Dear Love

Apollo Fields | Dear Blank | By Terrence Huie | Dear Love | Writer

Dear Love,

We got off to a late start, but ever since 2010 you’ve been a mainstay in my life. It all started with a decision to honor myself and the things that make me Me. Before that I was pandering to audiences like a two-faced politician, ready to change my position like a weather vane in the wind. I cared more about being liked than being myself; unaware that without an honest expression of who I was that I would never experience love.

Fate, destiny, or whatever powers that be were on my side after that. I met someone on a cruise in Bermuda who would eventually teach me all about you. There was suddenly a wholeness to my thoughts, like I didn’t have to be afraid of who I was. As time went on, those moments in conversations when I used to repress my thoughts I decided to vocalize them—especially if they were embarrassing or self-deprecating. More often than not those were the kernels of life where you popped up. Insecurity was just your disguise.

I wonder what other disguises you have that I still don’t know about. You have a funny connection with playing hard to get; how come when you’re too available you’re no longer desirable? That doesn’t make too much sense to me. Supply and demand? What the fuck am I talking about.

When I look at that picture of Heather and I at our wedding I see you. You are as intangible as a look and as hardened as a diamond, as malleable as softened metal and as rigid as a commitment. You are so many things both inside and outside myself that shape who I am and what I do yet you are as shapeless as air. You are the ether.

I used to pour you heavy-handed like a whiskey. Now I pour you like a Guinness draught and wait. I’m not so sure everyone deserves a full pint. The old me would tell me not to get jaded and keep filling up the glass. Who am I to say who does and does not deserve you? I guess what that really means is: who do I think deserves me? You may be limitless but my life is finite, and I will drink with those that make me feel whole.

Cheers,

Terrence