In between the past and the future

Thirty years.

Thirty years and I have realised that love has no perfect timeline to follow; there is no ideal path to falling in love.

There is no right or wrong way to give yourself to someone in pieces shattered from another, and completely raw that you don't even realise who you are or how you like your coffee. There is no manual or map to finding yourself when you've fallen off the grid.

But somehow you were ready all the same and accepted me and sewed me back together. No: you made me new.

There are words throughout history for what I feel: Rebirthed. My very own Renaissance period. 

A renewal, a resurrection, a resurgence. A revival.

And Now...

Love can be felt in your arms reaching towards me and enveloping me in the darkness as we're snuggled in bed close.

Love can be seen in the curve of your smile and the way you look at me like I am all you see.

Love can be shared in every bite of our dessert, in every inside joke, in each pet becoming our home. 

Love can be seen in your actions as you plan dates and wash dishes, and cook pasta, and fold laundry.

Love can be waited to be said aloud until the socially right moment, but it doesn't mean it wasn't felt before.

Love is unravelling your walls in bookshop aisles, glancing over covers and glazing over as they find mine.

The receiver is never shocked. The receiver will return the three most important words you have waited a lifetime to hear. And to feel.

Whether it's right by others isn't important; sometimes you just know.

Love is yearning to touch you, to kiss you, to feel you in my heart; treasuring the ordinary with you.

Reaching over to hold my hand against my thigh warmed by the sun and my own racing heart, and I look at you and love you right in that moment between the past and the future, in the short space between my heart beats.

I heal.

- Nicole xx