Today / Last Night

Last night might have been a pretty small breakthrough, but it was a breakthrough nonetheless. What I've realized is that Sean has not yet gotten over how I treated him in the past, especially during the summer at the Clam Festival and my birthday.

But I also think we did something pretty fantastic in that we had a successful, important conversation without it devolving. I wanted to say what I wanted to say, and I said it.

I want him to understand that even if he can't give me what I want, I still want to feel like I can express it.

Hearing him say that he still has anger about that made me realize that I can't hurry this, not any of it. So for a while, I'm going to forego the wedding websites and thoughts of marriage and "putting a ring on it". I can't hurry Sean, no matter how much of a deadline I may have, and perhaps taking a grand step back and revisiting myself is a good idea.

I'm not sure why I'm in such a hurry to get married. Perhaps this goes with my fear of dying, and also knowing that being married is something that I've always desperately wanted to experience. Maybe I worry about Sean's commitment in that he can't say to me "I want to spend my life with you", and a ring would be proof of that. Perhaps I want it because he's getting older, and I want to have time with him as his wife.

But even though I've half-heartedly known this all along, I have to stop treating our relationship now as an intermediary, as simply the step before 'it counts'. I don't want to be half in what we have now, waiting for the big commitment. I want to enjoy it, every minute of it, but when I'm in my head worrying about the future, I'm not here.

This has always been the problem with being a planner. In looking forward to everything, I forget where I am now, and perhaps that's partly where my innate fear of death stems from. I'm looking forward to so much that I worry I won't have time to 'do it all'. If I really, truly focus on being present, on sitting with myself at different times and revisiting me, of sitting with my thoughts and emotions and not always running wild with planning, I can truly find peace. I am loved. I am a good person. And I am blessed by all the love in my life.

I don't need to look forward. I need to look at now. Like Sean says. I need to stop trying to make things happen and just let them. I need to trust in the inevitable flow of life, in the endless possibilties that arise from each decision that do not fit in with my plan.

When I have let go of my plan, my life has taken spectacular detours. It was detours that led me to the most wonderful year of my life, with Sean, new relationships, new possibilities. It is detours that have led me to friends. It is openess and willingness and a sense of adventure and acceptance that my life is better when it doesn't follow my path.

Sean doesn't have to propose to me within the year. We don't have to move in together next year. Life is spectacular and beautiful right now. I have a man that I love, who loves me. I get to wake up next to him.

I have to just.... let... go.