Ten years ago, I was at a Reverend Horton Heat show. In my early twenties and cinched in to a high waisted pencil skirt and 5 inch heels. Towering over everyone with my already natural 5'10" frame (barefoot). Red lipstick and nails to match, I clutched a beer in one hand and my friend's arm in the other as we swayed and rocked through the crowd, listening to the music and not worrying about anything of any importance. I had never really been in love; I was 24 and had a couple of long term, but shallow relationships. The kind you feel you are "supposed to have". But when they ended, I was sad...not heartbroken, and I recovered quickly. Brushing it off and taking a road-trip with my girlfriends or heading to another show to distract myself. That night I was compltely unaware that I was about to meet someone that would change that forever...
My girlfriend and I sneaked up to the balcony overlooking the crowd and the stage. There must have been a few hundred people down in the crowd. Mostly dressed in black, mostly tattooed, mostly of no interest to me. Then he caught my eye...and I could not stop watching him. At 24 I was very unimpressed with men my age. I had already finished 2 undergraduate degrees and in a career at this point. Way too serious for my own good; my parents used to tell me that I was "30 by the time I was 3". I was still trying to figure out how to make my way to him when I watched as he wandered off and disappeared out of sight. My girlfriend and I decided to find our other friends; they were at the bar...with him. As I approached, he leaned in towards me before I could say anything and introduced himself (as it turns out, he was another friend's brother). I lost my usual confident demeanor and almost stuttered as I gave him my name. That was it for us...we were inseparable.
We fell deeply in love. For the first time. For us both.
He was 3 years my junior and an old soul. He shared my love of classic rock and folk, literature and obscure cinema. He had a style that was uniquely his, WAY ahead of his time. He surfed and skated as if his body and the board had no boundaries. And, when he kissed me I believed it. When he asked me to be his, he asked me to "go steady" and when he told me he loved me for the first time, I could feel him looking deeply in to me.
And then it was all ripped away from me. He was. His life was.
He had taken a trip to Costa Rica to surf with friends and would be back in 2 weeks time; a late flight home and then straight to work the next day. So, I thought nothing of it when I hadn't heard from him the morning of his return.
Until, I started getting panicked calls from mutual friends asking if I had heard from him. The last call I received that morning was from his best friend. Crying.
He was gone.
Gone.
I never experienced that kind of pain and heartbreak in my life. I had lost people before to death. Death be not kind. But, this was different. I felt as though I lost part of me. To this day, its still missing. It will most likely always be gone. For anyone that has lost a lover to death, you understand. The pain that lingers, sometimes fades, but returns as a reminder that death is the master of us all. Never finding closure...
I spent the next 10 years avoiding real romantic relationships.
I dated men that I knew would end up disappointing me or I never truly loved to in order to side step the possibility of that kind of pain again. I had 2 long term relationships within that time...one was just an idiot that was emotionally immature (God love him haha), and the other was flat out emotionally and mentally abusive... almost breaking me until I finally snapped out of it and left. I stayed on my own for the next 2 years determined to avoid empty relationships and happier than I had ever been.
Then, I met another "him". I should I say "met". He was an Instagram follower I hadn't really noticed until his recent commentary interaction with me. He was witty and never once left an overtly lascivious comment on one of my photos. He caught my interest. I lurked his page. Hard. He was handsome, funny and brilliant. And, one of my best friends was following him on both her personal and business accounts. She informed me that he went to high school with her husband and that I needed to DM him. I'm not "that guy"...I even noted that in the DM I finally sent. Longest 20 minutes of my life as I saw he viewed the message, but didn't reply. When he finally did, we never stopped talking. We exchanged numbers and spoke on the phone every night for hours on end. Text messaged all day. Commented on Instagram back and forth.
He was a few hundred miles away finishing the school year, but would be back down my way soon enough.
We went on our first date.
It was perfect.
He made me a meaningful gift with his brother because of our shared favorite movie (True Romance).
I had not let myself open up or be vulnerable with a man since the surfer's death.
But, I trusted him.
We spent as much time as we could together. HE said he wanted to be exclusive. HE said he loved me first. HE wanted me to meet his parents. HE asked me to stay with him and his grandparents out of state for a few days. It was all perfect and wonderful and real. He told me he was madly in love with me, that I was the woman of his dreams and that he intended on marrying me. I was in deep. I was in completely. He had a year left at school, but assured me that we were strong enough to do long distance, that we could be comforted by the fact that someone was waiting for us, loving us.
And, then he left. A difficult goodbye, but we had a trip planned already.
A week and a half later his tone was strange. Cold. Detached. I no longer knew the man on the other end of the phone. That alone began to break my heart. Then he said it, "I don't think I can do school and you. I'm not sure how I feel anymore. Let's not make any rush decisions...".
I got off the phone in shock. I felt nothing and everything all at the same time.
I called him back and made one of the hardest decisions I've ever had to made. I broke up with him. When you love someone, you know you love them. Feelings may wax and wane, but love is an ever changing behavior. I have too much self respect than to wait around while someone I know I love makes a decision about me.
When I love, I'm all in.
When I break, I break hard.
So, here I stand almost a month to the day later. Hanging downward mostly. But, moving forward...
Trying my hardest not to close off again and succumb.
LOVE ME FOREVER, OR NEVER.