The Meaning

I want this to be useful. It has become too easy to get lost in memories and emotion and pain, and though I have felt the need to just share it with you, and you with me, I have come away from the most basic thing I know I must tell you. Experiencing Love, living and dreaming with someone, then in the midst, learning they have suddenly passed has given me one simple ability. To know the way of the truly broken heart. I am not the first, nor the wisest, but I want to tell you in as basic a way as I can, there is a very simple moral code for nurturing the love you share with someone. Written as follows it is perhaps not purely unique nor perhaps even profound, but I believe it remains true and is a foundation for how we ought to BE with another person in consideration for their heart.

There are three main parts to this code:

1) Honor

2) Celebration

3) Nourishment

I would like to talk about each one individually in subsequent chapters, but for now, to give you a better feel for the idea, I would like to expand on the meaning.

1) Honor

Honor your partner as you would honor a best friend. Honor their trust for you, Honor them with your words and actions, Honor their life. That is also to say, do not dishonor them.

2) Celebration

Celebrate your partner for the best self they are striving to be. Focus on their most natural and positive qualities and help bring them closer to truly fulfilling them.

3) Nourishment

Be a source of health for your partner. Nourish their bodies with good food and passionate physical love.

To practice these principles in the best ways possible is not easy, of course, and does not guarantee you will not have your heart broken, or that the person you love will not pass, or that you were meant to be together for your entire lives. Such difficulties are inevitable. To practice these principles is to make a moral decision to grow the love you have found to the most beautiful expression of itself, and indeed, enjoy the fruits that such a love may produce in the warm seasons of your affection for one-another. Drawing from the things I may now only wish to express to my beloved, I hope to build a clear framework from which the creativity and uniqueness of each reader may be expressed to their partners from a position of truly rich intention - to elevate their partner, to cherish them, and to be someone they may trust.

In Honor of Edytka Marzena Wal, I humbly undertake to write this work to the best of my ability.
Every day is a struggle without you, Edytka.

Love,

Charles

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qds7M3jqtKA

The First Sleep

The first night we spent together I awoke in a cold sweat, and in a moment Edyta was sitting up with me. She placed her hand on my chest as I slowly realized everything was ok and I took a few deep breaths to try to relax. After a few moments we lay down again and she kissed me on the cheek and assured me as we both fell back into a deep sleep. I had not remembered that night in a long time. 

The next morning I cooked a good breakfast for us before walking her home through the park and across the bridge the western Engineering students had designed. It was very well built and as you walk across you can feel it bounce in rhythm with your steps. The river was low as it was summertime and the water rolled over the rocks hypnotically as we stopped to watch and listen.  

When we continued to the other side Edyta turned to me and told me she was sad. She would not explain why. 

We stopped anyway and set up her camera on the roof of an old car parked at the side. It was to be the first photograph ever taken of us together. With her sunglasses on she leaned back against me and with a soft smile she posed.

All I can hear is:

You can't resist her.
She's in your bones.
She is your marrow
. . .
You can't avoid her.
She's in the air. . .
In between molecules of
Oxygen and Carbon Dioxide.

Only in dreams
We see what it means.
Reach out our hands.
Hold onto hers.
But when we wake
It's all been erased.
And so it seems
Only in dreams.

You walk up to her.

Ask her to dance.
She says, "Hey, baby, I just might take the chance."
You say, "It's a good thing

That you float in the air. . . 
That way there's no way I will crush your pretty toenails into a thousand pieces."

Only in dreams
We see what it means.
Reach out our hands.
Hold onto hers.
But when we wake
It's all been erased.
And so it seems
Only in dreams.

Only in dreams.

Lyrics by Weezer