‘Ha! Hold My Brain; Be Still My Beating Heart.’ – (William Mountfort’s Zelmane, 1705)

My life has been filled with love. I have been fortunate enough to have already had three major loves, and a generous handful of loves who, although perhaps not quite as significant, also made me feel something deeply. Some people never get to know that feeling. You could say my life has been inordinately filled with love and that I would be greedy to expect any more love from this life. But yet still I feel hopeful that my love story has not reached its final chapter.

The last big love in my life came to an end almost four years ago now. If I am totally honest, (which it is essential that I am here or what is the point?), that love, and the resulting heartbreak, nearly finished me off. The love I felt for him was so all-consuming that it took me the better part of three years to finally let go. It has been said that only love can break your heart. Even for all the suffering I endured, would I go back and choose to erase the love so as not to have had a broken heart? Not in a million years.

This experience has, however, seemed to have had the effect of making me a little gun shy. Must keep an open heart, must try to see the world with clear eyes. Still, it cannot be denied that meeting men that I really like seems to happen increasingly less often. I’m sure there are several factors at play here: I am becoming more choosy and discerning as I know more and more what I find attractive and becoming increasingly aware of my own worth, there are less options available as people pair off to sprog, and perhaps I am just not quite as hot as I was when I was younger and therefore unable to simply attract any man that I fancy. Having said that, I do not believe that I have kissed my last kiss. I feel confidently hopeful that if I move boldly forward into the world with an open heart, that an ocean of love will once again flow towards me in waves, and wash away any trace of old heartbreak with its salty relief.

It has only been possible to arrive at this place of hopeful confidence after years of intensive scrutiny and self-improvement; the old cliche about not being able to be loved until you love yourself is undoubtedly true. I can now say with the upmost sincerity- I love myself and my heart is full of joy! The other morning as I sat meditating I had a moment with myself. There may be no other way to describe it than experiencing the pure love and ecstatic joy of the universe. I become so overwhelmed that I burst into tears of joy and true happiness, just for the sake of being alive. This is an experience I cannot remember often happening as a result of being with a man. Don’t get me wrong, there were tears, just usually not tears of joy as far as I can recall. Although there was that one time… but he just asked me if I would shut up so he could go to sleep.

I recently did meet someone who I thought I might like, for the first time in a very long time. On the third time we met, we spent an evening hanging out at the same party. There was a moment in which I really wanted to smooch him, and actually very nearly almost went in for a kiss. This is a feeling I can barely remember having, and although it was exciting, I was the most pleased about being reminded that I can still be stirred in this way, so long has it been since I’ve felt a feeling even vaguely akin to that. I am alive and capable of pure love and ecstatic joy, not just of myself, but of another human man! Self-love is fun but it does get a bit same-y after a while. I was intoxicated and I told him that I wanted to kiss him. He told me that he found me very attractive but that he had a girlfriend and that he was ‘trying to make it work’. The fact that he was trying so hard to make it work sounded doomed to me but I immediately retreated; I ain’t no home-wrecker.

Nevertheless, the heart wants what the heart wants and I spent my time abroad harbouring secret fantasies that this little spark might ignite into a blaze of passion. Upon my return, it came to pass that I found myself at his house for a dinner with a few friends. It came up in conversation that he was no longer seeing the ‘make it work’ girl. So, as we sat, side by side on his sofa after everyone else had gone home, I longed for him to take me in his arms and press his lips to mine. Instead, he sat there with his arms crossed, yawning. I should’ve taken this as my cue, shoulda taken it as a warning and made my exit, but some morbid sense of curiousity kept me there. Finally, he said he was tired and could he call me a cab. Ouch. I rang the cab and mustered up my courage. It seems misguided to kiss the mouth of a man with folded arms, and so I attempted to use my mouth for another purpose. (No, not what you’re thinking, dirty.) I started to say… but was interrupted by a text message- the cab was on its way. “Nevermind”, I said. “What? Tell me, I’m really interested to know”, he said. Okay fine, I thought, here goes, and asked him something about the thing I had said at our last encounter about the kiss and the fact that he was no longer going out with that girl. He tells me there is now a new girl on the scene. Three girlfriends in the last six months. Ah. I’m starting to get the picture here and starting to understand where my initial impression of him being a dissolute and licentious rogue had stemmed from. He then turns to me and says, “I really like you, we get along really well, I think you are incredibly attractive, I just don’t think I feel that way about you, I think we should just be friends.” Its as if there are a million little daggers with his face on them, piercing my heart all at once. All the pain and heartbreak I had ever known comes flooding back in through the reopened scab that was once my cardiac muscle, (or, love muscle- if you want to use the scientific term for it). You fool! I think. But I smile at him and say, “should we hug it out then? Okay, friends.” We hug. Thankfully, my cab arrives at that very moment; gasping for breath, I run for the door.

Yet, in spite of this, I refuse to believe that there is no more love out there for me. I live in hope that the big love of my life, besides the love affair with myself, is still yet to come and not behind me, regardless of the fact that that I have been ridiculously blessed to have been given so much love already. I will keep on living and loving and trying to believe that the universal law of love will be fulfilled; the more you give, the more you receive. If you are out there and all alone today, I hope you can feel the love coming from me to you. I might even be open to feeling your love coming back to me in tenfold. My heart is an open vessel, ready to be completely filled and ridden hard and fast on those wild waves out on the sea of love.

Happy St Valentine’s Day Lovers!!! Here are two songs I wrote on point here and here.

Lots of love from me to you xoxoxox