Inside Out...
Dear Noah,
I write this letter by candlelight as you lie sleeping in the bedroom we have shared since the day we got married. And though I can't hear the soft sounds of your slumber, I know you are there, and soon I will be lying next to you again as I always have. And I will feel your warmth and your comfort, and your breaths will slowly guide me to the place where I dream of you and the wonderful man you are.
I see the flame beside me and it reminds me of another fire from decades ago, with me in your soft clothes and you in your jeans. I knew then we would always be together, even though I wavered the following day. My heart has been captured, roped by a southern poet, and I knew inside that it had always been yours. Who was I to question a love that rode on shooting stars and roared like crashing waves? For that is what it was between us then and that is what it is today.
I remember coming back to you the next day, the day my mother visited. I was so scared, more scared that I ever had been because I was sure you would never forgive me for leaving you. I was shaking as I got out of the car, but you took it all away with your smile and the way you held your hand out to me. "How 'bout soime coffee," was all you said. And you never brought it up again. In all our years together.
Nor did you question me when I would leave and walk alone for the next few days. And when I came in with tears in my eyes, you always knew whether I needed you to hold me or to just let me be. I don;t know how you knew; but you did, and you made it easier for me. Later when we went to the small chapel and traded our rings and made our vows, I looked in your eyes and knew I had made the right decision. but more than that, I knew I was foolish for ever considering someone else. I have never waivered since.
I love you for many things, especially your passions, for they have always been those things which are most beautiful in life. Love and poetry and fatherhood and friendship and beauty and nature. And I am glad you have taught the children these things, for I know their lives are better for it. They tell me how special you are to them, and every time they do, it makes me feel like the luckiest woman alive.
You are my best friend as well as my lover, and I do not know which side of you I enjoy the most. I treasure each side, just as I have treasured our life together. You have something inside you, Noah, something beautiful and strong. Kindness, that's what I see when I look at you now, that's what everyone sees. Kindness. You are the most forgiving and peaceful man I know. God is with you, He must be, for you are the closest thing to angel I have ever met.
We have lived a lifetime most couples never know, and yet, when I look at you, I am frightened by the knowledge that all this will be ending soon. For we both know my prognosis and what it will mean to us. I see your tears and I worry more about you than I do about me, because I fear the pain I know you will go through. There are no words to express my sorrow for this, and I am at a loss for words.
So I love you so deeply, so incredibly much, that I will find a way to come back to you despite my disease, I promise you that. And this is where the story comes in. When I am lost and lonely, read this story - just as you told it to the children - and know that in some way, I will realize it's about us. And perhaps, just perhaps, we will find a way to be together again.
Please don't be angry with me on days I do not remember you, and we both know they will come. Know that I love you, that I always will, and that no matter what happens, know I have led the greatest life possible. My life with you.
And if you save this letter to read again, then believe what I am writing for you now. Noah, wherever you are and whenever this is, I love you. I love you now as I write this, and I love you now as you read this. And I am so sorry if I am not able to tell you. I love you deeply, my husband. You are, and always have been, my dream.
Allie
WOW...
