How do you prove that you are?

     You find a little hope, a little inspiration, and you get yourself functional.  You have a woman who loves you, shows you.  Then she stops showing you… starts again… stops… starts again… stops… starts again… Makes a lot of promises… yo-yo…

     Tons of emotional crap.  She needs, you’re there.  You need, she promises she’ll be there, but… things get in the way…

     And you need the hope.  You need the inspiration…

     But you’re supposed to ignore that driving force…

     Or maybe that’s just me.

     Ann, if there is one thing in this life I know, it is that I love you beyond words.  I need you.

     Meet me halfway.

     [ It never happened, but we wanted it to.  Her Mom got sick, people protested, there was drama.  And finally, she started back at her Job on February 4th, and that was the end of that.  On the 3rd, she told me, "No job is worth losing you, Mark."  It was left unfinished... I moved there, and what we have now is a bad end of history... Yet, I still feel exactly the same way. ]

     It’s Friday, January 18th, 2008 at approximately 10:30AM EST … and the Wildcat and I are making our last trip back to Kentucky where I leave her and come back home alone.

     The last six months feel like forever, yet they have gone by so quickly at the same time. 
     Apart, thoughts are consumed with things we’ve done, things we’ll do.  Together, we’re consumed in each other.  When we stumble, we hold on tighter.  When we’re down, we lift each other up.

     Every experience I’ve ever had prepared me for the moment that I met her.  Every bit of agony made me appreciate her that much more.

     On New Years Eve, at thirty seconds to midnight, I stooped on one knee and asked for her hand, the hand that I knew would hold mine for the rest of our lives.  With a resounding “Yes!” and a ring set on her finger, we entered the New Year with a kiss and a promise.

     And now, it’s time that promise was realized.

     I’ve lost my job.  My things.  My car.  My home.  My family.  My sanity.

     My Wildcat… She taught me how to Love, how to be open…

     And then … what it feels like to truly fear.

     I can have all all I want in the world, but it will never matter without her.

     Because now I’ve lost her, too.

     And there’s not a damn thing I can do about it.  No amount of compromise, bending over backwards, psychiatry, psychology or anything else can fix this.  She’s made up her mind: “Goodbye, Mark.”

     And still, I am completely and totally in love with her.  There is no compromise, there’s no less love, there’s no anger, just …. fear.

     Now my biggest fear is realized.

     I lost her.

(Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uZrddP5A4WY)

     And I just want to sleep and not wake up again.

     I can’t sleep.

     I went fishing Saturday night with Zacque and his Uncle.  I thougt it would be relaxing, but it wasn’t.  All I did was miss my Wildcat so bad I couldn’t stand it.  His Uncle drove, because I was absolutely smashed — lots of alcohol — and I’m so prone to go into crying fits at any given moment.
     Finally, his cousin came and drove Zacque and I back.  I cried the whole way home, wishing my Wildcat had been there.

     I called my Wildcat and left her a message, because I missed her.  I wished she’d been there.  And then this morning, this is the last message I got:

Okay, I played your last message over and over, because I heard a woman in the background and it sounded like she said, “Don’t start”?????????

     And nothing since.

     All I ever do is cry over this woman.  I miss her so bad I can’t stand it.  Everyone know that.  Everyone.  And it worries a lot of people, because I’m not very functional without her.
     I either break down crying or go completely despondent.

     And I can’t sleep.

     And I can’t eat.

     I want her so bad I can’t stand it.

     I need her.

     I don’t want to write any more.  I don’t want to do anything any more.  I don’t want to go to sleep and miss her, and I don’t want to wake up and be without her.  I don’t want to go out, because she’s not at my side.  I can’t keep my head in work.  And everything just feels hopeless as Hell.

     Now, I feel like I’ve lost everything.

     All I’ve done is hurt like Hell for a month.  It’s been a month…

     And it just gets worse.

     People talk.  Some tell me this is unhealthy, that I need to move on, and I tell them to go to Hell.  I can wait.  I will wait.

     When I saw her a week and a half ago, I got down on my knees with her and prayed with her.  I’ve never done that with anyone.  And I meant every word I said.  I take my vows seriously.  And I will walk through every Hell for this woman, with this woman.

     She is the One.  And she’s the only thing I need…

     If everythign else was gone, I’d still need her.

     And so, I keep holding out hope.  I keep praying. 

     She’s the only thing in the world that makes me happy any more.

     I need her like air.

     And I want to spend the rest of my life with her.

     I don’t care what it takes.

     Baby, I miss you.  And I want you to know, to know, that I would never do anything to screw that up.  I wear this ring for you.  I miss you so bad I can’t stand it.  I love you more than life itself.

     That’s just the way it is. 

     I’ve already lost everything else, including my mind.

     But I can’t lose you, too.

     There’s a memorable bit from Charles Dickens’ “A Tale of Two Cities” that springs to mind:

And so exactly was the expression repeated on the fair young face of her who had crept along the wall to a point where she could see him, and where she now stood looking at him, with hands which at first had been only raised in frightened compassion, if not even to keep him off and shut out the sight of him, but which were now extending towards him, trembling with eagerness to lay the spectral face upon her warm young breast, and love it back to life and hope–so exactly was the expression repeated (though in stronger characters) on her fair young face, that it looked as though it had passed like a moving light, from him to her.

     I love my Wildcat.

     And should it be the last of my life, the only thing that I want to remember is her smiling face…. her…. wholly.
     And that will carry me on.

     The gentle rasping of a lovers’ breath in your ear…

     Half asleep, mumbling, “I love you”’s on occassion…

     The little snore she makes and then catches herself…

     Affirmations she makes when she thinks you can’t hear…

     Those are the things I miss.  And last night, I listened to them for hours, albeit by telephone.

     My Wildcat is my world.  She can make or break a day, but I love her regardless.

     Soon, baby.  Soon.

Blue October: X Amount of Words

(Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GRgQVh7aDdQ)

     And there’s a cure…

Blue October: You Make Me Smile

(Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tUNM8qyazB8)

     For both of us…

Blue October: The Sound of Pulling Heaven Down

(Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EnskaYaWHjU)

     Remember where home is?

     I do…

     Miss you, my Wildcat.

     All I can sit here and do is look at this post-it, and think…

     Neither can I…

     I need my Wildcat now.

     Forever.

     You certainly can’t make anyone happy, but you can try and be there when they need you.  Depending on how much you care about them, you may even do it when it’s detrimental to yourself.  At some point, people around you may tell you how unhealthy that is.
     But the bigger sin to me is to ignore their pleas for help, to come to a point where you have no intention of trying when you’ve made your vows to a person, for better or for worse, in sickness and health.

     Extraordinary things can happen…

     Yet sometimes, it might take every iota of Faith that you have.

     And just when you feel like you’re out, you find a little more…