Jubilation, labels and Secret Keepers – SOC *e*

really, I just want to capture this feeling

I feel so incredibly strange today, but not strange in a bad way, strange in a way that is seemingly unfamiliar, yet comfortable. I’m going to be saying it’s strange a lot because it is. Perhaps its sad that I find it strange to feel so jubilant, so excited by the prospects of everything, so elated just to be alive, to be breathing, to be loving to my fullest potential (at least for today, it seems to exponentially grow daily, and when I feel like I’m full to capacity, my heart swells and makes room for just a little bit more) to be open and real and authentic, to be swimming in the wonder that life is…everything. I have gone without this feeling so long. I’ve mentioned it before, being unfamiliar with the feeling of happy, but how I’m feeling today goes so much more beyond happy that it doesn’t even compare. I don’t know that I’ve ever felt quite this way before. Do you ever have days where your head feels disconnected from your body? I have those days sometimes, but they’re usually brought on by cold medicine, or other medication, or illness. I don’t think I’m sick – although, I may take that back because when I woke up this morning, I was still reeling from a dream and I sneezed 20 times in a row when I walked into the door at work, maybe I’m allergic to work, and this is the universe telling me that I should have gone home a long time ago. After that I was a bit congested, and I’ve been nauseated off and on all day, but not in a yucky way, just in a way that makes me not want to eat.) I just feel like my head is spinning – not in a way that means I’m windy, because I’m not. I’m comfortable and safe and hopeful, and so incredibly excited, staring at the world and wanting to frolic in it – all of it, just to enjoy it and see what’s coming on the horizon. Maybe I’m not meant to see what’s coming, just enjoy what is to the fullest, and I can do that too. But I can’t help the planning that takes place in the back of my mind when I least expect it. As Amy Lee says “who can decide what they dream, and dream I do” – last night my dreams were beautiful. I had a moment of sadness upon waking, to realize that they weren’t true. That they hadn’t actually happened. But the sadness was almost immediately replaced by the simple knowledge that they would. Not might, would. I know that these futures are out in the making, every day we are moving carefully or carelessly towards them, putting one foot in front of another, taking one step at a time. After writing everything I did yesterday, I realized that I’m not exactly sure what the logical next step is, but it doesn’t matter. Whatever comes, comes, and I’ll take it all as it arrives and greet it like a familiar yet slightly unfamiliar guest at my doorstep, offer it dinner and place to sit – maybe a discussion over a bonfire or cup of coffee and see where the night takes me.

For now, I’m a secret-keeper. Not a holder of negativity, or bad secrets fostered in dishonesty or omission, rather like a patient child waiting for the moment to spring from behind the stairs to surprise someone, innocent and hopeful. I feel disconnected from myself in a way, but grounded in a reality that I have complete faith in. It started last night really, at the meeting and the lingering discussion afterwards. And I realized in that time that even though I get windy at times, it is because of me, not her. I never mistrust her, and my doubts have nothing to do with her – it’s due to a lingering mistrust of myself, a betrayal I made to myself by not being honest with myself about my realities, by trying to fake a life that wasn’t mine and live up to other’s expectations. Doing such a thing is dishonest, and when you’re dishonest with yourself for so long, it’s hard to rebuild that trust – even with you. But I’m getting there, daily, finding a bit more to like and appreciate about myself, who I really am, underneath the mess of all the mistakes I had made, realizing I am not defined by THEM, but the person I became because of them, and the person I now am trying to be – wanting to be – and I’m succeeding. So in the aftermath of that, waking up after those dreams, where the sunlight framed your face like a ring on your finger, and you were glowing brighter than that distant star ever could, even though the morning had its moment of disappointment and worry, even though you were not feeling great, and were tired – my mood stabilized and transformed my day into a beautiful daydream of faith, hope and love and it is good. I daydream my realities now – not reaching for a hope just out of arm’s-length, but I find my mind replaying things that were, and things that I know will be. I have finally reached the place where my reality has overcome my imagination, and it’s not a temporary fix, like a happy pill that makes me temporarily forget that there is misery and loneliness waiting for me upon my inevitable return. This is permanent. So many things are permanent these days, and I have no question of that. None. And realizing that the chains that bind me do not hold me prisoner to will but set me free to fly is probably the most liberating and beautiful thing I could have ever imagined.

insert sappy mini-letter now, which is my inner monologue talking, please hold
So, Spike:
I’m supposed to be creating a word for you – a word that defines what you are. You told me last night that I’m definitely more than your girlfriend, and you are definitely for me so much more than that as well, however – right now you and I are living in the in-between spaces of this and that, knowing where we’re going, but not there yet. We’ll get there. I know we will, and so do you. I can’t call you that, yet. But you told me to come up with a label for what you are, and I’m finding it harder than I imagined at the time. How can I put a label on everything you are? I know what you’re not…you’re not going to be my everything – I know how much pressure being someone’s everything is, and I would never put that restriction on you. You love me, now, because I’m something on my own, and to call you my everything would be diminishing everything I worked to become – the person that you fell in love with in the first place. And I’m not going to do that. You’re not my missing piece…I didn’t need you to complete or fulfill me. I found you when I had completed myself, when I had come to the realization that I was okay on my own, when I was safe and happy and content to life – to just live. So you didn’t complete me, you just were the light that shined on my completed puzzle like the spotlights on priceless pieces of art in a museum…the painting is beautiful on its own, but the light brings all its intricacies to life. You do that for me. You’re not my partner, although for the first time, I understand the concept of an equal partnership, where both people come together 100%, we help each other through the wind, we listen, we support, we understand. But a partnership sounds like a business arrangement, and you are so much more than that. You’re not my companion, which sounds even more clinical, although I want you by my side while I explore the world and its texture with you in it. Knowing you, loving you is so easy, and you make me want to shine. You make me feel beautiful. And you make me believe that I am. I wish you could see yourself throughmy eyes for just a moment, still though. So you could see the truth of everything you are, when you roll your eyes at me when I say it out loud. You’ll see. Someday you’ll recognize the shine in my eyes that is not from within, but is rather the glow from your existence in them. I don’t know what to call you, and the truth of the matter is, it doesn’t matter, as long as I can call you mine – not in a way to mark possession or property, but rather a joining of souls, a co-mingling. A becoming. You are my hope, and you are my future. I’m no longer looking for that “something else” that was always out there through my entire past that I couldn’t put my finger on. you’re it. You’re what I want. And that’s what I have, and I am so grateful and appreciative of that simple little fact, it overwhelms me and makes me misty…I won’t ever take that little spark for granted. I can promise you that. I suppose I have failed in this challenge, but…I’m okay with that, just to know the beauty of what I have, what I get the chance to live and experience, all the things I get to see that are made more spectacular by the fact that I get to share it, with you. What makes this a certainty in my mind, and not just a maybe comes down to one simple fact that has been repeating in my mind today like a broken record but I enjoy the tune: It’s not that I no longer have to wonder. With you, it’s that I never had to wonder at all. And that, love, makes all the difference.
elevator love songs completed, resuming normal programming, apologies for the overly sweet nature of that

There’s so much I want to say, but I can’t. For a word-spinner, my words have failed me and I’m okay with that. I’m going to just go and enjoy the feeling, knowing that it will last.