the picture perfect couple falls apart? Not to say we will, not to say I want that because I don’t I truthfully don’t. But I also don’t want to feel trapped. We have no growth. Maybe the only way to grow is to crash and burn and to pick up the pieces and start again. Things feel complete and things feel empty. And those are opposites and thats why I’m torn and thats why I’m frustrated and our conversations go nowhere because I feel like we have no where to go. I never understand what its going to take. Maybe i’ll always feel taken for granted.

I make these plans, these crazy love movie ideas in my head of the things we will do someday, and then reality smacks me in the face to remind me: we don’t have days. Time isn’t something that we are going to have. If falling in love is the sweetest and most beautiful of emotions then falling out has to be hell on earth.

There is no question that I love you. There is no question that you are my best friend. And there is no question that I picture my life with you forever. But how we are going to get from here to there like this is what my heart and mind just can’t grasp.

I once saw a game show where a man stood in a plexiglass box, and dollar bills swirled around him in a miniature tornado, and thought, Life is like that: you can keep whatever you can catch, but it’s all whipping past your head so fast, and how were you supposed to tell which were the big bills and which were the small? How could one train for such an infuriatingly stupid challenge? How could anybody catch all the beauty in the present moment, when, after years of misery, there was suddenly a day when all the wonderfulness of life unexpectedly blew down from all directions at once? And how were you supposed to store joy, for the ugly days when the bleakness returns?