First please don’t insult me by suggesting I am talking about telling
someone you love them. We are adults. The l word I am talking about is leave.
The reason I bring this word up is because when I tell someone I love them,
that is what I am thinking about. I love you to me, means I can not stand the idea
of you leaving my life. The older I get, the more patient I have become. I didn't
understand what love felt like when I was younger. All I knew was this anxious and confused feeling all the time. Wondering where this person I cared so deeply
for was, who they were talking to and for what purposes. People say that’s
not love, but in a way it is. Its young love. Not knowing quite what it is you
want from another person, but knowing one thing with all your little heart...no
one else can have them.
I have loved a handful of men in my life and each time, I have grown to
know what defines love a little more each time. But the one thing I am certain
of at this point, love is knowing life will never be the same without that
person. And sometimes that is not always a bad thing. Love is so vast and so wide
no one could truly ever describe to one person what it means to feel it by a
series of bullet points or rules. The cliché saying “if you love them, let them
go...” is true. You can love someone and still know at the same it’s not right,
it’s not forever or it’s not mutual.
However no matter the lessons I have come to learn over time, one always had
remained the same. Love for me is staying. The love, I want anyway. Through the
good and bad days. And there are bad days. Good days are implied. But the bad
days get rough. But when you love someone, it doesn’t matter. You fight and
conquer. Then there are times I believe you can exhaust love, and the will to
fight can die. When you love someone, the reasons to stay out way the reasons
to leave. That is why love is so damn terrifying, if I am going to use what I feel
is the most relatable word. Because when you admit to loving someone and
letting them in, you are lifting your gates and lowering your shield, and you’re
vulnerable. Then we are accepting of the fact, that this person has the means
to bring the castle down. But when you love someone you risk the chance to have
them leave, to have them stay in your life, for however long that may be. People
will come and go. For me a relationship is defined on whether or not that it
matters to me if you choose to leave. I know I can be shrill and cutting the
cord for me is easier than most. I have tried in growing up to not be so cold,
and appreciate the people who can’t dump others like trash that was missed on Monday.
We choose the ones worth suffering for I suppose. In a strange way, I find solace in that.
