retreat. review. release. reset. reconnect. recommit.

on my mind, as of late :: love, in all its forms. my abiding love for my kitties, my dutiful but fierce love for my parents and brother, my nurturing and awestruck love for my garden, my grateful and vulnerable love for friends, my tumultuous but certain love for myself and, of course, that elusive love that can loosely be labeled 'romantic love.'

i know i'm capable of a great and magical (romantic) love :: soul-warming intimacy, wild adventure, growth-inducing discomfort, laughable monotonies ... but it has been so long since i've loved like that or been loved like that in return that at this point, it seems like uncharted territory on the distant horizon that i question whether or not i'll ever reach.

on a city street, over coffee, a friend suggested yesterday that i make a list of what i want and need in a (romantic) love partner. this is something i've done time and again over the years, but it's always changing. it seems that as i learn more about my capacities as an independent human being on this earth, the more i realize that i need other people. and i need them to help me through things that aren't always fun or pretty or easy. i've lived in relative solitude and i've also had intense immersions into community. i can say without a doubt that the moments where i open my life up more intimately to other people are richer in every way. the intimate reflection and witnessing and sharing make it so. having strong community around you is like walking on a moving walkway. you progress so much more rapidly than when you're walking along alone on the path.

need.

• i need (right now, in particular) someone to gently push me out of my comfort zones, someone to supportively lead me along to new horizons ... the pushing and the leading won't be forever their role. i'll play that part, too, but right now, i may present less as the instigator because i'm a bit frozen. i've been thawing out for a few months, but i'm still a bit of an ice cube with significant interia. how i got so cold is a long story, but suffice it to say, my heart and spirit were broken. and hardening up seemed my only way to forge forth. and thus, i need some gentle rustling.
• i need intimacy and i need closeness and i need physical touch.
• i need quiet time and personal space in relationship, it's true. but that has manifested as such because i truly just need the freedom to be responsive. it has been my experience that people, when coupled or familied, become less responsive and more commitment-dependent, as if they have no choice but to follow the lesson plan laid out or agreed-to. this terrifies me. because i'm in constant assessment of how i feel, not by choice, but by nature. i like to engage when i'm feeling present and available. that's when the magic i have to commute can be dispersed, in any case. my desire to retreat or be alone comes not from disliking people or interaction with them, but from wanting to get back to the place where i can engage with them most authentically. and the fastest route back to that, for me, has been in solitude. but i'm always thinking of others when i'm in that quiet space! i'm the most community-minded, remarkably-introverted ambivert i've ever known.
• i need someone who is reliable and who shows up, someone who is honest and authentic and responsible and who holds himself and me accountable.
• i need someone with a grand sense of humor. who'll excuse all the silly things my body does and the imperfections is has (and herein lies my biggest self-consciousnesses) and who'll weather my giddy explosions of energy that come without warning or my quick plummets into silence/my own inner world. 
• i need someone who listens. who reassures me even when i don't ask for it. who can intercept my vata highs and bring me back to earth with a strong hug, a deep gaze and a quiet share of breath.
• i need someone who is utterly clear in their interest in me. someone who'll persist through the labyrinth that is 'getting close to keri' and not be deterred by the time it takes.
• i need someone who believes in and practices self-care
• i need someone who looks at himself in the mirror and feels the love. 
• i need someone who nows how to say no. to others and to me.
• i need someone who wants to get jiggy with me and who can fall utterly powerless when faced with my naked beauty and who enjoys shifting power dynamics under the sheets. 
• i need someone who earns money and has a roof over their head that is a space where i feel comfortable and cozy. 
• i need someone who is accountable to things in his life beyond me
• i need someone who likes cats. 
• i need someone who can eat and enjoy a fair amount of the food i make.
• i need someone who is truly and deeply kind.

want.

• i want to be somebody's valued and protected, prideful accoutrement; i want to live alongside someone comfortably and lovingly. i don't want to be someone's everything. but i do want to be someone's person.
• i want my partner to have a healthy community surrounding him that opens their arms to me when i'm present, but which is still a comfortable and nurturing place for him to be when i'm not.
• i want someone who can lie on my bed and dream with me. who can work alongside me creatively and quietly be with me. 
• i want someone who can handle my fluctuations. 
• i want someone who speaks my language and understands my history. 
• i want someone who says yes more than no, who smiles more than frowns, who laughs more than snarks and who knows how to build a fire. and use a drill. and how to cook a meal with kale, rice, and sweet potatoes. 
• i want our love to create a safe and inspiring space / example for our community.
• i want someone who doesn't play emotional games, but who'll certainly play board games and other fun games. 
• i want someone who loves music. and reads books. and drinks wine. and who laughs from his belly. 
• i want someone who has interests and passions that keep his fire burning; i want him to lose himself in his world from time to time because i certainly always will get lost in mine.
• i want someone curious and communicative who can express himself with a flair. 
• i want someone who's game to be my partner in projects. 
• i want someone who can call me out. and talk me down. and lift me up. and make me smile.
• i want someone to create traditions and ritual with. someone who moves soft and slow. who can explore with me sexually. and forgive me for lagging behind in experiences if that shows to be the case. 
• i want someone who reveres the earth and wants to live close to it. and who'll haul chicken shit into the garden with me and hula hoe the beets.
• i want someone real. and courageous. who'll consciously sign up with me as a partner in this grand adventure while understanding, of course, that there are no guarantees and that our time together may be long or short, and that we'll never know.
• i want there to be differences between us. and comfort in the places we overlap. 
• i want someone who, at the end of our journey, can say he loved me, and that he loved me well.