il pleut

raining today
inside & out
i'm the girl who
loves you

from the love shop

{ nothing is real but dreams and love }

pleine means "full" in French, but if you say je suis pleine ("i am full") after a meal, you've just told the table you're pregnant. a decent blush and a hand over your mouth won't confirm or deny anything; you have to recover somehow and explain. in this case, it would be for your own good.

so what do we do when we must explain ourselves and that means uncovering our mouths and letting the embarrassment show across our cheeks? what is our choice when it would be easier not to elaborate, less painful, less risky? i think retreating and hiding for awhile is understandable. sometimes things are more than we can bear and there's no shame in that. but eventually we must learn to love (and even like) ourselves enough that there is no shame in appropriate disclosure. we may not have had loving opportunities to be translucent in the past, and much of the safety we perceive depends on those with whom we share . . . but if there is safety there, if there is grace, we must try to return the kindness and show ourselves.

to return kindness with kindness . . .
trust with trust . . .

it is the hardest. like walking on a bridge that's being built plank by plank before your feet as you step forward. and you aren't even building your own, the other person is. you are building for each other, you are making a safe and secure way. but you can't build it all the way across before you step out above the canyon. it is only piece by piece, hour by hour.

can you do it? will you?

faith, hope,
& love.
but the greatest of these
is love.