I don't convey that I can be moody or a perfectionist or that I'm a nervous person, but I am all those things. It's just not going to shine through when you're posting a picture.

What's the point of being sad?" he says. "We're here now.

i wish i could freeze this moment, somehow delay my final decision, and just hang here in the balance between two places, two worlds, two loves.

In days that follow, I discover that anger is easier to handle than grief.

You can run but you can't hide

I love him wholly and unconditionally and without reservation. I love him enough to sacrifice a friendship. I love him enough to accept my own happiness and use it, in turn, to make him happy back.

Maybe that's what it all comes down to. Love, not as a surge of passion, but as a choice to commit to something, someone, no matter what obstacles or temptations stand in the way. And maybe making that choice, again and again, day in and day out, year after year, says more about love than never having a choice to make at all.