The Art of Losing

I disappear into the person I love. I am the permeable membrane. If I love you, you can have everything. You can have my time, my devotion, my money, my family, my dog, my dog's money, my dog's time – everything.

If I love you, I will carry for you all your pain, I will assume for you all your debts, I will protect you from your own insecurity, I will project upon you all sorts of good qualities that you have never actually cultivated in yourself and I will buy Christmas presents for your entire family. I will give you the sun and the rain, and if they are not available, I will give you a sun check and a rain check. I will give you all this and more, until I get so exhausted and depleted that the only way I can recover my energy is by loving you more.

My fear, in being so transparant, is in teaching my son to love fully, and to take loss with his head held high. Sometimes things don't work out. Sometimes we lose those we think will be there forever. Sometimes the things we fear the most are the ones that float over our heads all our lives.

I am not concerned about teaching Dylan how to love, as I will lead by example and hope he learns quickly that the proper way to love is with an honest, open heart while still maintaining self-respect and a spine. I am not worried about teaching Dylan to love fully, unabashadly, and whithout restraint.

What I fear is teaching him how to fall. How to ration his love so that, while it is tremendous inside him, some people can only accept in small increments. I fear teaching him how to absorb unrequited love, to put it away despite not having a good reason to, and how to keep it safe until it is ok to bring it back out again.

I wish I could make it clear to him that the heart is the center of the body, but it beats on the left and that maybe that is why it isn't always right. That sometimes you love the right person at the wrong time. Sometimes walking away is the best way to love someone. Sometimes self-preservation kicks in and running away is the best way to love them. I wish he understood-without me trying to fumble out the words - that relationships don't always fail because there is no love. Sometimes they fail because one person was loved to much, the other not enough.

I want him to let go when he is hurting too much.
I want him to give up when love isn't enough.
I want him to move on when things aren't the way they were before.

But, more than anything, I want him to understand the subtle difference between holding a hand and chaining a soul. I want him to learn that love doesn't mean posession and company doesn't mean security. I want him to learn that kisses aren't contracts and presents aren't promises.

I want Dylan to know how to accept his defeats with his head up and his eyes ahead with the grace of an adult someday, not the grief of a child. I want him to learn to build his roads today because tomorrow's ground is too uncertain for plans and futures have a way of falling down mid-flight.

I want him to learn that even sunshine burns if you get too much. That he really can endure, that he really is strong, and that he really does have worth. I want him to learn, and learn, and learn.


"Of course if you like your kids, if you love them from the moment they begin, you yourself begin all over again-in them-with them-and so there is something more to the world again." -William Sarayoan