I wrote something for you.

I started writing it a long time ago and when I had no more words, when I was drained and empty and the tears were falling on my notebook, I would stop.

Some days, I would pull those writings out again, sometimes I would read them over, other times I would start where I left off. And I would write again. Until the feelings were easier to feel.

I turned what I wrote into a blog post and I held onto it, kept it in my drafts, sat it to the side, for a very long time. I desperately wanted to send it out into the world, to hit publish, to take the final step in healing that part of me. But I didn’t.

I was worried.

Not about whether you would like it, I knew that you wouldn’t. I knew you would find my thoughts too invasive, my feelings just too much. You would feel like your whole life was on display and all your secrets scattered across the internet. Of course, I would never share your thoughts on my blog, only mine, but I know you’d see it that way. And still. That’s not what stopped me.

I wanted to make sure I wasn’t writing about you to get your attention. To get you to notice that I was alive here, but barely. To help you see that I was hanging on, but I wasn’t sure how much longer I could do that for. I wanted you to see that I was hurting and I was hoping it would make you hurt too. And so I didn’t publish.

I sat.

I sat with my words. It’s been over a year since I first started writing the words that turned into that piece, what was left of my heart to be smeared across the internet for all to see, your friends and mine and all the strangers in between.

And then today I stared writing something for someone else.

And in a beautiful plot twist that I never saw coming, I realized that I hadn’t ever sent my words out to you. I hadn’t actually needed to aim my wordy little daggers at your heart in order to heal.

It’s just dawned on me, as I sat to write something for a person who I feel deserves my words, that the one my heart – – my mushy insides, my love stuff – – is aimed towards, is no longer you.

It’s not you anymore.

I healed some broken parts and you weren’t around for it, you didn’t help, didn’t lift a finger to make anything easier for me. You disappeared with no explanations, no goodbyes, no whispered final words into the phone.

I never thought I would write a word for another guy after you. I never thought I could pull myself together long enough to fake being a human again. To pretend my heart wasn’t smashed and my soul wasn’t crushed. I never thought I would make it as a girl in this world who has love to give. I thought I had to let some parts of me go, in order to get by, in order to exist as I should. I thought I would fake the trying forever, do you hear me?

And then.

I met someone and the friendship was instant, the connection and the quick pulse, the glances and the lingering. Months later, everything blossomed. Not forever, but for a time.

For a beautiful time.

My world, on it’s trajectory, the one that I was learning to be okay with, crashed into his smile and all these months later, I am sitting down to write for him and I almost laugh out loud at the luck of it all.

How blessed I am to have had you and loved you and learned you and survived you. To have been a partner of yours in this world, and to have been able to learn myself during that time. To know what it is to trust a person. To have learned what it’s like to be adored. To have felt love from across the bed, across a room, across a continent.

How lucky to have laid my head on your lap and felt your hands in my hair on a warm, sticky August evening in Paris with the balcony doors open and love in the air.

How wonderful to have stood by your side as your secrets came out and your thoughts appeared between us and your feelings rushed forth like you’d finally let the dam break.

Such magic.

And now all this time later, while I insist I’m not over, not done, not moved on, not better, I sit down to write and the words that come out for someone else are this:

“I don’t have any magical powers. I don’t have extra love, no more than the next person. I can’t heal other people or teach any life lessons. I can’t fix bruises or bones or a confused mind. I can’t make your decisions or your choices. I don’t know how. But I will tell you this. I can commit, I know that now. I can be loyal and I can sit still. I don’t know what this could all look like or how it could all work. I can’t promise you that there would never be sad times or arguments.

But I can commit to being present. I can promise not to run when things gets hard. I promise to stick it out and talk it out and share feelings and not lies. I promise to open up and let you in and to be careful with all your tender parts. Some of our secrets are probably the same, the feelings we have, likely shared.

I can promise you that what I bring to you can change and grow. My mind is open and every ounce of my body is willing to try the hardest I could ever try. I learned this about myself a long time ago when I was sad and I had no choice but to give up or figure it all out. So I’ve figured it out. I don’t even know if that was my choice, but it’s what happened, and now here I am writing these words to you, letting you know the things I am able to give, hoping that you will see that making choices is a gift and choosing how your fill your life can be the most gorgeous thing you can do for yourself.”

So. Now. After our wonderful friendship and glorious love that changed who I am, and then devastating heartbreak that changed me some more….after time and tears and healing deep wounds, I am seeing all the lessons you taught me.

And I am finally learning the biggest lesson of all: that I love myself enough to try again.

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