A Painting For My Heart

First Kiss, Bouguereau

This painting has been above our bed since the first day we moved in together. We chose it because they fit us. He the passionately aggressive one, always trying to pull me from within myself. Me the guarded reserved one, unsure of how to give myself to him. That's who we were. We've grown up since then and this picture has begun to haunt me. It rips at my heart for the boy and the girl who were. I wonder who they would have become on a different road.

He left a few weeks ago. The split has been on the horizon for awhile now. One night as I crawled into bed alone I realized I couldn't stand to sleep beneath this picture any longer. So I took it down and turned it to the wall. It's who we were and in a twisted way it's who we are. He's still passionately aggressive but it's aimed at a place outside of me. And me, I'm just a different kind of guarded. I'm jaded. I live that reality daily, I don't need the visual reminder. But then I found myself curled up beneath a wall of nothing. I felt my heart go numb from the loss. So I moved the bed.

He came back last week. But that picture will never go back on our wall. It's not who I want to be. It's wrapped up in too much hurt. I need a new picture. The problem is I don't know which one this story will lead me to choose.

My heart wants it to be this one...

Duy Huynh

...but I fear the distance and hurdles to reach this embrace are too great.

So will it be this one?

Moment of Clarity, Duy Huynh

Walking a new road alone?

I'm waiting on the story to unfold.