i've been thinking a lot about love of late--of what a love story is, what it means to love, to be loved, to love one's self. and then this arrived in my email (from a lovely reader named meg) and i sent an email back immediately asking if i might share. so a huge thank you to meg for her lovely words and gift it was just to send them to me.
Meg,
The love letters to your future husband are going to be helpful, later in your life when you might forget these times, or when everything is so long past it becomes a memory of a person you used to be and a place you used to live.
For many years I pined and longed for my one-true-love and I looked for him everywhere. Every city, every coffee shop, every low-lit bar. Looking back, I kept looking even when I was with a boy I thought was the one-true-love. This should have been a red flag, but I ignored it, despite it's bright color.
One day, I stopped looking. I forgot about it and thought of other things. I planned to leave, move to New York and live an exciting life with the friends who were waiting in Manhattan and Brooklyn for me to finally leave the Midwest behind.
I found him: I found my one-true-love. I didn't quite know it on the first or even second introduction because we were surrounded with people, friends, and acquaintances in loud places. Finally, we went out together, alone. Our big, loud, funny personalities were quiet and careful with one another.
We tried a few places for dinner and drinks, but they were loud and obnoxious and we were too delicate. We found a dive bar, we ordered gin and tonics, we talked and laughed. We walked back to his Jeep and he suddenly pulled me into a doorway where we kissed in the twilight on a May evening, almost five years ago. We both just KNEW we had found each other, finally. Finally. Finally!
I will tell you that you cannot quite imagine how or when or who it will be. Remember, you may not know immediately, but when you know, you know. It will alter the course of your life forever and you will never look back, or, if you do, you will be grateful for the letters you wrote now.
And yes, you will talk to him about the jeans, or lack thereof. If you don't mention it, he might just guess because he will truly know you in a way you were never known or loved before. And he will help you, even if you cannot help yourself. he will try to understand, he will be there, he will love you unconditionally.
I just wanted to let you know that it is possible to find him. And even after becoming a wife and a mother, owning a home and a minivan and a swingset, I look across the room at him and I think: Finally!
Best wishes,
(Meg)
