Gifts

My true love gave to me . . .

1. first hand hold
2. first kiss
3. first mercy and first trust
4. first love
5. first golden iridescence of God
6. only starlit swim
7. first butterfly kiss
8. he let me read out loud to him, and he read out loud to me too
9. he let me write words on his skin, and he wrote on me too
10. first anguish and passion
11. last love
12. he showed me a different way to live and reminded me of choices too

More than anything else my true love has always inspired me to want to do more, to face fears, to challenge myself.  I flunked out of college then met him and wanted to go back and graduate. I wanted to help him through grad school to become (maybe first a high school teacher but eventually) a college professor.  I lost him and flunked out a second time but eventually graduated, he became a teacher but not a college professor.  I became fat and had given up.  Then I met him again and was reminded of how I once felt with him, I wanted to be slim, to make him proud of me.

I've only ever wanted to make my parents pleased before but he is the first person outside of my family who I really cared to make him proud.  Now its all I want, to love him and be proud of myself, for him to be proud of me. I've never felt that way before with anyone, no friends, my husband, no one.  It feels humbling but in an honest way, in a way that is vulnerable, opening your heart wide for the world to see. I wonder if its humbling because I care so much about what he thinks of me?  More than anyone else.  But also because I love him so much and it seems so obvious how desperate I am for him.  My happiness depends on him in large part.

6-26 p.s. I figured out it feels humbling to love someone so much, because to know that your life will never be the same if they do not share your life with them, that is humbling and scarey, because you think everyone can see how much you want them, how much you actually do need them in your life.  To admit that you do need them, in order to be the person you want to be.