Image by artist Peter Horjus

Putting yourself out there fully and completely again is both freeing and also full of vulnerability.  You can be gay or straight, old or young.  You may be a newbie to relationships or a veteran of one or two or several.  It is a human experience. Wrapped in this need is this desire to live a life of love with someone else.

It has taken me some time to get here. First, I had to find myself , accept myself and come out.  That was a process that was painful for me and quite frankly for others, many of whom I loved dearly.  It involved the break up of a marriage I cherished, the parting with a wife and sweetheart I loved, and leaving the home of my children who were my soul.  Yet, my coming out was the process of many years of counseling, prayer, and self acceptance.  The duality could not exist in public what was truly the  whole that existed inside of me.

All of us have grown and we have learned to let love which united us all to carry us forward and kept us together in our hearts and in our lives.

After that chapter ended for me, I had to find who I was within my true identity that took a lot of discovering in a world I had no experience in and was frankly a life  that operated out of accepted society. Most of it , I could not share with my most of my family and the friends I had in my life to that point. I knew they loved me but they had no experience with my new life.  Frankly, I just did not know how to discuss it with them.

I could not tell them of the men I dated , the experiences I had, and the lessons I learned.  Those feelings and emotions were shared mostly with the family I created , people who genuinely loved me for who I was ,with  no closets and no judgments.

In time, I genuinely fell in love, authentically and for real.  It was the first time in my life that I felt entirely complete.  It was 11 years of  what I always thought a loving , committed relationship would be like. I was genuinely happy.  However, like many relationships, when things are left unattended and taken for granted, relationships can be challenged.  For me it ended in heartbreak and worse, lost of trust. I ended it.

I don’t regret the experience because I truly knew what it meant to really be  in love.  But it also made me wonder if I would ever find it again.

In 2013,  my heart is completely open to the possibility .  What has happened is that I have been meeting these great guys and going on some nice dates.  The difference is that everything is falling in line and I feel like I am in such a genuine and authentic place.  I also am finding that my desire is to expand my range of activities and experiences.  I also find that I want to connect with all the people I truly love from all parts of my life, especially those I have lost connections with over the years.

We may be in different areas of our lives, have different philosophies, religions, politics, but the love and the things that bonded us together are still there.  Those connections are what make life sweet and it is in our diversity that we learn and grow from each other.  In essence, this is what family is all about.

I am looking forward to finding love, but really looking forward to enjoying the journey.   I guess it is the result of feeling peace and this self confidence in knowing that in the end Love wins.

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