I fell in and out of love today…

He’s a mix of brown and black and white with short legs and wrinkles across his brow. He was hesitant as I opened the door and called to him, and when I bent down and reached out my hand, he scampered off down the sidewalk before turning back around to see if I would follow. My bare feet feeling like ice against the sidewalk, I crouched down again and waited for him to come to me.

He sniffed my hand, still uncertain of the stranger that I seemed. Then, a kiss as I scratched behind his ears and called him sweetheart.

I brought him into the house — where he promptly peed on the carpet — and watched the reactions of Riley and Mikey.

Riley’s tail wagged as they sniffed each other; Mikey glared at me (“What the hell is this?”) as the puppy chased him upstairs and then proceeded to investigate this strange new place.

I  named him Bailey.

He stole my heart.

But there was someone else who’s heart must have been breaking at the thought of losing him, I thought. And I could only imagine how I would feel if Riley had been that lost little boy.

I let them out to play in the yard and took a picture to post on Facebook and Twitter; I called the local police to file a report of a missing Beagle puppy with a collar but no tags, telling him he could stay with me until his family was found rather than being sent away to a holding facility; I took him to my vet’s office to have him scanned for a microchip.

All the while, I kept smiling — funny how all it takes is sweet innocence to make that happen.

He curled up on my lap as I pressed kisses against his head, simultaneously stroking Riley’s fur to tell him it was all alright. I thought, this house was meant for love, and all the teasing about wanting another dog suddenly became very real.

My phone rang about two hours later, just as I was at the vet’s office discovering that he hadn’t been micro-chipped. They’d gotten my number from the police after they discovered their little escape artist had run away. Bailey (real name: Apollo) and I sat huddled together on the front steps of my porch as we waited for his dad to arrive from two blocks over.

The soulful, trusting eyes, the happy, friendly countenance…Here again was love in its purest form.

With a smile, my heart full of happiness at being able to reunite a family, I said goodbye.

Meeting Bailey — maybe even rescuing him, if you can call it that — couldn’t have been more apropos. I’ve always believed that where there are dogs, there is love; I’ve always believed that they are the sign that it will all be alright.

But today, it became more than that.

He was the reminder that you never know who will come into your life; he was the gift that said, “look how you love, look how you’re loved.”

This weekend, I discovered that love isn’t a fairytale. I’d been hurt and used, my kindness taken advantage of in a story I’m not quite ready to tell. Suffice it to say, I opened my heart for someone who didn’t deserve it, though I didn’t know that until the damage had been done.

I could have blamed myself — and a small part of me did, for being too trusting, for believing too much in the good in people — but instead, I found my strength, my spirit. Instead, I realized that we all have a choice in life — we can drown with the suffering of others who refuse to change or we can soar and find others who wish to fly with us.

I choose to fly.

Pretty faces can sing pretty words and make pretty promises to keep you coming back.

They can call you sweetheart and stroke your face and beg of you to trust them.

It could be so easy to be lulled back in, to give up everything you stand for as they pull you under with them. It would be so easy to become so jaded after the heartache — to see another stranger calling to you and keep running away, never knowing if they mean help or harm…

But Bailey trusted me.

And he’ll keep on loving and trusting no matter who wanders in and out of his life, and in that, in those few hours, he has taught me the greatest lesson of all…

Let yourself make mistakes: love the wrong person, feel too much, let your heart get broken. Then, let yourself say goodbye.

It’s only then that you’ll find your strength, only then that you can make room for those who love and trust and see in you something special, too.

It’s only then that you can discover how the love you hold inside of you is only a fraction of the love you deserve…

Here was a little boy lost.

Here is a little girl found.

Goodbye, my almost lover
Goodbye, my hopeless dream
I’m trying not to think about you
Can’t you just let me be?

So long, my luckless romance
My back is turned on you
I should’ve known you’d bring me heartache
Almost lovers always do…
A Fine Frenzy, “Almost Lover”

He comes to my door at five-thirty in the morning; I’m barely awake, and for a moment, I lay in bed as Riley barks a warning, wondering if it had only been part of a dream. But no, there he is, standing on the porch in sweats and a jacket, and I can feel the chill of the morning air as I hold Riley back and unlock the door to let him in.

He wants to talk about the letter.

The letter.

The letter that I had written a week ago, questioning myself as I sealed it, scrawled his name on the front, and slid it beneath the welcome mat on his porch, before I drove away to spend New Year’s Eve with friends, wondering all the while if I would regret it come morning.

That letter that questioned where we stood, wondering how our innocent summer flirtations had suddenly turned so cold, how casual exchanges felt forced and painful, how days had turned to weeks and weeks had turned to months of silence, without so much as a hello as we passed each other on the sidewalk. Any bond we had forged as we sat on the back porch, watching our dogs play in the backyard and talking as the sun slept and fireflies danced had been broken.

We were two strangers again.

And I didn’t understand it.

So I had written to him, saying what I needed to say as the year came to a close in the language I know best — because I didn’t know how to talk to him — not that I hadn’t tried, not that I hadn’t pretended that everything was fine, that we were fine, that his silence was fine…But if there’s something I’ve learned this past year, it’s that there’s only so long you can go on pretending; feelings run too deep. Eventually, it will only feed the poison that threatens to infect the heart.

I didn’t know what had happened to cause this sudden rift, and I blamed myself. Of course I did. I had to have said something or done something to scare him away, to make him change his mind, right? Only, how could it have happened so fast?

And suddenly, I’m flashing back to being nineteen years old, in the middle of a young love story. I’m home from college for the summer, waiting eagerly for my boyfriend of four years to return from basic training. It had been a summer of love letters and cherished phone calls, of “I love you” and “I miss you” and “I can’t wait to see you again…”

He called from the airport.

I expected him to say he was home, that he was coming by to see me; I was expecting to hug him and kiss him and never let him go. I never expected the tears, I never expected the heartbreak, and I certainly never expected the story to end.

One minute we were in love; in the next, love was lost.

It’s this memory that resided in the back of my mind as I pulled a page out of my journal and began to write. I shouldn’t have cared, but I did. I do. I care too deeply, I want too much, and I wish, more than anything, that I knew how to make that stop.

It’s this that he wants to talk about as he sits on the couch, and I follow his lead and wrap myself in a blanket more for comfort than anything else. I watch him fidget and my stomach sinks, bracing myself to hear the worst and at the same time grateful that I have this chance to talk about it at all.

But he’s glad for the letter, he says. And we talk like we did in that once upon a time of summer, sharing what we’ve been feeling and letting ourselves be vulnerable and trust one another with past pain and present fears.

And we kiss…only kiss. And we hold each other as we fall asleep, and when we wake up, we smile and hold each other tighter.

He comes over again later that evening, and we sit on the couch and take turns playing with Riley. We talk about books, about philosophies, about traveling and our futures.  The more we talk and the more I learn about him, the more surprised I am at the feelings that begin to build. I feel myself opening up; and though I’d always felt uncannily comfortable with him, I can feel those defenses I’d so carefully built over the years begin to waver. Here’s a person I want in my life, I think.

Here was the beginning of a friendship, the beginning of something.

We make promises to call and text, and as we hug goodbye, the embrace lingers a moment longer than necessary.

I text him briefly the next day — my heart still smiling, my mind still in disbelief at all that had transpired in less than twenty-four hours — but he doesn’t respond. And when I send a message of hello two days later, only silence greets me back.

I don’t know how to keep from thinking the worst, sensing that he’s pulled back, pulled away. And suddenly those defenses are back as brick by brick, the wall gets rebuilt. Suddenly, that instinct for self-protection kicks in, and I fight the urge to entirely withdraw.

Gathering courage, I ring his doorbell, hoping for some peace of mind or, at the very least, some clarity.

It begins to drizzle as I walk back to my house, glancing back only to see the lights on and the door firmly shut. I don’t want to cry, but suddenly it’s like the past is becoming this present again and I don’t understand any of it. I don’t understand how hello becomes goodbye in the same breath;  I don’t understand how kisses can turn to silence and intimate hugs become avoidance.

I don’t understand how none of it seems to matter…

My heart feels a little bit broken, and though I fight the instinct to turn inwards and blame myself, I can’t help but keep the confusion from weaving its way through my mind, can’t keep myself from replaying it all over and over  and over again, to try to make sense of it all.

I can’t help but wonder how a person can be so easily forgotten.

I can’t help but wonder how a person can feel as if they’re never enough.

I can’t help but wonder how I can have so much love to offer…

…and how I fear I’ve become so unlovable in return.

We traveled familiar roads on a cool and overcast December morning.

Familiar turns and landmarks rolled past, but the mobile home parks and three-story mansions with blinking Christmas lights, the schools and bank branches displaying their vacation times or holiday hours, the farmland that gave way to even more sprawling farmland all seemed little more than a blur as we drove on, the memories close behind as we caught up to what we’d lost.

In the backseat, Grandma shared stories of people I’d never met and murmured recollections of the way things were. In the front, I shared glances and knowing smiles with Dad as we got lost in our own thoughts, our own reminiscence.

We pulled into the long driveway of Fort Indiantown Gap and drove past section after section of fallen soldiers and retired heroes, their resting places celebrated with wreaths and flowers and holiday bows.

“Are you ok?” I quietly asked Dad as our eyes scanned the section numbers for the one we all knew too well.

“Yeah,” he said in a way that I knew he was.

We parked on the side of the drive and stepped out into the cold that seemed to cling to the air; a group of bicyclists and other mourning families congregating near their own loved ones. We walked among the headstones claiming love and loss — World War I, World War II, Vietnam, Korea…Beloved Husband, father, brother, son.

May you rest in peace.

Grandpa’s was easy to spot. Two summers ago, I’d found peace in this spot, when peace seemed to only slip through my grasp as I tried to hold on tighter. I’d been lost then, the last time I had visited this place. I’d been lost and alone and searching for something I couldn’t name…

Self. Happiness. Love. Understanding.

Faith.

It was a time when I’d wondered if I would ever believe in love again…To believe that love would matter, to believe that love was worthwhile when all the prayers were left unanswered, when hope seemed to waver, and when goodbyes seemed nothing but permanent, punctuated by a never-ending heartache and wishes for the impossible.

Once upon a time, I feared the inevitable and wished for the impossible. I thought that, somehow, if I held on, maybe it would hurt less. I thought, maybe, by keeping the memories alive, I would somehow still feel close to them. I didn’t want to forget them — I didn’t want to believe that a life could be so fragile and so fickle, that someone could be so easily forgotten.

Once upon a time, I had to say goodbye.

But it wasn’t until this December morning that I finally began to understand what that meant…

We stood in silence for a moment, trying to shake the cold as a few flurries fell from the sky; I put my arm around my dad and pressed my head against his shoulder, watching as Grandma placed a Christmas wreath against the headstone, this simple gesture saying, “you’re still remembered, you’re always loved.”

We hurried back to the warmth of the car, silent prayers in our hearts and smiles on our faces as we started the long drive back home, laughing and teasing each other as only family can and creating another memory to keep in the secret spaces of the heart.

* * * * *

Hours later, the windshield wipers on my friend’s car worked in steady rhythm to clear the soft snow that fell from the evening’s winter sky. As passing headlights and streetlamps illuminated the car, I couldn’t help but peak beneath the bandage on my left wrist, happiness bubbling into laughter as we joked and I leaned back against the headrest, almost in disbelief at the events of the night.

It had all been planned, but I didn’t realize how profound it all felt until this moment. As my eyes traced the symbol that was now a permanent fixture of who I am, I understood what a turning point this was.

Years in the wanting, my first tattoo. A heart with the infinity symbol.

It’s been the last piece in this journey as I get back to who I am, who I’m proud to be. It’s the reminder that time heals in so many forms, that to hold on, you have to let go, that life will be filled with hellos and goodbyes and nothing can keep the heart from hurting, but that just means the loving was strong.

It’s having faith in the knowledge that, in this life, there is love and there is loss, but in the end, love is what remains.

Love is what will always remain.

Love Infinity...

Hush, now.

Quell the fears,
quiet the tears,
and silence the whispers
that threaten defeat,

this hum everlasting,
mocking:
you’re never enough.

“You’ll never find –
you’ll never last –
you’ll never be –

you’ll never succeed.”

Remember love?
It was times infinity,
this song that you wrote
upon ancient parchment,
waxing in an Edenic script
that calls for purpose and promises.

Do you remember love?
Now it’s blended and blurred,
the ink so smudged
it’s hard to recall
anything was ever written there at all.

Remember faith?
Existing in quiet utopian myth,
a waking dream where innocence lasts
longer than the ever after,
where answers are whispered
under winter skies
without a word spoken.

Hush.

Do you remember faith?
You followed blindly –
a path that spiraled past
the waters where Lethe flattered
and you flirted
and we wept that you
might remember us at all.

Remember hope?

Perched on the soul,
do you remember hope at all?

Hush, now…

Hush –

and quiet the tears;
do you hear?

a tune that stirs the soul,
and shepherds the lost,
and wakens the listless,

this hum everlasting,
singing…

remember me?

- Susan Pogorzelski
December 12, 2011

There’s a place that I know
It’s not pretty there and few have ever gone
If I show it to you now
Will it make you run away?

Saturday, November 5, 8pm

It’s my first night home from surgery after spending a week with my parents, and I never realized before how empty, how lonely, a home can be. It’s funny…I wanted to go home as soon as possible after the operation, but suddenly here I was again in my childhood home, being cared for, surrounded by the laughter and teasing and love of a family, and I found myself not wanting to leave.

Of course I didn’t.

A home is where your heart is, and my heart  has always been with my family.

But here I was in my own home  — a home of my own that I adore  — and I couldn’t keep from thinking of the place I’d just been, the home I’d just left. The silence began to invade every vulnerability, and though I tried to distract myself, nothing could stop the wave of emotion that threatened to crest. I kept watching the clock, praying for time to move faster so that I could go to sleep, so that I could lie in the comfort of my bed and close my eyes and forget the loneliness that had begun to seep back into an already emotionally weakened soul.

But Time doesn’t work like that, does it? And sometimes the nights can seem that much longer and that much harder.

So I grabbed my purse, clipped the leash on Riley and drove to my parents’ house. I barely said a word as I put my things down on the kitchen table, as Riley greeted my parents’ dog with a playful wag of his tail, as my parents asked in surprise what I was doing back, having gone home only hours before.

“I didn’t want to be alone,” I mumbled as I reached behind the couch to plug in the heating pad I’d been using religiously to ebb the physical pain. I wonder if there will ever be one that can numb the pain of an aching heart.

I could feel my mom’s eyes on me, but I kept my eyes averted, struggling not to cry.

“What’s wrong?” she persisted.

And then I felt the barriers break as my chest heaved in heavy sobs. Having been surrounded by people I love, by people who love me, it had become so hard to return to that silence, that awareness of how physically alone you can be. It’s not something that has taken me by surprise, not something I’m entirely unused to. The loneliness pervades, seems constant, buried for hours, days, weeks, months before it begins to rise to the surface again, seeping into the smallest of cracks in this armor. And suddenly, with little warning, I’m left feeling suffocated by the depths of everything I feel, and, oh, how I feel everything.

Or will you stay
Even if it hurts
Even if I try to push you out
Will you return?
And remind me who I really am
Please remind me who I really am…

Riley. On the drive over, I placed my hand on his head,  finding comfort in the texture of his fur, in just his presence, in the simple knowing that he was there, thinking that he was my anchor when I felt very much like I was floating away from everything real.

He’s been my saving grace in ways I’ve scarcely alluded to, for reasons I don’t think I’ll ever be brave enough to put into words. I may have saved him when I adopted him from the shelter, but he saves me every day. Every single day…on days when I’m aware of just how lost I feel and days when, for awhile, I have the relief of forgetting.

Because he loves me, unconditionally, and in him, I can unabashedly place all the love I hold in my heart — a love that runs so deep, so full, that it constantly threatens to spill over; a love that I’ve only ever longed to share, and it’s in this creature who knows the depth of love, too, that I can share it without shame, without fear of judgment or rejection.

He needs me, he depends on me, he lets me love him as I want to love everyone. And maybe it’s in that that I need him, too.

Like a diamond
From black dust
It’s hard to know
What can become
If you give up
So don’t give up on me
Please remind me who I really am…

I don’t get it.

I don’t get how I can have so many special people in my life, have so much love and happiness in this life, in my heart, and still feel so incredibly alone.

I don’t get how I can crave independence and then shun it in the next breath.

I don’t understand how I can be so blessed and still feel so fucked up.

I wish I could keep these emotions from persisting, from spilling over from my heart to my life. I wish I could learn to just accept things as they are, to continue to be grateful for all the blessings in my life– for there are so, so many — and to stop longing for something that I’m not even sure will change anything.

I wish I knew how to stop feeling so deeply, so much. I wish I knew how to channel these thoughts and emotions into something else, something that doesn’t leave me feeling so frozen with guilt at having these thoughts and emotions in the first place.

Most of all, I wish I knew how to stop wishing, when wishes don’t seem to be enough.

Everybody’s got a dark side
Do you love me?
Can you love mine?
Nobody’s a picture perfect
But we’re worth it
You know that we’re worth it
Will you love me?
- Kelly Clarkson, “Dark Side” -

UPDATED

When I posted a comment to Facebook/Twitter about how I was blaming this emotional-ism on being a writer, one of my dear friends, Brianne, countered with the following quote from the movie Raise Your Voice:

Terri Fletcher: Have you ever lost anyone?

Mr. Torvald: Yeah.

Terri Fletcher: I just can’t let this go.

Mr. Torvald: Well, you’re an artist and artists feel things differently than regular people. Look at Patsy Cline or Billie Holiday. You can hear it in their voice. Or, Vincent van Gogh. Cut off his ear, but hey, he could paint.

Terri Fletcher: Vincent van Gogh killed himself.

Mr. Torvald: That’s right. That’s a bad example. Hey, I’m a music teacher not a shrink. What do you want? I guess… what I’m trying to say is, artists convey emotion. They make an audience feel what they’re feeling. You know, that’s what it’s all about, right? You just have to find a way to take what’s in here [Points to his head] and put it in here [points to his heart]

It’s such an amazing quote that sums up everything I’ve ever felt…From not being able to let it go to realizing that I feel everything so acutely, so deeply, to shifting all of that from the head to the heart. It’s a quote I can’t stop thinking about, that makes me feel a little bit more accepting of myself.

Simply amazing. Thanks, Brianne!