my careless contagion

Unexpectedly, she came back into my life. There she was, at my door, and I welcomed her in. We talked. My heart throbbed with excitement. There she is, Joshua, the one you love! Right in front of you!  Being with her felt natural, like she'd always been there, like she would always be there. Like a part of me was returned or made whole. She just made sense. My favorite memories with her were simple ones: walking, talking, sometimes with Brutus  (the cheagle) and my son. There was the walk we took one summer day at a recreation area outside town. It felt like the rightest thing in the world to be with her.  It may sound strange, what I'm about to say, but it's true. I love the arrangement of her features. Her face and all its parts. Her body and how it's put together. I can't see inside, but I saw the outworking of its parts, and she is as beautiful inside as out. Her heart is my favorite feature.  The heart of that woman is precious. She displays a humility before t...

Thank you, Lord, for these moments with her. Holding her hand in the theater and fighting back tears of happiness because this is what I always wanted. Here she was, and sitting next to me as if it was the easiest thing in the world. Thank you for letting me see her heart and to understand, at least in part, such a beautiful soul — a special soul that knows no equal. I get to hear what's in her heart, her mind, and to see your imprint on her. It's all over her, in, and through her.  Thank you for letting me be something in her life. Just to be here is a miracle for which I am beyond grateful. She makes me incredibly happy, and I can't help but see her as a gift. I get to enjoy her, feel her warmth radiating next to me, revel in the scent of her skin, and bask in her laughter. And what beautiful laughter! I'm in love with the sound of her voice. I don't think there's a single thing about her I haven't fallen in love with. The sum total of her is probably more...

Thinking about this space where I spent so much time and expended so much mental and emotional energy, I can't help but liken it to something. I wrote an awful lot about a girl here. I was quite taken with her. I fell in love with her, and that love burst forth on these pages, year after year. I am still in love with her, though I know her differently now.  I wrote, not knowing whether she ever saw a word. I believed she did, and that's why I continued to write for so many years. This was my message in a bottle.  With a message in a bottle, we're never sure if it reaches its intended destination, if the one person in the world we want to read it actually does. I never knew. Did she ever feel those things I felt for her? Did she know how much I truly loved her? Did she read once or a hundred times or not at all? Did it make any difference what I said or didn't say? The hours I spent crafting my words, did it change anything? Did it make her bad days more tolerable? Were ...