I have been thinking of you of late.

As perfect as my life is at the moment, and as much as I love my Tigger, I cannot help sometimes but be profoundly sad at the absence of you in my life.

I was in love with you. And I think a part of me still is. The part that still cries spontaneously at the thought of seeing you and having to speak to you again. The part that reminisces about our life together, how stable and predictable it was and how I was so in love with you. I remember you gently stroking my face at night saying you love me and how pretty I am. The love light in your eyes. You asking me whether I can fall asleep at night. You mumbling back that you love me even in deep sleep.

I remember these things and wonder how it could all flee from your heart so suddenly. All this love that took years to build. All of a sudden gone.

I wonder how much you miss us, our life, this life you had with me and the dogs.

And today, on Athena's birthday, you must miss us more. I feel it in my bones. I almost want to cry.

I now know how it is possible to love someone in the present so much but yet feel some degree of love still for someone from my past. Not in a way that makes me want to be with you, but in a way that is sad at how things ended.

A small part of me worries still about you. No matter how much I try not to, I do.

But I do love my life now and the possibilities that lie in store for Tigger and I. It will be a wonderful life if we can get past the current madness and adjustments. She is a blessing that I am thankful for.

The way you love me

Tigger, I know how much you love me.

From our fights in recent days, our heated discussions, I realise there is a possibility that you may love me in a more noble way than I ever could love you.

Because the way I love is like a child. Unthinking, all feeling, complete. Yours is more considered, thoughtful. You take each part of me and lay it out before you, examining each fragment before deciding if you can love the whole. I, just jump in with both feet, embrace you and hope our wings are strong and big enough to keep us both from hitting the ground.

This is what I love about you. That you are thoughtful. That I am in your thoughts.

Disturbing

Last night I realised you were on my mind. Again. As if the invisible string that still binds us was tugged my your despair.

I thought of you all the way in Cameron Highlands, miserable in the cold that you hate so much. I always wondered whether it chilled you to the bone.

I thought of whether you were now mired in regret, finally coming closer to terms with the magnitude of destruction you caused all on your own. You must be in a deep, dark well now. Deeper and darker than the one you thought you were in when by my side. Then, at least you had me to blame. Me to aim your arrows of anger and frustration at.

Now, you have nothing. I can imagine that she does not come close to being able to understand you, nor relate to you, nor read you. Perhaps I may sell her short, but quite honestly, I don't think she can even dream of beginning to understand where you are from.

Nine years of loving and living with each other, breathing the same air every night, and on most days. Nine years of eating off the same plates, sleeping on the same bed, riding in the same cars, dreaming the same dreams. Nine years of me reaching out to you even in your sleep.

I am starting now to understand how strong that bond is.

I do not want you in my life anymore. Yet I cannot help but feel your emotions. It is disturbing.

Despite it all

At times it would seem we are two souls that understand one another.

At times like this, however, my own demons overtake me and you fail to understand.

When we have spent time, especially like we have over the last two days, in the company of others, I feel the need to connect with you. Be intimate with you. Feel you yearn for me the same way I do you.

I want you to reach out for me, want me, miss me, the missing on your lips and at the end of your finger tips.

For you, missing is not possible as long as I am physically present next to you.

For me, missing is possible even when I am in your arms and cannot feel you.

Perhaps it is my own warped perspective. I know these days I often make you feel inadequate, or that you are doing the wrong thing.

You told me that you feel you are walking on egg shells.

Maybe that is why all of you leave eventually. Unable to withstand my yearning or understand how my desire can be so great.

I don't know how to explain it. Don't you get it? When we are busy with our every day lives and errands and people and things that tug and tug at our sleeves and hems, there is a separation that occurs between our souls? One that is felt by me like a chasm. Maybe to you it is indiscernible. But to me it is all I see.

I see you. I see you and your needs and I try to bend and fulfill and accommodate them. But many times, I feel you don't see me.

You do not see the truth behind my words and pliant ways. You choose instead to see the times when I rebel and do not heed your words. To do what I feel instead.

Don't you understand that I mean what I say? That I do not need you to tell me what is wrong or right for me? That when I ask for something from you, the last thing I want is for you to turn me down but instead offer a directive that is what you deem for my own good?

I know your concern comes from a deep love. I wish you could see that my willingness to sacrifice my own comfort comes from the same place. And it is something I don't even see as a trade-off.

You and I are profoundly different.

I wish you would truly, truly realise that, and understand that the loving I want from you is not what you sometimes give me.

Maybe I should take heed. Maybe I should take stock of whether or not this is for me. Maybe your kind of loving, your brand of care and concern is not what I seek.

I do love you. I love you in ways I have not loved others. Ask me what I could give you as a gift and I could think of a million things. I bet you could not think of one for me that would mean something to me and be cherished the way you would cherish mine.

Despite what you think, you do not know me. And yet I love you, despite all that. You make my heart do little flips from mere words or a glance. I am grateful for any little bits of attention you give me that is unsolicited. Why can't you understand that?