
Three Years In
Life is constant. It breathes in deep and exhales long winded sighs of lucid relief. A warm, understated fluidity flows forward and we drift along doing our best to guide ourselves safely along. Because of this, we need ways to slow the movement, we need anchors to tie off to along the way. What are your anchors? Where do you seek comfort as the night moves in?
Me? For the longest time I left myself to drift, untethered. I let life carry me along as I slipped through blindfolded, that is, until I decided to open my eyes and allow myself to understand things about this flow that I had not let myself fully understand.
Joy is love and love is gravity. This is my anchor and I found that love, warm, heavy, and with a resonance that keeps me grounded in happiness. With it I am learning to balance myself and see things with a clarity that I only thought was possible in my imagination.
Three years ago today I married YoungDoo Moon and with a throat sticky with nerves and the newfound weight of an abundance of love I read the following to her during our wedding as a way to try to communicate how I felt with words:
Life brings us to unexpected places. It is infinitely complex yet unwaveringly simple. In this life I have felt so much and experienced a myriad of emotions and curiosities. I have seen the rise and fall of hope and love within me skip widely about the surface of my time here on earth and I have done so with open arms and a great, un-censored vulnerability that led me to both to moments of great happiness and of unbearable darkness.
As fate would have it, along this path, as transient and unpredictable as it has been, I have discovered something that has not only pushed me beyond my own self doubt and reservations, but has also given me the strength to transcend what I thought I was capable of within my lifetime. That discovery is you and the love you give to me.
Never have I felt so confident and capable as when you are by my side. You give me pride and a wholeness I never thought possible within myself, and for this, I love you.
For you, YoungDoo, my love is absolute.
It is, without question, the greatest feeling I have ever been blessed with and without it I would be incomplete.
There has never been a feeling locked away inside me that has been more pure, honest, and true as this love that I have for you. It feels as transparent and essential as the air I breathe.
You are my light.
The light by which I live and breathe and find happiness in all things. Together I feel anything in this life is possible and darkness will never again find me. I love you YoungDoo. You are my everything.
Of course, this is just as true today as it was when I wrote it 3 years ago while riding along in a busy subway train in Seoul a few days before the wedding. Struck with an exciting rush of inspiration the words flowed out without hesitation as though they were there waiting for me to pick them from the air. Happy anniversary YoungDoo, here’s to the years of joy we have yet to share.