October 12, 2012

I wrote in Adventures of Matt and Cassey this back in October after heading home overnight on the bus. Be warned, it's happy:

And as I sat there beside her in the car I tried with all my energy to be as acutely attentive as possible so that I could take in as much of her as possible. How she looked. How she felt. How she smelled. All in the hope that maybe if I noticed as much of her as possible, and felt as much as I could in those last brief moments, that they would somehow rub off onto me. That maybe by taking in as much of her as possible those parts might stay with me. That if I just held onto them tight enough I might be able to keep them, somehow, after she was gone. But that didn't happen, and when she was out of sight and out of reach she was still gone and those moments we had together became memories and drifted away, just out of reach of becoming tangible again. Read also : Toyota: Let's Go Places

Because that’s not how people work. You can’t just take parts of them into you and keep them when they’re gone, as if they hold the place of that person when they’re not there anymore. When they’re gone, they’re gone and you can’t bring them back in all their wholeness with little bits of them. Even though I tried to notice her as completely as I could in those last moments, once she was gone, those parts were too. The smells, the warmth and feel of her body and the feeling of her presence in proximity to me. All that was gone with her. And there was a single moment when I realized that my last attempt at holding on to her was failing, and a really scary thought entered my head. I thought, “she’s going to be gone. Just gone. In just a few minutes I am going to be alone. And how can I keep loving her when she’s gone?”

Thankfully I overcame that despair, because that’s one of the strange things about loving someone. They are completely gone from you when they are away, yet at the same time they’re still present. Speak For Me, There is this thing connecting you even when you’re not together. The wonderful, strange thing about love is that it keeps going. It doesn't stop when they are too far away for you to love them—you just keep loving them no matter what, even if they can’t receive it. You just put your love out there. You reserve it for them and you offer it up to them, and that’s how you know that even though they aren't here now, you’re still together. They’re still somewhere and they are still loved, just as you are. That thought is why after she was out of sight I remembered that we weren't saying good bye, and that we would be together again. Because you can only love a person, and I know I love her and that love has to be going somewhere. It doesn't stop just because I can’t reach her. 

Anyway, there are my sappy thoughts during the sadness of having to readjust to long-distance. I just thought I'd share them.

-M