Happiness

Is it a fleeting emotion or a life status?
Are you happy?
Happy when?
In this moment? With my life? In my relationship? With my family? At my job? In general?

Happiness is relative.
In general with the various dimensions of my life, I'm happy. Although it doesn't take a whole lot to turn my happiness on it head and spin it like a top.
Cause I'm not happy when things are fucked up.

I Love Her More...

I had this thought. While holding our son as he fell to sleep, I thought of a creative way to express all the little various things that I notice on a regular basis that make me Love Her More.

I love her more...
 for each red curl
 for being a girl
I love her more...
 than it shows
 than she knows

And as I think of one thing that I love about her, and another that cleverly rhymes, my thought grows to an idea. I could get post-it notes made! They could all say "I love her more..." and then they would be post-it's, specifically to post the various reasons you love "her".

Just another million (okay maybe not million...) dollar idea that was likely to stay in my head forever.
I have plans to print it up on pretty paper, put it in a frame and place it in the bathroom w/ a dry-erase marker.

Then I thought, I could put it out here.

Now I am never ashamed of the fact that we are a lesbian couple. I am quite proud, and very matter of fact when I talk about her/us publicly. She's my wife, and I'm not going to call her anything different. But I think I try not to shove our affection for each other in people's faces. So we keep it pretty G, which is kinda sad. I think for her more (being the more sensitive one this partnership)...I often tell myself I should be more expressive about how much I love and appreciate her. I get a little caught up about how I'm going to do this, and forget to actually do it I think. :(

I'm such a dude. And my ridiculously amazing wife loves me anyway.

I love her more for seeing me without the looming bar of potential looming overhead highlighting the distance to what I should be.

My love grows with each heartbeat, and continue to strive to meet my potential as the wife she truly deserves.

Our Story

My Dearest Brandi,

Every time I tell our story I believe my version (from my perspective) seems to steel some of the romance. Because we were (and still are) two separate people, coming together.

We had lived across the hall from each other in the Magnolia Villa Apartment in Savannah for almost a year. You spent more time with one of my roommates, and I spent time with your now ex-girlfriend (and mother of your first son), but unbeknownst to me, you noticed me. In May of 2004, when I was finally decided that the lifestyle I had been raised to live wasn't working for me, and immediately preceding my absent daughters birthday (which has always been a difficult time of the year for me), I noticed you.

That month was emotionally and psychologically insane, from beginning to end...but it ended with a BANG.
And a conscious decision.     ...and the romance seems to begin to fizzle out...
And my story, when told, always seems to fade out before it rushes back in.
Not this time...

Four days from the 27th, when you picked me up off the floor outside my apartment door and guided me across the short hall into your apartment, I found myself making the life changing decision to let myself fall in love with you. The word "decision" seems to suck the romance out of a love story. But there's a lot to understand here...
I've never been with another woman (and for the record, I hit the JACKPOT! I need no comparison to know THAT beyond a shadow of a doubt, but that's another story....).
I planned to move to Kansas City in July (I had just learned that my roommates were both moving back to Omaha).

I grew up in an extremely right winged household (enough said) and didn't know any other lesbians.
But I knew women, and I knew you well enough. I knew that falling in love with you would change my life forever, and that letting you fall in love with me would mean no less than forever for you too. So being in this position, after only 4 days, but also a whole 4 days of being in constant contact with you which had just resulted in a sun down to sun up X rated evening, that Memorial Day, I chose to let go and let me life change forever as I assured you that my perception of the evening's events were the results of a straight Christian girl wanting to experiment. I said the same thing during our ride back from Middle GA the previous day (I smile every time I reflect on the thick-as-rubber sexual tension in my Altima, that lingered from that day forward).

It wasn't long before July came and you left your home state and moved with me to Kansas City. Do you ever notice how fond we really are of our years in KC? I love our honey moon face. That August, you took me downtown for my birthday and surprised me with a Cinderella carriage, wrapped in greenery and white lights, drawn by 2 horses. I didn't know you well enough to not assume that was my birthday present. That was the beginning, followed by you pulling a short stemmed red rose out of nowhere, and a folded piece of paper, which you asked me to read aloud. It was a beautiful poem that used the literal and metaphoric action of looking deep within the rose, which you directed me to. I honestly didn't know what the fuck was happening, until you gently lifted a sparkling white hold ring, complete with 9 diamonds (your favorite number), and got down one knee and told me to finish reading the poem. In my literal mind, I chose to say yes...not that I thought for more than a second! If I thought anything at all, it was about the time your friend amazingly told me at our first meeting that we'd make it, but my life would never be the same. You held on to "we'd make it" and I held on to the words that were from my mind but spoken to me by a complete stranger. She was right... I love that she was right!

The next day, we went to lunch and we discussed...everything. First romance, then logic. We have always been a perfect balance! And while it's easy for your to be both logical and romantic (emotional), I find emotion extremely difficult and had always made every decision I had ever made with my head. And even in the beginning with you, but it was the first logical decision to lean on the side of pure emotion. And then change my life. You change my life. And then you saved it, because you gave me the pure emotion I had never owned. And although it can still a bit scarce, it's there, and only because I'm here (<3 <- your heart).

I know that being with someone as emotionally drought as myself can be difficult. You know that I think I'm a shit because of it. I love you more for hating when I call myself a shit. And even more still that you love me anyway, and not just anyway, but as much as you do. More than enough, or that I deserve anyway. I'm not sure anyone could deserve to be loved as much as you love me. I find that I am best expressed in written form, so I hope this moves you as much as you move me each day. <3 bd

She's a Real Bitch; Depression.

It doesn't make a lot of sense.

I have a loving wife. My son is AMAZING (no joke). I'm well liked at work by co-workers and management alike.

So why do I ever find myself crying on the way to or from work?

Depression is very hard to understand. While my life is pretty close to perfect, I still get in these ridiculous slumps. It's like a flashback of emotion really. I start feeling like no one loves me (the way I felt as a child) when I KNOW that so many people do. I've even found myself get cynical about love at time (another pass time of mine), even though I'm in an amazingly loving and supportive relationship.

Clinical depression is a real bitch, and no one (without the proper education) really understands her.

Feeling Like the Dad

It has always been said that he did what he did to me because it was done to him as a child.  Which to me translated to "you'll do it one day too".  Scared to death that I could actually be a predator, I have always told anyone I ever considered having kids with that I would never bathe my child unsupervised, or have a special bed time with them that lasted more than 5 minutes. Lucky for me, I have an amazing wife & incredible friends that keep be balanced. 

Now that a have a son,  turns out night time is my time which means I'm usually the one to bathe him. Still, I ask myself every time, how could  I possibly betray him like that? I think it's healthy, being that I was a victim, to keep myself in check. I wouldn't want to take the chance. No one would have ever believed that my dad would have done that to me. No one. So why trust me?

Since  I am the provider,  and she is his biological mom, I can't help but sometimes feel like the dad.  I'm afraid to be the dad because the only dad I've ever known was a predator. 

Black Licorice

I have spent too much time worried about what people think of me.

I like black licorice. You might didn't care to know, but now you do. More likely (or at least I assume) you think the above is gross.

Growing up, I didn't know much of anyone who liked black licorice. So when I realized this to be the flavor of black jelly beans and good and plenty's, I decided to keep it a secret. I didn't want people to think I was gross, and I didn't want to end up with everyone's bycatch either.

Why do I care about what people think of me? Why can't I be one of those people who just doesn't care. Cuz honestly, if I knew how, I would be less friendly and less social. Sometimes I actually wish that less people liked me; yet, I spend so much energy making sure most people do. 

Makes no sense.

Stop Talking

I've always been a talker. I've always been afraid though that people don't understand me. I've come to realize they don't.