Dancing in the rain

Recently I was talking to a friend of mine, and she was recounting the latest chick flick she'd seen. It was a Nicholas Sparks-soft-filtered-everyone's-a-model kind of love story, one that goes for every romantic cliché. Don't get me wrong, I'm a sucker for chick flicks, but sometimes I get so frustrated by those romance stories that try to tell us that they are the ONLY kind of romantic stories out there.

When I was thinking about what I wanted to do for Feeling 33, one of the things that I thought would be cool would be to slow dance in the rain with my beloved. I've never done that before, and it's one of those clichés that seems to have snuck its way into my proverbial bucket list.

I haven't made it happen yet. Maybe because I'm either at work when it rains, or it's like a monsoon-hurricane when it rains here (as was the case last night). Maybe someday we'll make it happen.  Meanwhile, I think about the things that do happen on a weekly basis - like talking together on the couch that leads to laughing-so-hard-I'm-crying-and-stop-my-stomach-hurts-I-can't-breathe, or lip syncing / playing air instruments to music in the car - that I feel makes our love story pretty much perfect.

Sorry, Nicholas Sparks, but my life beats The Notebook any day.

Maybe I'm Amazed

From our first month of dating. 

One year ago today, I told one of my very good friends that I had romantic feelings for him. I guess you could say that, in the words of REO Speedwagon, I just couldn't "fight this feeling anymore." My "crush" (I hate calling it that, because I feel like it makes my feelings seem so juvenile or inconsequential, or not serious) had been building for a while - about a year and a half, actually. It finally got to the point when I was comparing every guy I went on a date with to him, so I decided - with a nudge from another friend - to tell him how I felt.
As scary as it was (what if he doesn't feel the same way I do? what if I completely ruin our friendship? what if it goes horribly wrong and my heart gets shattered again?), I knew that I had to take the risk. I just had a feeling that if he felt the way I did, and we got together that it could be REALLY great. It could either end up really badly, or be really amazing - and I just had a feeling (I'm sorry, I had to say it again) that it would be great.
I say that I knew, but I really had no idea how incredibly great it would be. Even through the first few moments of awkwardness those early days as we navigated going from friends to significant others it was still so easy. It felt like we just belonged together.
Over the past year I've learned so many things about love - things that I'd always hoped were true, but prior to now I had no experience or proof. And it has been one of the most eye-opening, mind-blowing, truly wonderful years of my life. As scary as it was to open myself up one year ago, I am forever grateful that I did, because it led me to not only my best friend, but my greatest love.


Baby, I'm amazed at the way you love me all the time.
Maybe I'm afraid of the way I love you. 
Baby I'm amazed at the way you pulled me out of time, 
Hung me on a line.
Maybe I'm amazed at the way I really need you.