Here We Are Together Again

Life is so fast. I've wanted to keep up with this, I really have, but everything happened and I was so busy experiencing it that I forgot to write it down. So, I'm starting again. Mainly, because I've got the "itch". Anyone that enjoys writing knows what I am talking about- the point when you have so many words that you can't hold them in anymore. To you non-writers out there, here's the way I think of it: I believe that everyone has words that they hold in their head. They collect them throughout the day; things to remember and things to feel and things they want to sing but they don't have the words for, only the emotions, but somehow music is words too. Eventually, if you don't let them out, the words build and build and build until they press against your forehead, and your heart starts to ache and your mouth starts to open and your fingertips get what I call the "itch". It's that need to write, to write everything, and maybe its all just for yourself, or maybe not, but you just have to let the words out. 

That's been today for me. The last few days, really. Sometimes when this happens I can just pull out my old guitar, which has many more stories than I do, I'm sure, since Alice is older than I am...but those are her words, and I don't know enough of them to tell them to you yet. Alice is a great help, though, for me, to get all my words out through singing the words of others. But sometimes she isn't enough, and I have to let the words out another way. I wish I could hand write them all, like I used to do in high school, but I don't have the time, and the internet is just so much faster. 

I'm engaged. I'm getting married in almost an exact month, and the time is going so fast. I sometimes still feel like a little girl, sitting on a swingset and dreaming of this moment, right now, when I've found my person and everything in life makes sense.(Everything in life does not make sense right now, but does it ever really?) My little girl self could never have imagined this, though, this place that I am in, emotionally and physically. It's so much more than the idea of what love is like when we are children. 

I'm living with my fiance's family, which is incredible and strange and exciting all at once. I love them. The first time I met them it felt like coming home. I got incredibly lucky to have future in-laws that are so accepting of me, the Mormon girl. They have taken me in and made me their own daughter...it's an odd feeling, to adopt a second set of parents. They give me hope for Dylan and I, for our future together, and they have been a blessing to have in my life. 

And then, sometimes it's hard. Dylan and I have opposite work schedules; I work in the day and he works in the evening. Some days, most days, I don't see him until nearly midnight. Some days I feel like I spend my whole life waiting for him to come home.  I never get tired of talking to him...usually he gets all of my saved-up words. Having been in a long-distance relationship for so long, we have given each other so many words that sometimes I wonder how there are still words left. Sometimes there isn't, and we just look at each other and laugh for no reason. It's basically my favorite thing about our relationship...all of the laughter. He makes me laugh until I cry, until my sides ache and my face hurts and I can't breathe. It's a glorious feeling, and I hope it never ends.

And then there's me. There's so much talk about "us" lately, that sometimes I forget that I'm a person too. As I write this, I am wearing a blue bracelet that reminds me that "I am Somebody". I'm not trying to say that I am selfish, or that I want to be. I just think it's good to remember that I am an individual as well as part of a bigger whole. Dylan fell in love with me as an individual, and sometimes I forget that. It's been interesting, finding the balance between myself and someone else. 

Marriage is much more work than I thought it would be. (Ha, and I'm not even married yet, technically.) It's all about sacrifice and love and work. It's a life's work, and one that I want to be proud of at the end of it all. I am so excited to make memories, good and bad, because the bad ones make us grow, and the good ones make us happy. It will be an adventure.