Is Real Love Ever Really Lost?

I am not so sure that real love is ever lost. In my own experience, love grew over time and became intrinsically woven into my very being. This growth was like a limb, one that played a part in everyday of my life.

Sadly at times…it may seem that love is abruptly severed from our life. A broken trust, a betrayal, a bereavement. I am not sure we ever fully recover. Like losing a limb, we are in the position of having to learn to live without that love.

Even when it has been abruptly severed from our life, it is always there. I am not sure we truly recover from the loss.

Having lost in different ways…I lost the life I loved living, I lost the career in which I thrived, for a time I was estranged from the love of my life, for a time I lost my cheer and my sense of trust in others. But it was always there. Slowly the hopeful disposition and the love for those who had hurt me came back. Amazingly, my estranged love came back. I still long to return to the life I love, to the career I love, to the home I love. It’s always there. It never leaves me. Everyday I live my life in a way that shows that is the life I love….not my current situation.

Love, real love is so deeply entwined within your bones, within your deepest organs, it is not easily uprooted. Even when the tree has been severed at its base, it would take something extraordinary to hack the root system away.

Although for some people, it is better to move on because the love we had developed was harmful, and we need to let go of it…in many other cases, that love remains a part of for the rest of our lives. It is always there. We learnt so much about love, about real love, from that experience, that we cannot be without that knowledge. Just as someone has learnt to walk, skip, dance and ride a bike with their limbs…so we have learnt what real love is and what real love does. Now we know that…

…I am not sure that love of that real and true variety is ever lost.

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This was my response on the theme of “LOST LOVE” for

FANDANGO’S DOG DAYS OF AUGUST:

https://fivedotoh.com/2020/08/04/fandangos-dog-days-of-august-4/

We Will Always Have Popcorn

You probably already realize Jack is back in London. He thinks he came at a good time. By the time Jack emerged from quarantine…restaurants, shops, pubs, cinema were all open. He sailed through social distancing with only two weeks on his own…unlike the rest of us hey!

He told me last week that he misses Africa. That makes me worry that he is eager to receive another assignment abroad. He misses looking up at starry skies and feeling a sense of awe. He said that he often looked up at the sky wishing he could share them with me. There are not so many stars in London skies. They are obscured by light pollution.

Jack and I have very honest conversations. I told him I am not cut out for long distance relationships. I have had it with Goldfinch and it was very hard. I sometimes talk about how I feel about Goldfinch. I have a very romantic view of Goldfinch, that even he himself does not want me to have. But you see, he rescued me. He didn’t know it at the time, but he was everything I needed at a time I was struggling. I do love him. I have had to accept that 10,000 miles is a greater distance than ever before. This year has made me feel a sense of panic at times that I might never see him again. I am glad Jack is here and I can talk honestly about how many things remind me of Goldfinch.

Sometimes all it takes is a word. Sometimes all it takes is a picture.

I often look up at the stars and think about how the starry sky is one of the things we have in common. Even though he is in Australia, and I am in London…we will always have the stars.

Goldfinch sent me a photograph of some popcorn. Not just any popcorn…it was salty and sweet popcorn. One picture took me back to the night we met…and to many other times when the question of whether popcorn should be salty or sweet came up. He also told me that the first night we met, I was eating sweet popcorn and that was the one thing I did wrong that night.

When Goldfinch was last here in my little nest…I placed a packet of salty popcorn on his pillow. He likes it salty…I like it sweet. I miss him. You know that.

One simple photograph of a bag of popcorn kindled wonderful happy memories with a man I was so in love with. But a man who wanted to go home. A man who wants to be free. A man who who I love so deeply, even though deep down I know he and I are different in ways that matter far more than our taste in popcorn.

Jack and I beat to the same drum. He and I share the same dreams and the same purpose. He and I care about each other and support each other as we put volunteering for the charities we believe in first. Jack and I understand each other.

But I will always hold a flame for my rescuer, Goldfinch. Little things…a word, a picture, will bring him back to my mind in a pleasurable way, and I will be reignited. I will be inspired by the love he breathed into me.

 Jack likes sweet popcorn by the way.