Love and Freedom

It's been precisely one hundred twelve days since I began seeing Jennelle, and I am mad, mad, mad, crazy in love with her. And I realize something – love is freedom. You could be bound up, twisted up, beaten, cold, and with all odds against you, but if you have love...you have freedom and you have hope.

That's it! That's what I've always loved and always missed about loving another – it is the power of it and the fact that it cannot just make the impossible seem possible, but all things possible. Love does things to your mind, your heart, and every ounce of your being – it changes you. It is magic in that it can alter your perceptions and change your mind and your heart and thus change everything. Love gives you hope, belief, strength, and literally everything.

Everything is possible to those who believe, and love makes you believe. Love can imprison and set free, but when it leaves you wounded it will always come around and mend the pieces which cannot be fixed by time – the pieces of yourself which are missing without someone to love.

The song "The Rose" by Conway Twitty perfectly encapsulates what love is and what it means to me. The song goes through all the stages of love and it is all about the power of love and the freedom it can take away through it's pain as well as the intense mind-blowing freedom it has to give by unleashing its power.

When I spent that first night with Jennelle up on Shade Mountain we were sitting there talking and telling stories. I found a small flower (really, it was teeny tiny) and I gave it to her. It was a symbolic gesture on my part. I can't remember if I handed it to her or threw it at her – that is how much of a conscious gesture of symbolism it was at the time, but that flower is not the point, it is that moment. I planted a very very small seed on the top of that mountain, a seed of life and freedom and peace and happiness. The song "The Rose" really fits that moment because it tells the story of everything that was in me at that moment and everything I had to give which was hidden away but dying to come out.

I found a little more of the freedom I have been longing for by finding Jennelle. I can't explain it and I am trying too. As the song says, I will not be "the soul afraid of dying that never learns to live." I want to live and I want to love! I can't be free if I cannot love, and love like I want to because loving is a part of me.

And my Goddess the liberty in it all! It just makes me hear music and beauty everywhere! A thousand songs run through my mind at once: "Sugar Magnolia" by the Grateful Dead, "Somebody Like You" by Keith Urban, "Good Lovin'" by the Grateful Dead, "Woman" by John Lennon, "Your Man" by Josh Turner, "Hangin' By A Moment" by Lifehouse, "Believe" by Lenny Kravitz, "4th of July" by Shooter Jennings, "When It's Love" by Van Halen, "Happy Together" by The Turtles, "Feel Like Makin' Love" by Bad Company, "Is this Love" by Bob Marley & the Wailers, and dozens upon dozens upon dozens of others.

It just feels good to feel this good for this long, and to know that I am more alive and more free than ever before.

Words cannot describe.

Peace,

Alraune

75 Days Later

I am a happy soul and a happy man. It is great to be in love again. Every time I try to love deeper, better, with more thought, more feeling, and more depth of thought and balance in case it works or it does not. Certainly there is no rationale to what is called love, but it sure as hell feels rational when living in that moment. I think this time I may have found a woman who is near my mentality and intellectual as well as emotional level when it comes to actually building something, working together, and going forward.

She seems to be very truthful when she says it is not all about sex, but then again, so have others. A certain ex-girlfriend is correct about me and I have to watch for it and be weary – I am intense. When I fall into love I come on as intense physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually and it can quickly swallow a soul and make them lose track of the deeper me which they may or may not love, especially if they needed such intensity at that particular moment in their life. I'd be lying if I said I did not worry about this.

And it is not all the woman. I too play a part and get swallowed by the intensity of it all, perhaps sometimes more so than they. That is the price one must pay for having a soul and being capable of emotion and empathy for others. I think I have learned a few things along the way though and I have hope this time, and each time. Many women I have loved and dated have wanted a man who is the perfect balance (perfect for them, that is) between a man who is manly, powerful, strong, skillful and forceful and a man who is open, communicative, social, empathizing, caring, kind, and deep (to name a few important traits). Thankfully, I walk that fine line and always have, which is probably why I am found attractive by the women I have known and some I have not. I have learned this and in my maturity I am learning to refine it and be better at it in all arenas.

Naturally, I am and will just be myself, but I am constantly seeking to improve upon myself so long as it is truly me. So far the man I have become seems to be something Jennelle greatly enjoys, and that makes me very happy.

On the 44th day we both said we loved one another, and this time...different than all others...she said it first. I could see in her eyes that she truly meant it, at least at that moment, and so I kissed her and held her deeply. That moment is all I ever wanted in my life – that moment!

Jen is everything I ever dreamed of. I thank the God/dess for her and resign myself to be thankful no matter how long it lasts, but to wish it to last forever. She is beautiful, she is strong, she is smart, she is inquisitive, she is child-like...she actually “gets me” and does not see any part of me as insane, but knows exactly what is going on in my head and my heart. She sees right through me, and like she said to me, I feel naked around her, but it is alright. I don't think any love truly exists unless both feel completely comfortable and naked around one another.

Her life has become better since she met me and I view that as a gift and confirmation from above. She has a better job and a better life ahead of her. All is going well for her, and she says, “you're next.” THAT is why I love her! She is silently aching inside to see the same fate befall me, as I have always done for her. She is my mirror, as she says I am to her.

She says she has never been loved like I love her, and by God/dess I will not allow her to ever think otherwise! I want to love her like no one ever has and no one ever will, and I want to because I need too. But not too much at once...I must savor it, allow her to soak it up, and move slowly but steadily and with equal fervor along the entire length.

I will not allow anything to ruin that love. I do not expect her to be perfect. I do not expect her to never go astray (though I have a feeling she is much less likely than any other). I don't expect anything from her other than she expect from me what I have always done and always will do for her. If I can do that and be me and true to myself, then I know I will have her forever. If she can do that, then we shall be forever.

I sometimes wonder if I had met her before. Perhaps in a bar some time when she was hanging with Julie? Perhaps I was with Kim at the time or just hanging with some friends, or maybe I was alone and in my head? I sometimes get the feeling I did, but did not recognize, and I certainly do not remember. Needless to say, she was always no more than three degrees of separation away, we just never knew it.

In any event, I am beginning to feel I have found what Daryle Singletary called “that Amen kind of love,” and I am thankful to Freya for it. It is not me rebounding or anything. I had purposefully ceased dating for some six years. It took me that long to get over my past loves, find myself, and grow. No past love would recognize the true me any longer, but that does not matter...who I am now was not meant for them, it was meant for this moment now. They were meant to help bring me here. I will always love them in their moment and time, and I have told Jennelle this. She agrees this is right!

Jen has met my parents and my daughter. They all like her. I have met her parents and some of her other family. They all like me, including her father, who is apparently a hard case but somehow he took to me. Her family is actually a lot like my own, more so than the family of any other I have ever known (nothing against those wonderful families, but there is more similarity here).

Jen makes me feel like getting of my ass, which is how I feel about my life myself – another area of compatibility. She worries about my happiness and my health. She actually and truly cares about me. Thank you God/dess!

We both have a thing for the forest and camping and more than a dozen times we have run off into the forest just to get naked and frolic. We both love good cooking and good eats and it all goes right along with everything else we do. She is truthfully my kind of woman. Neither of us leads and neither of us follows.

I don't know what I did to make her love me. Perhaps I will ask her? But I am glad I did it. The past 75 days have been wonderful, fulfilling, youthful, and sublime. I think I will go ask her now. We talk like that.

May you find your love,

Alraune

A New Love

I haven't written for awhile and that reason is: a woman – Jen. She is incredible and I thank the Goddess Freya for her. Our first date was camping and I couldn't have possibly asked for more. I spent 9 straight hours talking to her before I even kissed her (this is my way), and she is madly deeply into me, as I am her.

She is 21 days older than me and a near mirror of myself. She is crazy (in a good kind of way), highly sexual (and very good at it) – the best ever (and I didn't think that could be topped), highly intelligent, an awesome cook (specifically on a campfire), crazy about the natural (she even likes camping nude), into mythology (specifically Celtic and Norse/Germanic), loves fantasy novels, and is cool with me as me all the way from the skin to the bone and spirit. Mere words cannot describe how incredibly perfect she is!

The Goddess Freya shines down upon us (in more ways than one) and there are so many confirmations it is bizarre. Neither of us dare not say it at this time (we are too old and too wise to say such after a mere 27 days), but we are falling in love.

I wonder where she has been my whole life, but I know it was not meant for then, but for now.

We work together and we work great together – we know this. If that is not a firm foundation, then there is none (in my mind). I love this woman, and I did not think I would ever love again...

We just spent an entire week together camping (without pants) and it was the greatest and most fulfilling week of my life. I did not think this woman existed! And I can tell – she is not fake. Words cannot describe the happiness she brings, and I am content just knowing I have her NOW. For the first time in so long (too long) I think of nothing but her.

I am overjoyed with her in my life. I thank the Goddess for her, and for the first time in a long time I can say again, “I never want to die” - not as in “me”, but as in “us”. I feel complete. I don't know what to say – I am exceedingly happy, and I thank the Goddess for her.

Thank you Goddess for giving me Jennelle. Thank you so much! Even my daughter's face shines upon us just as the Sun's rays shined upon her beautiful body dripping dry and the Moon shined upon us every night we made love.

Words cannot describe my happiness – I am healed.

Peace.

Alraune