josh! where do i start...well, first i will tell you that as i read this description of you, i could totally see you there. you see, i just looked at all of olivia's photos from huangshan and she said the exact same thing about feeling like she was inside of a Dr. Suess book, with the truffala trees. and i saw them there in the pictures, stunning and unlike anything we have seen before. to think that you were looking at them not in pictures but right in front of you is a wonderful thought, and i hope to go there or somewhere equally incredible some day with you. as i was reading, i was not surprised, but reminded of how you are such a damn good writer. its interesting to me that you might think of all your thoughts and anxieties as complex and at times controlling your mind, because the way that you write about your experiences and thoughts are as if there is no confusion what so ever. that you have untangled a great mess and can now articulate it to the world (or just to one lucky lady) and i love that feeling, because i think i have had it before. and about those feelings of yours, i am so glad that you could make this very important distinction between the so-called peace in a relationship (although its ever-fluctuating and evolving) and the peace that you have within yourself. indeed, i believe that they are very connected. for instance, i think that since falling so in love with you over the last nine months, my idea of what peace within has changed dramatically. i am less intent upon finding that close-to-perfect place to live, job, roommates, etc. etc. and I have begun to give parts of myself to you in a way that sees our lives, happiness, contentedness interconnected in many ways. but as you articulated in your last letter, we cannot be and should not be interconnected and therefore dependent on each other on every level. and that is when it becomes important to listen to both each other and ourselves when deciding what we want to do each (proverbial) day we are together.
and that realization that you are on your own for nearly the first time and what kind of effect its having on your psyche--i have thought about this before too-- just the feeling that you are under some sort of pressure (not the pressure-cooker we know all too well), a pressure to figure out something amazing for yourself and to figure it out quickly. but joshua, i am here to say that you do not have to figure it out quickly. because nothing actually goes quickly except falling in love with each other, right? the quickness is otherwise perceived or self-imposed, but not real. where i am sitting now (al's couch, where we watch the world series together, nobody here, just writing while al showers) the room is quiet, the house is calm, and while the snow is coming down very hard now, i too am at peace here. its my huangshan. i saw some of my friends for the first time in a while last night--caitlin, carol, em and olivia. we very spontaneously decided to go poach the franklin hottub and hang out under the beautiful sky together. and while the evening was lovely, i wanted to come home to you and as i walked into my dark room, i even thought there might be a nice boy lying in my bed, waiting for me. but when i turned the light on, you were not there!
oh josh, i have had a couple of really wonderful conversations about love recently, with christina and then olivia, and not that i necessarily needed reassurance, but both conversations just left me with such a strong sense of the fact that i am so excited about us. excited that we have gotten to know each other so well, that we have been patient in times of confusion and that we are able to talk about what we want to do together in the near and distant future...
speaking of which, i might spend some time looking for plane tickets for our romantic getaway! im still hoping that olivia might stop being stupid with stephen so that we can go to cuba, but then again, i also just want to be somewhere where i am a total stranger to everyone except you.
and that realization that you are on your own for nearly the first time and what kind of effect its having on your psyche--i have thought about this before too-- just the feeling that you are under some sort of pressure (not the pressure-cooker we know all too well), a pressure to figure out something amazing for yourself and to figure it out quickly. but joshua, i am here to say that you do not have to figure it out quickly. because nothing actually goes quickly except falling in love with each other, right? the quickness is otherwise perceived or self-imposed, but not real. where i am sitting now (al's couch, where we watch the world series together, nobody here, just writing while al showers) the room is quiet, the house is calm, and while the snow is coming down very hard now, i too am at peace here. its my huangshan. i saw some of my friends for the first time in a while last night--caitlin, carol, em and olivia. we very spontaneously decided to go poach the franklin hottub and hang out under the beautiful sky together. and while the evening was lovely, i wanted to come home to you and as i walked into my dark room, i even thought there might be a nice boy lying in my bed, waiting for me. but when i turned the light on, you were not there!
oh josh, i have had a couple of really wonderful conversations about love recently, with christina and then olivia, and not that i necessarily needed reassurance, but both conversations just left me with such a strong sense of the fact that i am so excited about us. excited that we have gotten to know each other so well, that we have been patient in times of confusion and that we are able to talk about what we want to do together in the near and distant future...
speaking of which, i might spend some time looking for plane tickets for our romantic getaway! im still hoping that olivia might stop being stupid with stephen so that we can go to cuba, but then again, i also just want to be somewhere where i am a total stranger to everyone except you.
love,
em
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