by N. D. Guerre

Created on: June 18, 2008   Last Updated: February 12, 2009

The photo is odd, somewhat faded, a dogeared copy of a copy. It's hard to make out faces, but the mood is clear. It's private, intimate, shared by just two. We clearly see his delight in her joy as she tries with one delicate hand to stifle a giggle. We see the suggestion of strength in his handsome face as he smiles upon the woman laying beneath his arm, her hair dark on the pillow, her gown white on pale skin.

They are in love.

It's a bad photo from a technical standpoint, as bleached and faded as week old daisies, but beautiful from an emotional one... the result of bringing the camera back to bed on the morning of one of many departures.... capturing a dance that is sleepy and warm, safe and trusting.

It is our "Sunrise Ballet".

I seem always to be "departing", leaving him behind. We have become expert at saying "goodbye" and my last hours with him are bittersweet. I am torn between wanting to make the most of every moment, and in my soul being gone already, my heart on the road, back to a life without him. I bounce back and forth two or three times a month like this, loving, laughing, hurting at times but at least living. I seem most alive when aching for him and I am, with him and even when alone, now very much alive.

I wonder what the stats might be on laughter to tears with him. It would be hard to say. Sometimes the laughter IS tears, sometimes the joke sad, the heartache funny and they are mixed together like some horrid fruitcake, aging to perverted perfection somewhere in the back of the fridge.

I adore him.

I take the opportunities as they come, one of the many bumps in the road for those brave souls who attempt a long distance relationship. Still, I leap upon them, the way one jumps at free tickets to a show they assumed they would never see... always first row seats, with a backstage pass.

I have laughed at those holding out for that great love of thier lives. I find the idea of one soulmate per customer absurd, idealistic and just plain lacking in reality. Such goofy notions of finding the perfect man or woman, one chosen for us in advance by some greater being, are immature concepts that belong to the teenagers and those lacking real life experience with love.

But while i was mocking, laughing, poking fun at others' ideas of perfection, someone with an even greater appreciation of the absurd dropped it square into my lap. It took me months of turning it over in my hands before realizing just what i had. It's something most never find, that elusive state

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