Slow Dance — Saint Motel

When I met him, I just knew.

I always just kinda thought that love at first sight was just something that people said—it only happens in stories and on film. But I met a man, quite unexpectedly, who handed me a crystal and told me that my aura or vibe or whatever was very weird. 

I knew it in that very first moment we met. I knew that this was the person that I was supposed to meet—he was why I came here!?! It was such a strange thought to me at the time, because, of course, how could I know that I would meet him? It was a whirlwind, sudden and intense and, in the beginning I was naive and had a very unhealthy idea of what love might entail—the person who had consumed my life before had done just that—consumed who I was and swallowed down in great gasping gulps all the love and support that I had to offer until my cup was cracked so badly I had feared it may never overflow again! Never would I have to endure such draining attention masquerading as love, not now that I had met someone who was capable of loving me like I had always deserved! And what a revelation to my soul and how healing it was to have a mate who is complimentary and uplifting rather than impetuous and degrading! How very different it is to come to expect tenderness where there was once ridicule, laughter instead of shouting, and how strange to be told, “No!” and that perhaps I can’t have everything that I want! 

The path I had chosen back then wasn’t easy, and I had known that the day I decided to really be happy again. I would have to learn, grow, and figure out who I was as a human, independent person, mother, and woman. It’s a journey that I am still on today. It’s been over ten years since I had met the man who would be there with me through all the amazing, unbelievable, terrible, and awesome events that life can bring. Living inside of the sprawling suburban-utopian-lie of a house had been my comfort zone simply because my prison cell had become so familiar to me. Steven came into my life, took one look around, and promptly sent me to “relax” by myself outside the house for the first time in years (I wasn’t very good at it at first)! And, when the divorce was final and I had lost it all—that suburban dream home and all it’s promises—while we snuggled together in bed searching apartment listings, instead of telling me what I wanted to hear when I was so very sad in that moment, Steven told me what I needed to hear first and then comforted me when I found the truth upsetting! 

Is it real? Could it be true? Who was this person in my life showing me a new and altogether different way of living that made things better for our family—more enjoyable, fun, and, most importantly, safe!?!? Wasn’t that what I had been missing? Wasn’t this the life partner that I had wanted all along? Maybe true love isn’t being told everything you want to hear when you want to hear it and, instead, is something more akin to telling the ones you love the truth when they need to hear it the most, even if it’s painful or unpleasant. 

A decade ago, before I had grown and changed so much more than I could have ever dreamed, I was struggling with a great loss. My mother had passed and the grief had caused me to suffer greatly with depression. When I met Steven, my whole life was changing and I decided then and there that I wanted him to be a part of it always. So much has happened in those ten years and we have been through so many different challenges in our lives, both as individuals and as partners in this life. For a whole year, a little more than a year, I suppose, we were apart. I enforced a boundary that I think did us both some good. It took nearly the whole year for me to stop being so upset at being apart. After a while there would be days that I didn’t think about him. After months I could listen to songs and not have to change the music because it reminded me of him. I emailed him to tell him of my little victories in not being so upset about us being apart.

And then I made a phone call. One call and it was…like the time had never passed. I came here and wrote. It took more than one conversation but I finally found a way to communicate clearly with him and let him know how I felt, not only about the past year, but also about how things had ended and how I never really wanted to have to go through that again. And, we don’t have to—because love is a conscious effort.

And so I have decided. I will choose love every day. And I choose to share it with all who participate in this life with me.