By Your Side

You asked me last night what my life would be like without you in it. I told you it would be like a red balloon untethered. Bobbing in the wind, directionless, at a whim. With you, I am grounded by a thread of love.

I know you worry about your future and having me in it. How it will affect me, being around you and your uncertain life. I know you worry that I will leave you. Or that perhaps you will ruin my life or make it more difficult or uncertain because of where you are now in yours.

I don't know how to tell you that I am in this with you with eyes wide open. I understand what you are going through. I have every confidence you will make the right decisions when the time comes.

You are now at a crossroad that could change your life. I know that. And the fact that I cannot reach you there, to even hold your hand and make you feel better is something that makes me a little sad. Yet I know this is something you must do alone.

If you want, I will stay away from you, so you have time and space to think about where you want to head next. Perhaps it may not include me.

I fully realise the risk of that happening. While it makes me sad, I will understand.

You often tell me that I could be with someone better. But what is that, Tigger? Someone who is more certain of their life path, more sure of their future, with more money in their bank accounts?

I understand why you would think that I can perhaps be better off with someone like that.

But I think you also need to finally recognise it is not what I look for in a person to love and make my life partner.

You give me the things money cannot buy. The tenderness, the care, the concern, the consideration, the thought, the loving, the kisses in the morning and the waking up at night because I am coughing too much in my sleep. No amount of riches in the world can make up for all that.

No amount.

Know that I am here by your side. I always will be for as long as you will have me.

That I love you is something I am fully certain of. That it may not be easy, because of the life path you have chosen, is something that I know too, but it doesn't keep me awake at night. Because money is only something you need to get by in life, not the be all and end all of it. If there's less of it you make do. Life doesn't stop.

I know you are tired. Tired of fighting the battle that seems uphill all the time. Tired of having to rely on others. Tired. I know.

I wish there was something I could do to make you feel better. I wish there was, Tigger. But all I can offer you is a shoulder to cry on, and the promise that I will always be here to love you, no matter what you decide and where your life takes you.