Vulnerability

"To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. To love is to be vulnerable." 

— C.S. Lewis

I can't seem to find the words to tell the story in my heart.  I've read stories that create a picture only the imagination can see, however it seems words will never tell what only my heart can feel.  I've always been protective of those I love, although different, sometimes even more so with romantic relationships.  The excitement is so intense and the love so strong I want to shout it from the highest peak, but so precious and tender than I want to hold it softly and protect it from danger.

As I both literally and figuratively "pack" away the relationship I thought I would be cultivating for the rest of eternity I would seem callous if I didn't notice how drastically things have changed in the most recent past.  What I would give to go back and try again, try different, try harder.  

Odd how much easier the getting on with your life seems when the mourning has been in motion for so long.

I have missed you for months, even more so now - only miles apart - than I ever did when the distance was so much greater.

Time will pass, distractions will alter my mood and mind, and eventually someone new will come along.  Someone who holds me tighter when times are hard, rather than pushes me away.  Someone who protects me from any harm and makes me a priority.

Only time will tell where our lives will lead.  If being vulnerable brings me to this place again I will take the leap with eyes wide open and pray I am stronger, wiser, happier, and all along the most marvelous me I can be.

Here's to love.

Here's to life.

Here's to vulnerability.