I'll return to my thoughts on the church and its failures next week. For now, I'd like to approach a subject very personal to me and extremely hard to talk about: the one that got away. Yes, it's a woman. These are my confessions.
For some reason I always prided myself on the fact that I had never been in love. Odd, I know. There was something comforting to me about the fact that no woman ever conquered my soul, rendering me weak and powerless to fight her grip on my heart. The truth of the matter is I'm wondering whether that is still true. Once upon a time, I met a woman who changed my life...a lot. Deep down, I wrestle within, wondering whether or not I was truly in love with her. What I do know is that I felt something for her that I'd never felt for another woman. For some reason, to my core I honestly felt that I wanted to be with this woman. I didn't care what it took, didn't care how hard the journey would be, I just wanted to be with her. In some ways, I understood Ginuwine when he said he'd have to be superhuman not to love this woman.
She was the epitome of beauty. There was something about her presence that instantly made the world a beautiful place. If you read my writings, you know I care deeply about injustice, oppression and the plight of the poor. I often find the world a very sad place and I grieve for all those who suffer in it. Not so when I was with her. With her, I learned to stop and smell the roses. I learned to see the green of the trees and indulge in the simple pleasures of life. I loved my world with her. Most of all, I never got accustomed to any of it. Every moment with her was still breathtaking. Every time I looked into her eyes, I was in awe of her beauty. Like a person emerging from the dark and unable to adjust to the light, my eyes never adjusted to her splendor.
So why am I not with her today? We were completely different but that did not stop me from feeling what I felt. There were many things that made us incompatible but none of them convinced me that I shouldn't, with everything I had, work to make it happen between us. There was nothing I wouldn't do to make it wok. Regardless of how hard the struggle would have been, I felt the greatness of what we could have together was worth it. I felt that if she merely put half the effort into us as I would, we could have made it and I would have loved her in youthful beauty and aged effervescence.
I would have loved every part of her. Her flaws, her shortcomings and every insecurity. I could have loved every physical feature she didn't. I could have loved every quirk and frustration. Nothing about her was beyond the scope of what my heart could love in perpetuity. Even so, I could not love and embrace her seed. I tried, with all I had to do it. I prayed, I thought and I stayed up nights with this dilemma. It was all to no avail. Like Ginuwine, I would have to be superhuman not to love her but like Meatloaf, I would do anything for love..."but I won't do that."