I could really use a wish right now

I've been thinking about love a bit lately... and what love really is...  I think Nathan and I had a love fit for a Greatest Hits album... and I hope to someday find another love like that. It's really hard to go from a marriage... from a "we," back to a "me." It's lonely, and it's just hard to switch gears in general. But I don't think love is even a "we." I think what love really is, is a "you." I care more about you than I do about me. I care more about your happiness than I do my own. I care more for your needs than I do my own. My life is lived for you. My heart beats for you. My world is yours. I care about the things that you are interested in, because they matter to you. I would give up my life for you.

I really think love is that selfless... or at least that was the kind of love that Nathan and I worked on... It certainly wasn't always successful... but we got close sometimes... Of course, I think we also got a special dispensation of grace, because God knew we wouldn't get to have much time together. I couldn't imagine a day without him and now I wake up every morning without him. God just wanted it to be as good as it could be for as long as it could be. I know it's becoming my mantra, but I promised Nathan I would be ok. I promised him I would be ok... and I love & loved him. So my life is lived for his wishes. My heart beats for him. My world is his... and it feels really weird because it feels self centered... but I don't know how else to express how very much I loved him... Love is normally supposed to be in a partnership, you know. I'm not typical... I know that grief looks different for every person... but I also know that I'm a bit off from the "norm." But I feel like if I can live my life.... If I can be ok... then that is the best way that I can honor Nathan and the love that we had.

Kara was talking to me about something she read in Blue Like Jazz. I have no idea the context or if I'm misquoting what she actually said, but my impression is that Donald Miller mentions that friends are made when people start to feel/understand that you like them. When people can trust you to like them... I know that's the hardest part of friendships for me... trusting the other person to like me. But if I can take the focus off me and put it on making sure that the other person knows I like them... Maybe in friendships, too, it's less about me and more about "you." Makes me think I should actually read Blue Like Jazz... I got through college and several years at the Vineyard without reading this book. Nathan would laugh if he knew that his death is what might finally get me to read it.

It's a hard balance to strike... especially in American culture. How to live a life of selflessness while taking care of yourself... I mean ideally you have a partner who will take care of you... but sometimes that doesn't happen... and sometimes he gets taken away far earlier than planned. I guess it's something to work on... something to build a life on...

There is this song on the radio a lot these days, called "Airplanes" The lyrics go like this: "Can we pretend that airplanes, in the night sky, are like shooting stars? I could really use a wish right now, wish right now, wish right now."

I like the thought that we can all just decide that the airplanes count like shooting stars, and you get a wish for them. I say, why not?  Why do wishes have to be so hard to come by? I could really use a wish, right now. Wish, right now.