there was a stolen hour when i was in boston a week ago. an hour in which i found myself on a bench in boston commons sitting next to one of my oldest friends. we sat, the two of us, dark, green wood beneath us, looking out over children and their families, young couples, and the ever present waddle of the ducks.

i was fourteen when i fell half-in-love with sam. he was seventeen and, heaven help me, did he seem old and wise. i was out of my depth around him. knee-deep in wonder and hormones and absolute amazement.

we have lived countless lives since that summer so many years ago. the two of us. we've each lived countless lives in opposite directions.

but just over a week ago, on a bench in a park, in a place called boston we sat and spoke. of all that we know and don't know. all that we've learned and are just now waking to.

mostly of love. of how terribly hard it is. and how terribly painful it is. and why, oh why do people the world over subject themselves to it's brutal whims and terrifying fancies again. and again. and again?

because it's deliriously good. that's what we decided. because of just how delicious it can be--if only for a short time.

we spoke of the beginning of it. of how you can barely look at the person for fear of being found out. and the end of it. of how you can barely look at the person for fear of... being. found. out.

and sam teased me. asked if i still doodled my name across notebooks with the surnames of all the men, the world over, i'd ever been to afraid to look at? and i laughed. tilted my head a little and laughed. no, no of course not. that's not to say i haven't thought about my name next to his. and his. and his and his.

and do you know what sam did in that moment? he didn't make the expected comment about girls and their nonsense, he just leaned back against the bench, took in the water before us, appraised the park in which he'd spent so much of childhood, and said, it's hard for us--us hopeless romantics, isn't it?

and i smiled. fell half in love with him all over again and thought, certainly, it is.

and if i wasn't tethered to sam before, i am now. for that moment--that one right there. that simple moment of absolute inclusion when somehow, i least expected it.

and even if it is hard, and it is, certainly, i wouldn't change it. not for anything.

we're a band of thieves, us hopeless romantics. stealing the world of all its very best love.