Circles

Well, Sexy broke up with me again. Before anyone gets overly concerned about this, I should point out that we do this on a regular basis. For a while, we were breaking up every other week, sometimes more than that. It never lasts very long. In fact, I was back over at his place the next night.

Actually, it's almost become a game of sorts. He'll turn to me and say, "This isn't going to work out between us. We're at different points in our lives. You're just going to get bored with me and leave." I'll just turn to him, smile, and say, "Okay, see you tomorrow." I know I shouldn't jest when he's dumping me, but you really have to know the two of us. He doesn't want it to end any more than I do. The only reason that this keeps happening is because it's so intense with us. Even I find it frightening from time to time. I just take a different approach than he does. He freaks out. I refuse to think about it and just enjoy the moment.

I suppose that, at some point or another, we'll have to do something about it. We can't keep traveling in this same circle over and over. I've tried talking to him about it, but he doesn't want to talk about it. Truth be told, I don't feel like tearing it apart and analyzing it either. I really don't want to think about it. Thinking about it means doing something. Doing things means changing thing. I don't want it to change. I love what we have. This would be the first relationship in my whole dating history that was exactly the way I wanted it. Of course, if this relationship had happened a few years ago, it would've been a different story.

It's funny, actually. I grew up like every other girl out there, dreaming of picket fences and knights on white horses. I would put on my mom's wedding dress from time to time, stand in front of a mirror and dream. In my dreams the roses would never wilt, the kisses would never end, and two halves made a whole. But reality is much different, isn't it? In my reality, I can count the number of times I've received flowers with one hand and have fingers to spare, kisses became meaningless, and marriage was just a piece of paper. I discovered that what I thought I wanted, wasn't much like what I really wanted at all.

It took me a long time to figure out what was wrong with the painting I had painted in my mind. It took even longer to find out what it was that I really needed to be happy. It was very hard to figure out. It involve a lot of brutal honesty with myself. You can't imagine how hard it is to tell yourself the truth. You don't even realize how often you neglect to tell yourself everything. And even when you know you do it, you will outright lie to yourself to protect this piece of artwork in your mind. The fact is, you just don't want to give up something that you believed in for so long. I dreamt of that picket fence forever. It was all I wanted to do, wanted to be. It was very hard to let that go.

Divorce was pretty hard on me. It was the end of a very long dream. I found myself adrift afterward. It was like being lost in space. All around me was the glow of other dreams, shimmering like stars, but I existed in an emptiness, a void I had no hope of filling. But just when I thought that dreams were for the naive, Sexy comes along.

Please don't get me wrong. Sexy is not a cure-all. He didn't make anything happen for me. The only thing that happened by loving him is that I learned. I learned what it was that I wanted. I learned that the mess that was my marriage had blame at my feet as well. I was guilty of lying to myself. I told myself that if I worked hard enough, any man could be my knight. I had settled, modified, adapted the situation to fit this dream. Only, in the end, I had distorted the dream so much that it was nothing like what it had been. Oh yes, I have guilt in abundance.

Now there is this new man in my life. His intelligence intrigues me. His humor charms me. His passion burns me. His gentelness weakens me. In his presence, I find comfort. In his arms, I find love. It's everything I wanted, and so much more. And yet, it shares a similarity with my marriage. It too is nothing like what I had once dreamt of. There's no picket fence to contain us. There's no rings to bind us. With Sexy, one and one does not equal one, but for the first time in my life that doesn't matter.

Why it does not matter, I couldn't tell you. It's one of those things that I would have to think about, and I'll admit that I'm afraid to approach the subject, even in my own mind. Thinking means changing, after all, and I'm so blissfully happy now. In loving him, I'd found another piece of me that I had lost along the way. I fear losing it again.

I know that, in time, I will have to think about it. You cannot travel in circles forever. We can't keep breaking up, mending things, then starting the cycle over again. There's something that we both need that lies further ahead. I'm not sure what that is right now. The only thing I do know is that it's there. I know, with a certainty that is beyond explaination, that he's the one my heart has longed for all this time. He's touched me deeper than anyone, reached more levels than even I knew existed. It's why I don't think about it. Instead, I live it, feel it, take it all in one moment at a time. I savor the goodness of it. Instead of trying to pump life into the dream, I let it exist on it's own. And I pray. I pray, and then I tell him that I will be there the next day. And the next day. And the next day. Surely it's not a jest when it's true.