If I Could Keep Time In a Bottle

Time. Do any of us really know the value of it? If we can grasp the meaning, do we ever really hold on to it, and if we do, do we take full advantage of that wisdom? Time. It's the only thing we really have in this life. Time creates opportunities. Good and bad opportunities, its up to us which ones we throw away and which ones we venture. Time. It allows us to grow fellowship amongst ourselves, affect change, touch lives, and endure love. It also allows us to make mistakes. We measure time in seconds, minutes, hours, days, and years. We diminish what time gives us by these labels. We live for time, but in all the wrong ways. We all have to work, we all have to participate in school for a given amount of time. What do we do with the time that is not predesignated to our societal obligations? Do we cherish the seconds we have with the ones we love? Learn from the moments we spend with our enemies? Grow stronger from the days we feel weak? Do we dwell on the good hours, and move forward from the bad? It's impossible to live on the light side of these questions our whole lives.
Time. If time were measured in pain, the last few months of my life would have been the longest so far. I've had a broken toe, and gone through childbirth, but it doesn't compare to the pain of love. We don't enjoy love. We endure it. As I sit on my couch watching Hancock, a story of angels who turn mortal when they are together, and seperate several times over thousands of years in order to survive and protect the world despite their love, I am slightly reminded of my story. Many of you may know bits and pieces of this story, but no one, not even the other character knows the whole thing.
I lived for the longest time believing love could never truly find me. I took times opportunities and made mistakes. Mistakes that made me undeserving of love. I had my son, and I knew differently. I knew instantly love had found me, and that I deserved it.
Like most though, when I got what I needed. I decided that maybe I could have what I wanted too. I wanted a new approach, I wasn't going to hunt it, I would keep an eye out, but I wouldn't actively seek it.
What I wanted--he found me. I'd watched him for some time, and kept my distance, knowing his love was shared with another, but he found me. He kissed me and gave me love, and I accepted it, knowing it was someone else to accept. I was selfish, but what I had wanted found me, how could I not seize the opportunity time had given me? I soon felt guilty, offered to relinquish it all, without feelings of resentment. I offered the opportunity many times, knowing my gain was another's loss. He reassured me he had found what he wanted too. And time moved on.
The pain we caused another was too much for her. She fought hard, dirty, and won.
He returned to her arms to comfort her, keep her safe, sane. He left me, took away what I wanted. Ripped it from my hands. Took a piece of my heart with him. Holding that piece, he gives her love, compassion, and time. My heart is forced to watch it all. My heart sees her pain, but it goes much deeper than what he and I caused. Her pain causes his. My heart watches on, trying not to explode. It sends the images back to the rest of me that eat me away inside. Knowing I caused pain upon someone else, and that pain is causing my love pain, slowly kills me.
I'm promised his return over, and over, and over again without result. I'm dying, I can feel it. I spend so much time alone, I can share this with no one. My humiliation and shame create fear. No one can find out. No one can know what I did. No one can know what he's doing. What if I open up to someone and then he makes good on a promise. More humiliation. Explaining the time I spent in pain away because now I'm important again. For how long? How long before she needs comfort, safety, and sanity again? Will he save her again? Will he leave me alone again? Do I hold on, and for how long? How much time will it give me with him if I hold on? Is this worth the value of my time? Perhaps, I am not meant to love, and be given love.
I feel unworthy of his time, because most of it is spent with her. Yet I still long for time. Time with him. Time seems to be the only thing that brings me back to life a little. Until it's time for him to go back to her. Then I die. I can feel myself dying. I'm slipping away. He seems to know, a little time will bring me back, and uses it to his advantage. My love is so strong so deep for someone I wasn't looking for, someone who wasn't available to love, it's so inbedded in me that I'm willing to cause pain on myself just to have a little more.
The things he promises, the life he offers, to love my children, to have build and make true dreams together only deepens the pain. He tells me "what's one week, if I'm to spend my whole life with you." It's time love, it's time we can never get back. Every time he leaves, when my time is up, those promises, ideas are ripped away. I'm dying, I can feel my world caving in on me.
I realize I'm not dying. I'm losing love. It's slipping away. It's more painful than dying. I look at people who love one another, and burst into tears. No, I have to be strong. I can't show weakness. People can't know what I'm doing to myself. Time moves on whether I'm in pain or not. Emily, do not let people dwell on your pain, their time is much more valuable.
It's slipping away. Love is leaving me. I'm standing in a dimly lit road, I can see him in the distance. He isn't facing me. He's walking away. I'm screaming, pleading for him. My arms are reaching for him, but I can't move to him. I will do anything. He pauses, turns his head to the side. I know he can hear me. He keeps walking. Beyond him I see her. She's not screaming for him. She's not even looking at him! She doesn't see him. She's looking away, and he's still walking towards her. I've never been so weak. I've never avoided looking at myself in the mirror. I've been hurt before. Been able to look at myself and say I AM STRONG. I can't do it this time.
I'm ashamed to say anything. People know. People know I'm not myself. I'm not that strong woman I'm suppose to be. They see weakness. People who don't know me before this time know I'm weak. I've never had a problem hiding weakness. Even if I felt it before, I could disguise it as strength. I can't do it this time.
Is this a test to see if I deserve love? If I can make it through this, will it be worth it in the end? When will this be through? I'm told "it will be over before I know it." It feels like an eternity. I've been hurting myself for so long, can I hold on longer? Should I hold on longer?
I'm breaking. I AM dying. There's just a tiny bit of love left in me. Without love, we are dead. They are one in the same. I look at my kids, and for once, I don't feel love. The most shamful thing--I can't love my children. I have to feed them, change them, and make sure they sleep. I HAVE TO DO THAT. If there's any chance of loving them again, I have to meet their needs. If I'm not dying, I want to. What did they do? Why can't I love them? Why am I so weak!? Why have I allowed someone to do this to me? For love that doesn't exist?
He returns, and there's a bit of light, but its dimmer than ever. He leaves and it goes out. I'm in a dark place again. I'm screaming again. This time I'm not begging for him to return. I'm begging he doesn't. Pleading, please just give me peace. I need to heal, give me time to heal, you've taken enough. Please, just honor one wish, please. He doesn't. I'm cold. I feel empty. I'm dying and I know it. I just want an end, now I don't care what it is. Like a drug addict, needing a fix. I don't care what it is, or what it will do to me. I NEED it.
The opposite of love isn't anger, it is hate. The final stage of hate is indifference.
I think I'm there, and then he returns. He's holding a bag labeled "promises," and even though I know it's empty, I accept it when he offers it to me.
Hancock ends, for those of you who don't know, as I hope my story can end. You see, the reason God's paired angels need to be seperate, is because they become mortal, injurable, old, and die. They're drawn to one another, but make eachother weak. Hancock, and his paired angel reunite, and begin the process of becoming human. One of the ending scenes dipicts her telling him about his battle scars. How he's saved her so many times over thousands of years. How their love has always brought them back together, and always hurt them in the end. In order to save eachother they must be apart. She's shot, he feels it too. She's dying, and so is he. He looks at her, giving up his love for her, he knows he has to be apart for her to be strong again and survive. She's got her own life to live, and so does he. Their love is still real, still there, but being together is killing them both.
I can't explain why, but this is true of my love and his paired angel. By being together, even with love, they are killing eachother. Is it fair to make him know this? Do I just let him love and die? How can I watch my love die? Is there a way to make him see? See the value of time, he will--they will never get back? Fighting for his life is killing me.
I can feel myself dying. Now, I need to make a choice. Spend more time trying to save someone knowing saving them will take away love. Or save myself. Walk away, don't look back, and forge on alone. Who will lose love? It wasn't mine to accept in the first place, but it felt right. Selfish.
I'm faced with a decision I can't make.
Time. We never know how much we will get, and what it will offer us. All we can do is take advantage of the opportunities we see fit. Cherish time. Keep happy times in our hearts, learn from the bad times, but put them behind us. Spend time with our family, friends, children, and selves. Time is all we have. Quantity is the question. Make the best of your quantity.