In response to my previous post, my blog brother Eric of Straight White Guy, responded by reminding me of an old C. S. Lewis quote: "To love is to be vulnerable." Thanks Bro, for the encouragement and inspiration.
UPDATE: My blog Dad, Harvey of Bad Example, shares about what it was like to find, lose and reclaim his wonderful, first and, only true love of his life. Laughing Wolf has two posts. This post is an extraordinary tale of how love led him to become the man he is today. His 2nd post is about how true love is about the experience of loving and receiving rather than loosing.
I see that he and I share similar philosophies of love, for no matter what has happened in love, I have become a better and stronger person for it. Sometimes the pain might get in the way of that lesson, but in retrospect, I see that I am better for having loved.
Acidman and Jerry of Stuff About were wonderful enough to share memories of their first loves.
Those of you who have emailed me your love stories (for my eyes only), thank you. They made me laugh and one in particular touched my heart and almost made me cry. For those who still want to write about their First Love, please do so as I'd love to read your story.
In the last 4 years I've experienced a great deal of loss. Loss that for a long time I thought was too insurmountable for me to even consider being social again. During that time I retreated from the world to a place of silence and memories. I needed to be there in order to grieve and heal. Today I find myself in a better place. A place of hope, where I feel ready to open up my heart and allow people to enter it once again.
Thanks for showing me that you have loved, lost and have been able to love again.
Posted by Michele at February 22, 2005 09:48 PMI am hopeful that someday I can rise to where you are as well. My loss was singular compared to yours, but I have yet to recover as much as you have.
Bless