Sometimes………

Sometimes I open my mouth and start to speak before my brain has a chance to stop me! It is SO easy to talk to you. Honestly, I am generally quite guarded when talking to people, something that I did not really know about myself until I met you. I THOUGHT I told everyone EVERYTHING about me…but what I really did was just tell them all the things I thought they wanted to know…and then hope that they would leave everything else alone…and they always…ALWAYS did…until you came along. You would not do that…you saw thru it instantly! And always before….on the RARE occasions that I did start to say something that I did not mean to openly say, I could always redirect it and get the conversation going in a different direction before anyone realized any different…until YOU came along!

You seem to know my every thought before I ever SAY them, sometimes I wonder if you know them before I THINK them! And then I wonder “ Well WHY, dammit, does he MAKE me say them when he knows them anyway?” And I know you do it for my own welfare. But sometimes I wonder if you really know how incredibly hard it is for me. Today was the first day in a LONG,LONG time that I found myself wanting to reach for my keyboard. It was both a good and bad feeling. Good in that I am feeling so much more comfortable “saying” the things that are in my head now….to YOU anyway. I am not sure that I will ever be able to do it with anyone but you…but with you…they seem to be flowing more freely. And on the occasions that I do linger…I consciously think to myself “You can do this….he knows anyway…you can do it!”….and I do. But today was SOOOO incredibly hard. Sometimes it is STILL hard for me to say how I feel about you. I know that you know it. And I can EASILY put it into words on “paper” for the entire WORLD to see. In fact, if I had to TELL the whole world and they were sitting in front of me, staring at me…I could probably do it…and do it fairly easy. But to say those things to you…alone…just you and I…in our quiet and most intimate times, is SO hard for me. And even harder still is to tell you of my greatest fears. Those things, I cannot even bring myself to write on paper. They haunt the inner recesses of my mind and your love and confidence keeps those thoughts held at bay, so that I can enjoy my life. If it were not for that, I sometimes think that those things would take me over and keep me from LIVING the life that remains. And I cannot let that happen. I CANNOT let fear control me ONE moment longer. I have allowed it for too long!

Today when I started the sentence and said “Sometimes…..” I realized it was too late! I had started it and I would have to finish it…and I had hoped that MAYBE you did not hear it…maybe there was too much static on the line…too much background noise…maybe I had not said it loud enough for you to hear…but OH NO! That could not be the case. And then I wondered if you could HEAR my mind trying to formulate a response….trying to quickly come up with a “counter move” to undo what I had done. And when I made a feeble attempt at that…I wondered if you could hear my mind trying to formulate a WAY to say the things I was saying without REALLY saying them. I COULD NOT bring myself to say it. I just could not bring myself to say the words. I HATED myself for even thinking it. I KNEW what your response would be and always has been. I KNOW I should not let myself dwell on things that have not happened and cannot be helped, but SOMETIMES…. I cannot help it.

I know you have said that you think in THIS life that you got the better deal and would have to make up for that in the next one. And we laugh and joke about it…and in someways that maybe true, but…when I REALLY think about it, I am not so sure. We both know there will be hard times in the years to come…and I have thought and thought about how to make that better…and the only solution I can come up with, is to deny you the wonderful years to come as well. And I cannot do that. I do not WANT to do that. I NEED you. SO…in a purely selfish move on my part, I WILL live the remaining years of my life with you. And I PRAY that the pure pleasure that is derived from EACH second of being with you, will be enough to get you thru the hard times. I have NO doubt that you will “love me to the end.” We are capable of that. We can make that kind of commitment and mean it. We have done it over and over and over.

So when we start this crazy journey over again…let’s do so with a clean slate. No one owes the other anything….except the debt of love.

FOREVER…your adoring wife and personal…:)…slave…..D