Love/Life

Everything you can imagine is real.
–Pablo Picasso

I wish I could believe that. Then, I would look for love. Long ago, when I was young, I believed I’d find love. It would be embodied in a man who possessed the qualities of a prince. Love would be a man who would hold me and give me freedom. A man who could talk about the world, the universe. A kind man with an innate sense of justice.  Together, we’d build a life together.

I spent years searching until I decided loneliness was worse than not having love.  So, many more years, I lived with a man who worked to provide a secure foundation, a home to give shelter and money to buy whatever we needed. I accepted his shortcomings, his failures. But, his inability to see me for anything other that a minority shareholder in the life we built hurt. We wrangled over it. Somehow, he never understood what I was saying no matter how many times and in so many different ways I tried to explain that his attitude was a source of pain for me.

I’ve become adept at making my life work for me. Doesn’t everyone settle for something in life?

Hope

Sky Over Jones Beach

Hope is a useful attitude. For me, the idea that something may be obtainable has carried me through some tough times.  When my sister was diagnosed with Stage 4 cancer, hope induced me to research treatments and pharmaceutical trials. After all, she was young and she possessed the strength to pursue harsh medical protocols. Of course, the less obtainable something becomes, the less hope we feel. Once it became apparent that the treatments didn’t work and that there wasn’t that much out there to do anything but prolong her life a month or two more, it was time to reassess the situation. Hope was no longer a motivation. The main concern became alleviating her pain.

Just this year, I realized that decades ago I gave up hope of ever being loved again. Yes, all these years I have been in a relationship. We have worked together, raised children together, traveled together and prepared for old age together. Yet, the love aspect of the relationship withered a while ago leaving us in a business partner/ friend position. That’s fine.  Many, many couples experience this role progression and make it work. We are too.

Still, I think of resurrecting that hope–of somehow, in some way  feeling in love with someone again.

Ten Surprising Things That Happen When You Fall In Love.

 

Roslyn Harbor

1. You are much more likely to smile when you are in love. Your reactions to the world around you are tempered by the addition of tender feelings.

2. When there is a problem that affects you, you are less likely to place blame preferring to give the benefit of the doubt to people around you and work from that point.

3. Love is a surprise that delights the soul and provides buoyancy so that we seem to float through the day.

4. Your imagination expands and provides a spring board for ideas and alternative options when there is love in your heart.

5. Love makes our touch tender and brings calm to the tumult around us.

6. We allow ourselves to expand our horizons–to see beyond the usual, the expected  when love enters our thought process.

7. Love brings happiness and that becomes a sturdy platform for hope.

8. We are more tolerant and willing to accept feelings, behaviors, and beliefs that are different than our own.

9. Love keeps you slightly off balance preventing rigidity from taking over your thoughts.

10. You are kind to others when you’re in love.  There is no reason for animosity.  Friendly relations are preferred.

Please feel free to add other surprising things that happen when you fall in love in the comments below.

 

Why I Write

 

On the grounds of Cedermere, the home of William Cullen Bryant.

The urge to bring the thoughts and feelings that reside inside me out into the air is why I write. There is the desire to record, to explain, to revisit, to understand, to share the world I know. The words flow sometimes faster than I can write. Other times, I search for them as they elude my awareness. Then, there are days I wake up thinking of them and all I have to is sit down and they write themselves. I write to connect with others, to pay tribute to all who came before me and point to a path for those yet to come.

Ah, But California

Cedarmere –Home of William Cullen Bryant

William Cullen Bryant was a prominent 19th Century American Poet. He was also the first citizen of New York City.

Cedarmere, Roslyn Harbor, Long Island

Roslyn Harbor

Cedarmere, Roslyn Harbor, Long Island

Bleak Week

On the grounds of the
Shuttered Creedmore Hospital in Queens, NY.

 

Damp, dreary weather for five days. Everything seems moody after a while without sun especially an abandoned building and grounds.