On the Topic of Soul Mates....

:officially official:

This last week I crossed something off my bucket list I never expected to - marrying my soul mate. This was unexpected to me in several ways. First of all, after failed marriage number one, I told anyone who would stand still long enough that I would never, ever marry again - which goes to show that even the best of us eat our words sometimes. After thoroughly disappointing and hurting someone else, as well as being quite emotionally battered myself, I had no desire to ever again give or receive that kind of pain again. Secondly, I have never believed in soul mates. One person, and only one, put on this earth specifically to be your other half, your perfect match? Nope. Not buying it. I adhered to the idea that each individual had at least a handful of people that they could make a match and live quite happily with given the right circumstances, although I did add that I supposed everyone had a "great love", a person who, out of any other who might come along, was the closest match to their heart. Which only shows, dear one, how lost I was for so long.

I believe my attitude on this subject had something to do with fear. What if you never found that one individual meant for you, or you found them, and then lost them to forces outside of your control? Were you destined then to spend the rest of your life alone? Furthermore, there were also the severe emotional scars from my first marriage. My first husband and I were comrades, we knew how to get along with each other on a day to day basis, how to be fantastic parents together, how to make life work with the least amount of waves - and yet, as good as this all sounds on paper, we never really clicked. So many times I would lie awake at night, looking at the profile of a man I knew so well, and then not all. Our fights, no matter the origin, would always end with me dissolving into sobs, pleading for more emotion, more romance, more connection, while he emotionally retreated faster than the Southern boys after Gettysburg, telling me what I was demanding was the stuff of fairy tales. When I left, I had the strongest conviction in my heart that I would never remarry. See other men? Yes. Maybe someday care deeply for someone else? Sure. Trust another person with my love and sanity and last name? Nope. I never wanted to belong to someone else that way again.

I didn't mean to fall in love with Michael, in fact, at the time, I was doing everything I could to have a completely superficial relationship to get me through the trauma of a divorce. As my coworker and best friend, he was the worst possible candidate for this type of fling. I'd met him when he started working at the same gym as me, and over lunches between clients and long hours at the gym, we'd developed a close friendship. We found early on we were both struggling in our relationships, and that shared bond brought us closer. He was younger than me by a few years, but wise beyond them. He'd packed quite a lot of life experience into his time that most people never experience, and I found a steady shoulder to lean on and sound, meaningful advice in him. He was loyal and kind and smart and funny, and even back then, larger than life to me, but I never once looked at him as anything other than my beloved friend.

And yet, in the way these things do, a normal conversation turned into much more and suddenly, I was in his arms enjoying the best first kiss I'd ever received. I only remember being completely dazed when he pulled away, both of us breathing hard and looking quite unsure how we had become entwined on the floor. I left then, needing some time to think, and promising to meet him later. As I drove around replaying that kiss in my head, true to form, I made a mental pros and cons list why this was a perfect/horrible idea. The only concrete fact I had come to as I drove to meet him that night, however, was that I had to make sure that kiss hadn't been a fluke. And so, in a stroke of brilliance or complete insanity, I told him the truth: I was still married, albeit already out the door, so I couldn't offer anything of permanence. Further, I had no intention of getting serious again, especially this soon, and so this would most likely be a passing affair, destined to end horribly. I finished and waited for my level headed friend to say no.

What I didn't know at the time is that my level headed friend had a streak of impetuosity that was about to seal both of our fates. As he put it to me later, "When I find something I want or love, I put everything I have into it. Also, I jump headfirst into dangerous, potentially terribly ending situations." Completely disregarding everything I had just told him, he asked only one thing: that one night would be just ours, no past relationships, no future pressure, just two people feeling their way through the moment. And feel we did. We stayed awake all night until the dawn, loving and talking and wondering together. I felt like Cinderella, caught up in a night of magic and watching the second hand tick closer to midnight (or in this case, three or so in the morning). As his car drove away I wept harder than I ever had in my life, pulling my own car to the side of the road as the wracking sobs consumed me. I knew it was over before it had ever began, the timing just too wrong, the roadblocks between us insurmountable.

After a few fitful hours of sleep, I woke up to begin my day, melancholy as I fixed my kids breakfast. The day became slowly more unbearable; I could still smell his sweet breath, feel his hands tracing down my back, hear his voice whispering in my ear. Finally, I couldn't take one more moment and, throwing all caution and good sense to the wind, drove as fast as my car would take me to the gym where he was working. As I turned to walk into the office my bravery fled, and I realized I was probably about to have my heart smashed - we had agreed there would be no more to this. Then I turned the corner and saw his face. I knew then what his answer would be when I asked, but I did anyway, practically begging him could we please, please just ride this out a little longer and see where it went?

Where it went, darling, nine short months later, was down an aisle. A rather beautiful outside one surrounded by mountains and trees and a lake. You see, shortly after that conversation I changed my opinion of soul mates. While I still hold that there are probably many people a person can make a go of life with, and probably be quite happy with for the most part, some of us are lucky enough to meet the one person made just for us. Yes, you read it right, made for us. A perfect equal. A love so deep that it surpasses emotion and words and is instead inferred directly onto our soul, completely tangible at an intangible level. And when you become one of the fortunate few who find that kind of love, it just doesn't do to shy away from it. Timing and obstacles be damned, you hold onto it and trust that it will see you through. Because it will, dear one, it will.

:the crow catches his butterfly:

And so, earlier this week, I found myself starting another chapter of the fairytale as I stood beside my best friend and vowed to love him the rest of my life. Having eloped the first time around, this was my first real wedding, and it was perfect. The breeze whispered through the trees and small waves lapped gently behind us. I held his beautiful hands and looked into his eyes as he confidently spoke the vows we had written together, and then held back tears as I repeated them back. After, our closest friends and family celebrated with a barbeque style reception and s'mores around a bonfire. To read more about it, you can go see the wedding website. Suffice it to say here, down to the last detail, it was exactly us. And one more (thought to be impossible) item crossed off of my list.

The Bucket List

I suppose people start blogs for all sorts of reasons - to keep family and friends apprised of their day to day lives, to journal their way through experiments, or maybe simply as an outlet for themselves. For me, this started with the list...my bucket list to be exact.

As I begin this, I am in a transition phase in my life. As a matter of fact, this week marks the nine month anniversary of the most important, and selfish, decision I have ever made - to live for myself. This year I ended my marriage of seven years, went back to school and started a new career, and, quite by accident, met and fell in love with the most amazing individual I've ever met, and subsequently, married again. I also happened to find out I have a condition that seriously limits my life expectancy. Enter the bucket list.

With the doctor's long face fresh in my mind, I took a good long look at my life and realized that all those "things I'll do someday" might not ever get their chance if I kept them on the back burner. While I've never actually seen the Hollywood version (another item to add to my list perhaps?), I knew the gist and slowly began making a hard copy of all those things I'd always wanted to try or learn or see, figuring if it was in black and white there was a better chance those things might actually occur. It's like when I tell my clients to keep a food diary, because your mind will forget those twinkies when you're thinking back over your day, but you can't ignore those extra 400 calories when they're staring you in the face in print. Instead of vague ideas in the back of my mind, I wanted something concrete, something that would remind me every day that there is some new adventure to strive towards.

Somewhere between places to travel and new skills to learn, starting a blog popped up in my mind. Not a totally foreign idea as I've dabbled in blogland before, but the motivation behind this particular idea was stronger than simply chronicling my days. I realized I wanted an account. The same way I wanted a list in black and white, some physical presence I could mark off as I went along, I wanted a place where the details were recorded, where I could look back on the days I start to feel overwhelmed by that impending doom feeling and see the proof that I am still striving toward new goals, still making progress, still living.

And so it starts. You can see the list in its entirety by clicking the tab above. Some of the items are bucket list 101 average, some are very personal to me, a few come in conjunction with my new husband's, and several appear completely impossible. But that's what makes life worth living, n'est-ce pas? Striving towards the next, the new, the utterly insane and downright impossible - I intend to do them all, and leave the record here.