Experience...

"...Without experience, there is no wisdom..."

Absinthe, I forgot what a friend she could be.  As lovely and enlightening as a soft spoken mentor.  As dreaded and fearful as the archest of enemies.  She matches wit and style.  She laughs slightly, imparting wisdom based on all you've seen and if you let her...she can even let it stick.

I watched a movie tonight.  "Une Vieille Maitresse" is the only movie I have seen thus far that can in detail elaborate on what my mother once called "crazy love".  Two people that create combustible energy when together.  What is so interesting about the movie is that it, like this love itself, was uninteresting at first but held you captive at the end.  Examining my own life, this is the only love I've truly ever known.  In truth, looking back, I could find no "fairy tale".  I never planned for anything.  I never looked for this sign or the other.  I just held on because love demanded it. Throughout doubt and tidal waves of emotion.  Hatred, fire, lust and love.  All fitting together.  All having their due and way with us.  A bit of "want" giving way to "need" where the here and now suffers like a junkie looking for the next fix.  I've heard people fall in and out of love...something I could never understand.  I dare say that humans seldom see the real depth of love and miss out on the bigger picture.  Like looking at a masterpiece from afar and missing the lake and the mountains along side the lake.  They focus in too squarely on the sun and miss everything else.

People please understand.  Love is way more than good times, poetry and roses.  It is way more than walks on the beach and the famed trip to Paris.  No folks, it's tearing each other's clothes off in the middle of a heated argument.  It's "longing"...even after it's over.  Silence and distance can't make it go away.  It is eternal.  I get stumped when people ask me, "what's the perfect date?".  The fact is...there is none.  Yet before it all, connection is king.  Like two mismatched puzzle pieces that don't fit no matter how hard you try, such are the two souls that won't connect.  I can paint you a picture that will never happen.  A picture that will make you swoon.  I can tell you about the beach, champagne and rose petals.  Horses and carriage rides that you see in movies.  All those beautiful things you read in your romance novels but they may not be as real for you as to whom they were tailor-made for in the first place.  I mean...this movie had a scene showing the two main characters making love next to the burning corpse of their daughter.  Extreme as hell, but point well made.  

To love me past rejection.  To love me past hatred.  To love me in death.  To love me when I've irreparably wronged you...that's love.  Not to say these things should happen to test love but this is life.  It is chaotic and unpredictable.  Life is a wave meant to overtake the soul and it's inconsistency makes it almost impossible to read.  Yet real love remains constant when true and is able to overcome all that life throws at it.  I know this now and knowing this makes me happy with all the decisions I made.  I'm blessed to have married young.  I am grateful to all arguments and failures for solidifying the truth of love when it came to my committed relationships.

Folks, I've been blessed to have had two serious relationships in my life and although both were different people...they were both tested, proved real.  One seems to see this clearly and the other was never taught to understand this truth.  I will not fault her nor will I condemn her for it...I will just keep loving her.  One day it will click...

Even so...I'm more than good...

~Apollo