Well, I'm a big boy now. I know that this kind of thing happens & life goes on. But it's a lot of 'splaining to do when your family doesn't know what randomly happened to change things.

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But from stupidity erects intelligence. From mistakes come experience. Sacrifice build character and death & destruction begot life and reconstruction. Everything that's happened & all of the things I've brought on myself have made me the person I am, now. By all means different than who I might have been, before.

I'll be more sure of it when I get where I'm going & become who it is I have been dreaming of being, but even as of now, I can see that everything I've done or become has been along the way to where I want to be, as necessary parts. So, I have no regrets to speak of.

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I've had only a handful of relationships since then, and none even close to the first, thus far. But I'm sure that eventually I'll get there. I've distanced myself from that fact, and just tried to retain the good that each experience does for me. The first one taught me everything I know about love. The rest have seemed to show me that I can still do so, even with such an abused heart.

I've had lots of bad experiences. Maybe I've deserved it. Maybe it's played out this way for a reason. Nowadays, it doesn't hurt. It is frustrating, but it doesn't hurt so much. At the end of my thinking, I still believe that something can last forever, once started. I just know that it takes the right combination of people.. and that this combination is hard to come by.

I am a person who doesn't know any better than to become loyal & devoted.. when I believe I have a good thing. I believe in being.. but don't know how to be.. cautious.. because I think caution.. mind games.. security checks.. they are wise preventative measures.. but I think that love is not a cautious thing. I think that you have to lose yourself, in order to find that bit of home, once given a chance.

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1a.) If the terms or reasons for the relationship's collapse are unknown, ambiguous, incomplete or otherwise without closure, perform an autopsy.. and register your own conclusion to refer to for all intents and purposes. This may result in inaccuracies, however, each person's history is written as seen by them, anyhow.
 
2) Accept that, for the reason(s) established in step 1, There is no longer and shall never again be an "us" between yourself and whomever it was.

3) Proceed forward with life. My recommendation is not to operate heavy machinery for 1-3 months following said breakup, nor try open heart surgery to forcibly remove emotions that seem well dug in. I did both, so I would know the potential dangers well.

4) If this is your first deep relationship, see step 1, again. There are a number of events that may occur in the short and long term afterward that you would do best revisiting step one, in order to confront them effectively.

5) Do not revisit, reprocess, recall or otherwise revel in any pertinent memories. Likewise, do not attempt to destroy them. Much as old feelings, they will degrade and decay on their own, left undisturbed.

6) If it is possible, forgive all transgressions, the final one in particular. Make peace at whatever pace it's possible.

6a) If it is not possible, do not forgive, but do not cultivate anger over them. Simply resolve not to grant forgiveness for the too severe. Resolve not to make peace. Establish borders. Do not allow crossing to or from.

7) Move forward at all cost because, ugly or otherwise, the end of a relationship isn't the end of Earth. Maybe the end of the world as you know it, but not the end. There'll be other chances to get it right.  

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These are my precious nieces & nephew . The closest thing to children I've got. Maybe the closest I'll ever come to it.

I have a lot to feel other than happy about. But I mostly forget about the whole of it when I get to see one, some, or all of them .
   

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I mean, sure.. there is a lot of very deep pain & regret that comes with the loss of someone you love, but love [especially the first time, wherein you get your first lessons in love and how to love] teaches you things and provides personal developments that you can't get from anything else.

Love takes you to that.. convex border where madness and logic meet and mix to form abstraction & courage. It gives you the first thing worth fighting for, in life. It gives you your first look at your own deeper emotional complexities and makes you aware of perhaps hidden capacity and potential.

I happen to know that it's extremely unpleasant to lose love. It's happened to me enough times that I border on indifferent to the things that come with it. The only time I really felt shot in the heart was the first time I was knee-deep in love. There has been nothing comparable to the first time, and there hasn't been an end comparable to the first time I lost it. I would still describe it as far worse than death, on account of.. death is over when the nerves in a body die, and can therefore transmit no more pain to the brain.

Even so.. if given the chance, I would go through it all over again, doing a few things different maybe, even if it has to end that way inevitably. There are times when I do wish I could go back and erase that time or go back and tell myself not to fall in love.. because there are sometimes when the permanent damage reveals itself in my life.. or when I remember things and feel like it's a big shame. But were I to remove that part of life, I wouldn't know the things that I know. I wouldn't have learned the lessons I did nor be the same person I am today.

I think it's sad that it wasn't meant to be like I thought and felt, at one time, but I definitely know that there was a reason God or whomever put her in my path, as much as there must've been a good reason she was taken away. I believe it's because I needed to be shown some things and taught some things.. so that I wouldn't give up.. like I was ready to at one point... so that I'd be at war, like I am now, against the things that put me there. So that I'd know what kind of beautiful things this planet has for me besides the things I dreamed of as a younger man before that.

So.. I definitely think it's better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.. just because love put all aspects of life in higher definition than what you know, previously. For this value, by itself.. a love, even lost, is a priceless part of one's life not to be passed up or erased from memory because of the possible or exacted pain that comes or came with it.
   

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Hostilities began on May 17, 2005 when the first round of unprovoked aggression was committed. 5 Years.. 5 long, terrible, trying, yet transformational years.  In this time, I have gained and lost an entire lifetime of important things. I have breathed only precious days of life. I have died many times & struggled to find which way to go.

In this time, I have changed from one person to another to another.. until now; I am a composite of all preceding versions of myself.

I have constantly debated a number of things, in the privacy of my own thoughts. Among them: The right or wrongness of my intentions. Whether or not I can win the war that I've chosen to fight. Whether or not there will be a form of peace to go to, when my current will is done.

My conclusion is always the same. I have a valid purpose for choosing my way of handling things. I have managed to filter all motives of spite or vengeance.. any desire to see wrath brought down upon those who've harmed me.. from my system. It doesn't mean that I forgive anyone. I've done enough searching inside myself to know that forgiveness is not anywhere within me.

What it does mean is that my only desire is to get home. To be gone from this place, this physical location. To be abysmally far from the bones & ashes of all I have lost and all those who have taken it from me.

It's only when that is achieved that I feel I'll be able to rest in peace, though not dead.. but by my own definition.. alive.

I know the way, now, and I nearly have the means to take back my streets and regain the peace I once got a hold of. I have done it mostly on my own.

This year, 2010, I resolve to finish the fight, in the same way I resolved to begin it.
I will lose no more years to war. This year will see peace. This is a resolution I will keep, so help me God.

Nothing else on Earth is more important for me to do. 

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I'd wish I'd never lost footing in any of the homes I had and lost.

I'd wish I'd had brothers, not instead of anything, just that I had blood-brothers.

I'd wish I never met some of the people I have, this lifetime.

I'd wish I could simply go where I wish to be, now, today. I am at war, now, and have been for the longest, to get home.

I'd wish the world was the way it's supposed to be, or at least not as messed up as it seems to be fast becoming..

I'd wish to be a legitimate billionaire. That's more than I'll need in 1000 lifetimes. Therefore I'd change mine & 999 other lives, with it.

I'd wish I never had my heart trampled upon, any of the times that it has been.

I'd wish I'd finished university studies and obtained the degree I wanted to study for.

I'd wish I knew all the answers to all the questions I never got answers to.

I'd wish I never did the stupid things that I remember doing. The ones I regret, anyway.

I'd wish there was a way to make peace with the family I've been given, and still follow my own path.

I'd wish I wasn't born last.

I'd wish my father would'nt have been a numbnuts in his day. He might not have so much to regret now, if not.

I'd wish the children in my family never know the times I did, nor go through the things I did. I'd wish they always have eachother, when trying circumstances do come for them.

I'd wish for 1000 more wishes, so as to take care of these wishes I've eliminated for one reason or another but would nonetheless like.. and then I'd use what remains to grant some other's wishes.
 

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Fakes last longer, can be made to look and smell like a pine or like anything else so desired for that matter, and can be reused.. and they don't require the destruction of a life for a non-essential purpose. Though the tree they save may still be destroyed to be used as wood or paper, that's still more valid purpose than to sit in the someone's livingroom, indignantly displayed with ornaments and used as an idol.. and then discarded completely, as wasted trash, within a week or two of being killed.

Would we do that to people? Would it make sense to put human bodies on display instead of statues or mannequins? Who would willfully let themselves be destroyed for either purpose?

If you draw a blank on those questions.. then ask yourself why, when there are perfectly good alternatives available, we should consider it ok to do that to another living thing.. for a very temporary ritual purpose.. particularly a life form which does nothing with it's life but help keep us alive by providing us the oxygen we breathe.. and is already in enough shortage, for all the demands we place on them as practical natural resources.

It could be we just don't see a tree as important. It could be that we're just too bound and attached to traditions. But if we were the trees, and some higher life form were exterminating us.. wouldn't we want them to stop?.. or barring that.. wouldn't we want only to be killed on necessity..? If something were using us as a display idol, as humans, would we not have retaliated against them before too long?

Some people might read this and say.."Dude, they're just trees". True.. but trees, animals, and other plant life we consider to be lower than us were not put on Earth so we could have the privilege of slaughtering them for sport or recreation. To do so is an adherence to the same destructive ignorance that's setting the whole planet out of whack.

To simply use plastic trees instead of a real one is a simple way to acknowledge that you respect the life put here alongside you.. and that you recognize that being irresponsible with that life, or any other part of this planet will have consequences.

I remember when I was little, in the late 80's and early 90's.. always seeing commercials about conserving the Earth. Keeping her clean. Saving energy. I didn't really understand it then because.. I was ~5.. and because the world, at the time, still was nice looking. The summers were hot, winters were cold, wildfires didn't cover half of California and Tornadoes didn't form by the platoon, this far North. One thing I can see now is that the message back then was real and valid. The end of the world isn't coming, but things sure have changed.. and they've changed in part because we, down here, have not changed.. and have gone on with everything we do, as though nothing ever will come of it.

One inescapable truth that we have thus far denied but begun to see the light on, though, is that.. if we do not respect or show mercy to this Earth, the day will come when she will not respect or show mercy to us. The day may also come when she simply wont tolerate our abuse anymore. 

Atonement, though, starts with acting on the knowledge we do have, with the ability we have. This is one way to act.

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I'll tell you what, though, Indomitable resolve conquers all. Used for love or any other purpose.

People with a strong enough will are what make love or anything else that's hard to make and keep and build upon work out.

Love is not magic. It cannot directly solve all problems. It can only feed a person a handful of things that make the right people able to see it through. A strong resolve, however, is the solution to any problem, the arbiter of any aspiration and the weapon of choice for life.

Love, for all that it is capable of doing for someone, is useless in incapable or too-weak willed hands. 

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