The Extrication Era I

Adrian and I had a small disagreement about where we should get dropped off for the day. I didn’t really think anything of it initially it was just a simple hey we should get off here instead of there because of x,y,z kind of thing. He reluctantly agreed but did not utter a single word to me the remainder of the time we were in Paris. What I believed would be our first dream trip had become one of our last and a nightmare.

Walking on Sunshine

I was new at this love thing, so I came out with guns blazing. I wanted to go places together, do cool things, to hang out all the time, but most of all just to be held. It’s so simple but the things I wanted most of all was to simply be held. For him to look into my eyes knowing everything good and bad about me. To have his arms around me and feel that I was safe. To be loved for my imperfections and to be allowed to grow into the best version of myself. My ideas of how love was expressed was purely based on what I had gathered from songs, movies, TV shows, and books. I had never seen what I believed to be real love exercised by anyone in my life. I just collected the good parts of the real relationships that I had seen while vowing to avoid the negative parts. I had it all figured out.

Surrender

I actually just looked up the words surrender and submit and almost had a panic attack. It was all this talk of “yielding” power and control. To willingly give oneself up to another, to allow something to happen to you! There was also talk about the person you are surrendering or submitting to being more powerful or having authority over you! The surrendered party having admitted defeat because they were not powerful enough to resist! I do not know how this is humanly possible outside of an actual battle where one surrenders or submits so that they might survive to fight another day. I don’t know that I have the capacity to surrender to another human at this point in my life.

Playing at Love

Love is another one of the words that I have struggled to truly understand. I grew up in an environment where I didn’t feel loved in the way stories, movies, and TV shows described it. I knew my parents cared about me, but I honestly didn’t feel loved and therefore had no real-life reference for what love actually felt like or really was. I had only the perfect stories from sources not based in reality. The sad part is while I longed for that perfect love, deep down I didn’t feel that I deserved it or would ever actually have it.