. This Is How You Come Back .

I love Kevin Costner. 

This is no secret.

One of my favorite movies happens to be For Love of the Game. He's a pitcher in that movie (in them all?). He's dating a girl and in the middle, the movie shows time passing. The seasons are changing out the window and his girlfriend asks him millions of questions - one bleeding into the next. The girl's daughter asks a million questions - and he answers them all. 

Yes, I'd still love you if ...
Yes, I'd still love you if ... 
Yes, I'd still love you if ... 

Eventually, he mixes milk with bread and raw eggs or something and stirs it all together and the daughter opens her mouth to ask what the hell he's doing, and he holds up his spoon. 

No. No more questions. 

And she sort of sits back.

Enamored. 

Trusting.

Last night, The Boyfriend and I couldn't sleep because of Daylight Saving Time. Eyes wide open in bed, I started in with a thousand questions. 

Do you like me more than flannel sheets? 
Do you like me more than summer mornings? 
Do you like me more than your cousin Matt's pulled pork? (You guys. You don't even know. It's so good.)

Yes. 
Yes.
Yes.

Sillier and sillier my questions became, but more and more necessary that he answer. 

More than the ceiling fan? 
More than vacation?
More than your car?
More than Christmas? 

Yes.
Yes.
Yes.
Yes.

And then a heavy sigh. 
And a pillow yanked violently over his head.
And a breath blown out. 

I love you, you know. 

The thick eye roll was heavy in his voice and I smiled. 

Of course. 

But in the every day thick of things ... 

In the vacation mayhem.
In the morning mayhem. 
In the job mayhem.
In the every day.

Do you like me even when ...? His yes, yes, yes - a shield ... a faithful chant that acted as a balm to the burden that every single girl seems to carry. 

​I could tell you a thousand things I've learned over the last year and a half or so. A thousand things about loving someone hard after getting divorced. A thousand things. But I think the thing I would tell you the most - if you ever asked, if we were ever talking about it over a rancid shake of bread, milk, and raw eggs - is that the quiet moments, the soft nights when you slowly let something unfold in front of you ... when you gently open yourself back up and allow someone else to love you, too. Those are the most restorative moments. 

In each exhale.
In each answered question.
In each inhale.
In each answered question.
In each answered question.

In each answered question.

​xoxo, B. 

PS - I wanted to find the Kevin Costner clip from the movie for you, but then I got lost in some kind of sick and twisted rabbit hole and suddenly I was watching Whitney Houston's funeral and The Bodyguard is still one of the best movies ever of all time. Amen.