I'm Scared, But It Feels Good!

I can’t even express what I’ve been through emotionally, physically, psychologically, or even intellectually over the past few years.  Well, I don’t have to, these blogs have recorded that for me.  I find myself even unable to read them because those emotions are just under the surface, and I can’t jump back onto that roller-coaster ride, not yet. The highs are really high, and the lows are so deep I find myself really, really, really wanting to stay afloat for just a little while somewhere in the middle, somewhere in a medium, somewhere safe I can breathe.  Don’t get me wrong, I still want to feel the thrill of the peaks and the even the pain of the depths, but I just plead the universe gives me a little time to enjoy this moment of inertia.   

I’ve met someone recently, a wonderful, handsome Marine that keeps me smiling. I call him my Bello, because that’s what he is to me, he’s a beautiful soul that arrived in the midst of my darkness. I’m not sure I can explain what meeting him and knowing him is doing to me, because whatever is happening it’s momentarily outside my understanding.  I’m not going to say it’s love, but I’m not going to say it’s not.  I can only honestly say it’s different.  All the loves of my life have been different. Some complicated. Some painful.  All in the past, all gone, all of them I lost either by death, divorce, or deception. Each left a mark, a scar of their own, but a scar that I’m not ashamed to bare.  These scars have made me who I am.  I have no regrets. 

Last year, when I thought I was dying, I pushed everyone that meant anything to me out of my life, or at least to the edges of it, and built this huge wall of fear.  I became afraid… of everything and everyone.  I lost that girl that was living out loud and doing all these amazing things.  God, I envied her, I still do.  She was so full of life, so full of hope, so exuberant, taking on the world and taking a chance on life and on love.  Even now, I still envy her.  I fell in love with her, with myself, with life.  She had nothing, yet she had everything. But, I had to let her go, because cancer killed her, fear destroyed her, and a broken heart ripped her to pieces. She went from living out-loud and deep into survival mode - a place of numbness, detachment, minimal existence, darkness.

But light has entered the room.  Not a big light, but a little one and it grows brighter every day, exposing the shadows that have petrified me for too long.  I’m waking, wanting to find my way back to the light, back to a life full of sunshine, a life where I can once again live out loud.  I have too many dreams, too many hopes, too many passions to keep them hidden in the dark.  A dear revertant friend of mine has helped me see a glimpse that girl I once was, and though I can’t go back and be her, I can be even more.  I survived, again.  I’ve lost so much, but there is much more ahead of me.  

My Bello is showing me that though I’ve lost a lot, but those I’ve lost also lost me. I suppose that’s what I’ve had a hard time to see.  I’ve been so focused on what and who I’ve lost, even the girl I used to be, to see that I was the one lost, not them.  They lost me.  For whatever reason they didn’t choose me. Now, here I am, breathing, standing on my own two feet, staring at a world of possibility, alive, and ready to live.  I’m scared, but it feels good.  I’m ready to live out loud again. I’m ready to jump back into the light and fly.  My wounds are still there, and I have a few new scars, but my wings are not broken.  They’re sore, but I’m so ready to fly.  Yet, this adventure will be different, because I’m different.  I’m not the same woman I used to be. I haven’t yet figured out who she is yet, but I’m okay with that.

My Bello came to see me this week.  He moved his schedule around so that I wouldn’t spend Christmas alone.  Someone put me first.  It felt nice.  He moves me to find me.  He encourages me to chase my passions. He doesn’t ask me for anything.  He makes me feel beautiful, wanted, desired, and adored. Mostly, he inspires me want to live out loud.  While I love the feel of his strong arms around me, or the softness of his lips upon mine, I mostly love the fact that I don’t want to change for him. I only want him to hold my hand as I break out of this cocoon and spread my wings.   

I have loved deeply.  I have loved faithfully. I have loved wildly.  Mostly, I think I’ve loved love.  Maybe now it’s time for love to love me back.  I’m still scared, but it feels good.

Till next time,

~T.L. Gray