I didn't know it at the time, but it was a year ago today that it all started to become confusing. I came back to a relationship believing God explicitly led me there, the possibility and purpose of which I no longer expect to ever understand. I think I've let go of that because there isn't the same pain to it. It's got the dulling ache of a once broken bone, or the tenderness of a scarred wound. I've now come to terms with the fact that I survived the feeling I was certain and fearful would break me. I don't love it, but it is a part of my story now: having loved deeply and lost painfully.
A year ago I wasn't thinking much about the risk of all the pain that inevitably made its temporary home in my life. I'd spent so long regretting taking that step back into the relationship, but I don't anymore. Cliche as it sounds, to love was worth it, the risk of my very life. I learned afresh that in my darkest valleys, still I am not alone. I learned that in my lowest weakness, there is a strength that endures which sustains me – it's my own.
Still I may - or likely will, in my humanness - forget such impacting lessons. Time will continue to press on, and things like anniversaries of dates will come to remind me, putting that weird little flutter of bittersweet remembrance in my heart. I'll otherwise remember today as the day I watched baseball with someone I loved.
