je ne sais pas.

every man has his secret sorrows

which the world knows not.

{longfellow}

sometimes mes pensees become sad, and i don't always know why. i think there are invisible triggers in each day that prompt certain memories and feelings in us all. maybe i listened to To Be Alone with You too many times yesterday, or maybe it's the grey, oppressive weather. maybe i haven't seen the boy i love in too long. maybe the fluorescent light i sit under every day has finally turned my brain to a maudlin mush. i really couldn't tell you.

i've been thinking about loss this week, specifically how it feels to lose someone and leave on bad terms. i'd like to say i'm one of those people whose every relationship, past and present, is wrapped and packaged perfectly, but i'm not. and partly i'm okay with that --- if you live boldly and passionately, chances are you're going to have some intense encounters that just don't fit nicely into any box. it's not that i've made a list of mortal enemies in my short life. but i've lived and i've lost, and i suppose losing is a part of life that deepens us.

there have been relationships that have fractured and, years later, been resolved, usually on my initiative. i've resented others' inability to step forward and face the past at the same time, but on second thought maybe it's easier to be the one who brings reconciliation about. maybe i'm not as brave as i think i am --- maybe i'm just selfish and controlling. in any case, i've found that all the people i've gone back and reconnected with were receptive, which didn't mean we became best friends, but at least their "box" was contained enough to put a lid on and put on a high shelf, perhaps never to be opened again.

i think we all crave resolution. likewise, i think we all know that resolution won't always be an option, and therein lies what i believe to be one of the primary sources of melancholy.

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being in love is a wonderful thing just like everyone says. but there's a dark side of love too --- insecurity, jealousy, that reflexive self-preservation that often kicks in and ruins everything. i'm not being a pessimist here, just a realist. we must overcome the darker side and allow the beauty of love to overtake us.

for the first time in awhile, maybe the first time since my relationship has gotten truly serious, i allowed myself to think, what if i lost him? and i stopped to consider it, really consider it. i started to cry and realized just how devastated i would be. my entire life would change, would seem to crumble away. i'd be orphaned and lost. the realization of how utterly awful it would be was staggering.

living with the fear of loss is like harboring a disease that may never surface. you can't ignore it completely, but you can't let it take over either. the truth is, i could still lose him. the truth is also that i may not lose him. nothing is certain now. nothing is ever certain, is it?

no, nothing is certain with our words or intentions alone. it's our actions that make it so.
if i say i will love him forever, chances are i won't. there will be days i don't love him, or don't feel like i do. but to stay with him day after day even when i don't think i can, to respect him when i don't think i could be more annoyed with him --- maybe that's love, or the highest form of love we can enact in this finite world.

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see, i think i know something about love, but really,
i know almost nothing. i don't think most of us do.
or maybe we know more than we appear to,
but there's no way we could ever express it.


either way, there's only the trying.
i'm up for it if you are.