meet me at the beginning

ph: Anastasia Tailakova

I had been bugging my boyfriend to write me love letters for a few months (we've been long distance for 9 months now) and so for Christmas he gave me a moleskin notebook with a letter from him written on the first few pages. "It's so we can write back and forth to each other like a love journal" he said. Best gift. Anyways, it was my turn to write something to him. The problem was when I tried to write, everything was sad, I miss you, I'm miserable without you, I hate that we have stupid fights etc. I didn't want to immortalize the bad times and wanted to bring the joy back into our love instead of the sadness from being apart. So I wrote this poem/story about the first month of our relationship, when we were physically together, so that we could bring a little bit of that magic back.

For Thomas

This is the story of two young people at the beginning of love, one that has been told thousands of times before, but each telling is as special and novel as the very first.

We begin with…
Boy meets girl.
Boy chases girl.
Girl just wants to be friends.
Boy doesn't give up.
One year later, boy asks girl to the dance.
Girl says yes.

They dance, they drink, they laugh, they sparkle.
That night, they lay in each other's arms, wrapped up in the newness of it all.
He makes her hash browns and she makes him laugh.
Days become good and bright. Nights are spend in quiet whispers and heated discovery.
They fall together.
Reveling in the lightness, they flourish.
He is kind and passionate and understanding and confident and all the things she has wished for.
She is full of ideas, captivating and radiant.
There is no fear, no doubt.
They were dancing, each completely in tune with the rhythm of the other.
Perfectly imperfect.
Happiness was ours. Let's go back there, to simplicity, to tangled limbs and locked lips, to playfulness and bliss, to incandescent love. Meet me at the beginning.

With all the love I possess
Alexandra