Contain

I want to go back to when love existed in Disney movies, books and my parents' hearts.

Maybe with it contained it wouldn't be so hard to understand.

Maybe it would.

Two.

I have two ideas in my head; there is the incredible dominant feminist power job with my ridiculous salary and my sweet flat and my puppy and my life in the city. And then there is me in love.

All I have ever wanted for my life has been love.

I know this is juvenile and probably narrow-sighted, but ... it's all I've ever wanted.

I don't know how to have both; I don't know how to have either.

You know that song by Brad Paisley, "Waiting on a Woman"... I don't really think that's very valid. Yes, men tend to have to wait on their women to get ready for a date or when they take their time shopping and there are those of us who are just perpetually late for everything.... but let's be honest-

We have been waiting on men our whole lives. Perhaps our leisurely lateness is just a tiny touch of payback for the years upon years we have had to wait for men.

My personal life has been filled with nothing but waiting on men... since as far back as I can remember. Let's, for a second, forget the obvious waiting for Mr. Right, and think about the real world:

I spent high school waiting on my basketball coach-to make choices, to give orders, to teach.

I spend my days now waiting to hear from my guy or my guy friends, seeing what might be going on tonight.

I spend my evenings, ready, sitting, waiting, for those guys to come over or to pick me up; waiting on invitations, or on schedules, or just waiting on time.

I have spent my Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays battling and visiting the Undergrad Admissions Office, waiting on Kevin to reappear, to get healthy, to get my paperwork from upstairs, to actually do what he said he was going to do.

Aside from those current dramas---

I have been waiting my whole life for one guy to prove to me that they're not all the same.

I've been waiting for a nice guy, I've been waiting for someone who will be there, I've been waiting for someone who will handle me, I have been waiting for someone who will bring out the best in me.

I waited for the magic, I waited for the weak in the knees, can't breathe moments...

But now I'm waiting on the love, I'm waiting on the promise, I'm waiting on forever. And I'm pretty sure I'll be waiting forever for my forever...

I have to.

It's day like these- days when spring is finally here and the weather is damn-near perfect, so majestically warm, with a cool breeze at exactly the moment you seem to need it. Smelling the freshly bloomed honey-suckle on days like this take me back.

That is an understatement.

They say that smell is the only sense that is truly connected to your memory... and I firmly believe that, because today I was swept away; I was 4 years old again and the world was 2 blocks wide. I was back to playing in my grandparents' backyard with my sister and walking up to Grandma and Grandpa's for dinner, taking in that sweet honey-suckle smell.

That was the life. I had no worries, no serious concerns, hardly, in fact, a serious moment. I can't say for a fact that I remember everything exactly, but what I do remember was magical. There is nothing quite like the early memories of childhood when the entire universe could become condensed into one backyard, one game, one moment that lasts for hours.

So on this entrancing day, I came to realize a few things...

My idealized version of life and love really does need to change. I realized that just because you have love in your life, does not mean that the rest of life becomes paradise. And as much as you might feel like there might really be, a little fairy is not actually following you around, sprinkling you with dust, making you shine on the outside as much as you are inside. Life doesn't stop for anything... until it stops for good.

The point is, just because you feel like mush half the time and can't think about anything other than the mushy aspects of your life, that certainly does not mean that you can let, or even want, everything else turn to mush.

I have recently come to find myself envying young mothers, thinking that I just want to start that happy, adult phase of my life, where things will be easier because I'll have things figured out: the guy, the job, the path... but I don't know what on earth I was thinking. That life, if I choose to lead it, will not be easier. That will be real. More real than, hey you actually need to work hard for the first time in your life; that will be- hey you better have the best plan ever and 3 amazing backup plans because life is soo much bigger than you ever thought it could possibly be. That's not even mentioning all the work and time and effort it will take to get there.

So what is at the bottom of this??

I no longer can pretend that life is peachy and rosy and will all just work out for me because it has in the past. I will work hard, because I HAVE to. I have put myself in a place where I no longer have a choice. And as paralyzed as I feel in my life right now... I have to keep moving.

Life is hard. Living is harder.

Jake: "It's funny... it's very funny. And it's a lot of fun, too, to be in love... I don't mean fun that way. In a way it's an enjoyable feeling."

Brett: "No... I think it's hell on earth."

Jake: "It's good to see each other."

Brett: "No. I don't think it is."

Jake: "Don't you want to?"

Brett: "I have to."

-The Sun Also Rises, Ernest Hemingway