maybe my future

When I was 15 or 16, my mother told me that my great-grandmother never felt older than 16 in her heart; that she believed each of us has stays one age inside for all of our lives.

I can't say I have stayed one age, but several remain. Lying on my back in the cool over-grown grass early on June mornings I might be 6 and I might be 10. Falling in love anew, I am 13. Dreaming of my future with a beau, I am 15 or 16 all over again and filled with hope and promise.

I think we've all been hurt by loving- trusted too hard, gave too much, stayed too long. Somehow I was always glad the end hurt so much. No pain would have belittled everything we'd had.

Through Boyfriend's Rhapsody account, I am listening to "How Can We See That Far". It's so simple, and so ... simultaneously pinching and promising.

I've been engaged before. I was almost 31 when we got engaged, and almost 32 and nearly married when I left. I left, and no pain or guilt has ever been harsher. I left one morning in the middle of my third full anxiety attack of the month, and my father and I drove up to clean out the apartment- our apartment- five weeks later.
I cried and screamed- literally screamed and howled- for the first three hours driving home. I was glad to be alone with my pain for the first time, but it's hard to see and drive and have a melt-down barely breathing with legs going numb all at once.

I've learned from my mistakes and I think I know better what I'm doing this time. I'm excited and scared; but I am comfortable. It feels much different this time around. I want it for me. I want it for my parents. I want it for him. It's something we are able to talk about, something we are able to face.


How can we see that far? We can't. None of us can.

Loving makes us vulnerable but we take our future and place it in the hands of another, and accept his and promise to give our best and make it work no matter what.