I know better. Really, I do. And yet--I blame myself. I knew we weren't meant to be back in 1999 when we first met. Kind of like I knew I shouldn't have enrolled in that AP English class in high school. But I can play a good game, talk a good talk. I get my way, and for a moment, I think I'm winning. It looks like I'm winning. But I'm wishing I had the courage to speak up and step down. To tell the truth. Hey, this doesn't feel right.
I loved you for your commitment to your left-of-center beliefs and your passion and outspokenness about all sorts of things. I loved you for being one of a kind. A dramatic, abstract piece of art that I wanted so badly to comprehend. I wanted to be more like you: fervent, brazen, steadfast. And sometimes I was--and sometimes I wasn't. And it was those times that I wasn't when I felt like I was in over my head. Like Mrs. Whoever had just assigned a character analysis of Tess of the d'Urbervilles and all I can come up with is "Tess is a pretty name." But mixed in with these feelings of inadequacy were countless periods of growth, too. That's life outside the comfort zone.
As I count the growing ripples between "old us" and "new us," I am wrestling with a way to define the unquestionable love I felt for you. I loved love you with my soul, but I don't think I was ever able to fully put my heart into it. I looked to you on so many occasions to "fix" my feelings with those three words--and you couldn't either. It saddens me to admit that I loved without my heart--and perhaps it hurts you to know it. Or maybe you agree.
But there is something so liberating about walking away from that abstract piece of art or putting down that book full of impossible prose. Isn't that what the expression "something for everybody" is all about? I'm grateful to live in a world where all these differences exist, but I think I now have a better idea of what will make my heart sing--and that's the direction I'm headed.
Soundtrack: "I and Love and You," by the Avett Brothers
