IS OUR LOVE REAL?
HOW DO YOU KNOW?
"How do you know when love is real?" he asked.
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"Compared to what," she responded.
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"Say, infatuation, or a moment of weakness,
Neediness
Vulnerability?"
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"Have you heard the story of the Velveteen Rabbit?" she asked.
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"Maybe, but tell me."
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"Well the Velveteen Rabbit asks the skin horse
a similar question.
The skin horse says
That real
Is having your fur loved off.
When I first read that, I thought,
How sweet.
But then the more I thought about it,
OUCH!
So real love sort of implies
A little suffering,
A little loss of skin,
Bumps and bruises
Along the way."
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"So real love hurts now and then," he said.
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"Well, the pain comes from the journey,
Sometimes the uncertainties,
Sometimes the fears of
What have we gotten ourselves into,
Sometimes finding ourselves in the dark,
Sometimes feeling lost,
Sometimes not knowing which way to turn,
Those moments when even God
Seems to have no opinion.
We are left to ourselves
To make important decisions
That seem to hold
Our entire life in the balance."
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"You say it so well.
So
What do you think about our love?
Is it real?"
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"It is as real as the darkness that covers the day.
It is as real as the light that dissolves the night.
It is as real as our hearts
Keeping time together.
It is as real as this very struggle
To decide where to go from here."
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"Do you remember
When we climbed the mountain together?
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"Yes."
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"Well, so does that apply here?
These questions, these struggles, are they like the mountain?"
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"Yes,
Hand in hand,
We traveled the face of the mountain,
Discovering places
That seem almost unreal,
But real they are.
Places too high
For the fog
To cloud our vision.
Places where only God dwells,
The God we will someday
Stand before
Naked
To account for our love
For each other.