WARNING! THIS NEXT PART GETS A LITTLE ANECDOTAL...
This morning, I must confess that I have somewhat more on my mind than usual... I was up rather late last night - 2 am to be exact - at a friends house contemplating a precipice. It is a wide chasm; and its dark down there so I can't see the bottom. It could be just out of sight, hiding under the line where dark meets light, or it could be hundreds of feet down and quite the fall. Either way, I most likely wouldn't come back from a trip over it. "Well, no duh, Josh! When you fall off of a cliff, you usually die..."
Rarely have truer words been spoken - falling from great heights is bad for the human body. Well, the fall isn't lethal, but the stopping part most definitely is. For this post, we're going to say that "falling" means there are no parachutes, ropes, lifelines, bungee cords, etc... It is just you, the wind, and gravity. In this way, the stopping part would be lethal. A part of me - I'm still not sure how big or powerful it is yet, but a part of me non the less - wants to leap from the cliff and fall into whatever awaits. To be engulfed by the darkness and let its secrets caress and embrace me. I am intrigued by and curious about what awaits in it. I have been there before and I enjoyed it. I miss it. My heart yearns to go back there. This is the easy way to go
However, there is another path I must consider. It leads directly away from the cliff to a steep climb up beyond the horizon. Just as I couldn't see beyond the boundary where dark meets light, I don't know what the boundary of the horizon holds, either. The trail is difficult and its intensity is a fixed and immutable fact. It will not and cannot change. It has a sign with the 2 stipulations for following the trail:
1. Don't take your eyes off the horizon.
2. Put your heart into the climb.
These two rules carry quite the implications with them. Regardless how much I want to, I cannot look back for an instant. If I do, I am whisked back to the beginning of the path. Here's why: I broke the two rules of the trail. I took my eyes off the horizon and I showed where my heart really is - at the cliff-side, not on the climb. I know in my head that the best decision is to take this path and sacrifice as it requires. My heart disagrees with me.
Complicating matters, at both the cliff-side and the trail head, there are people beckoning me towards them. Each is convinced that theirs is the right way to go and I am trapped in the middle needing to make a decision. Neither party will wait very long. Both parties will be hurt if I don't choose them. I cannot keep both parties happy, which means I will not be happy...
I now stand in the middle, lost and confused as to which way I go. Whichever way it is, it must be permanent. Anyone who knows anything about my life in the last 3 months knows how much I hate this whole situation, and how much I hate myself for hurting as many as I have as I blunder about trying to figure things out. As much as I want to wish this whole situation away, it isn't possible. There are no fairy-godmothers waiting to waive their wands and have the problem disappear. There is no magic cure for a broken heart. There is only making a decision and learning to live with yourself afterwards. Falling in love is always messy... It is compounded a hundred fold when it involves two people of the same gender. Multiply it by another thousand when you see them all of the time.
"There is no easy road this time, Josh... What are you going to do?"
"I have no idea..."
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