I Have Always Liked This Line

For Fragments of Fiction:

“But you’ve never looked at a woman and been totally vulnerable. Known someone that could level you with her eyes, feeling like God put an angel on earth just for you. Who could rescue you from the depths of hell. And you wouldn’t know what it’s like to be her angel, to have that love for her, be there forever, through anything,” Good Will Hunting

I have always liked the line I quoted above. Some people get it and others understand it. But I kind of suspect that only a few really get it. That is a special sort of love. A different kind of love and if you have had it I hope that you were smart enough to recognize it while you did.

Because if you lose it than you start to understand a different sort of loss. Than you start to understand that there is an ache that never goes away and a hole that can’t just be filled. There is an empty place in your heart and no matter what you do or where you go the loss goes with you.

If you are lucky it is a temporary thing. Circumstances or some such thing pull you apart and you are given the hope that maybe, somehow, someway you can bring it back. Sure, there are no guarantees. It may not ever happen. It might be something that becomes a memory of a special time and place.

But then again maybe not. Maybe it is something that can be done. Because if two people love each other in that way and have that sort of you know in your gut it is real magic then maybe there is enough stardust still floating around to bring it back.

At least that is what I think. Because in the end I believe that there are people you fight for. There are relationships that are so important you jump into the fire and burn so that you have the chance to look them in the eye and see how they respond when you tell them that you love them and don’t want to miss out on life.

So that you can look them in the eye and see if the flame still burns or if it is truly extinguished.

Relationships are funny things and not always in the way that makes us laugh. Sometimes you have to shake up the dynamic. You have to walk away to regain your perspective no matter how much it hurts. You walk away so that you can catch your breath and recharge your batteries so that you are strong enough to carry the two of you.

And maybe, just maybe you’ll be proven right. Or maybe you’ll find out that you were wrong. But the bottom line is that you have to figure out what it is that you need to do so that you can sleep at night.

You have to be able lie in the dark and know that no matter what happens you did your best. And though it is certain that you have made mistakes, in the end you’ll rest more comfortably knowing that it is better to have tried and failed than to have never tried at all.

(Originally published here)