I was twenty when he walked into my work. He had chin length brown hair, was short like me and when his eyes found mine we both seemed to know: this is someone. My decades-later mind says he wore Vans and a rumpled button up — can’t remember what was said but it felt immediately clear we each thought the other was hilarious and cute. We had a similar weirdo friendliness; he reminded me of some long lost lover meets ancient best friend. We exchanged numbers and a few weeks later he invited me to his piano recital at the local community college. I remember having nerves like never before as I paced the lobby of that recital hall, too overwhelmed and awkward to go in. I used my high school era brick phone to call my mom in a feigned catch up call — one of those quick “I love you”’s in case I die and she probably knows something’s up but oops gotta go. I forced myself to walk in and watch this creature play piano. Some details have gotten foggy but I succinctly recall never having had such a sharp, mutual connection with someone — such kicks we got out of each other, and he was genuine, thoughtful … I was having that thing where when around someone funny, I get extra excited and maybe a little out of control. I remember driving us into a parking garage and amid our jokes, ripping up my ticket animatedly in front of the attendant, thinking they were saying we wouldn’t need it — they’d in fact said it was the only thing to get us out; somehow we bargained and cackled our way back to his parents’ house in South Los Angeles. His room was in the garage and as we sat on his little bed, I had a sudden urge to cover the horrifying vulnerability creeping over me by kissing him. (Isn’t this what you do with feelings?) He obliged, but wasn’t excessively interested. He liked ME, and eventually I drove home thinking fuuck. Raphael.

For me, home was a fairly new friend group’s punk apartment in Hollywood that I crashed at most of the week. I kept a retro suitcase filled with clothes (mostly 60’s dresses) in my trunk, driving back sporadically to the apartment in North Hollywood I was still technically a tenant at, though I was rapidly growing more distant from my old dance friends who I had rented it with.

My new comrades had felt like a godsend when I’d found them. A co-worker had introduced me one night to Justin and Kevin — cool, cute punk guys who I immediately hit it off with. These two took me in as one of their own and within days I was an unofficial roommate. We spent nights listening to The Stooges and took the bus to Echo Park every Sunday for Morrisey dance parties. I have fond memories with this group (so much dancing, and beneath our attitudes, sweetness) but somewhere buried deep, I knew I’d begun sacrificing parts of myself in order to fit in. In the few photos from this period I scowl desperately at the camera (I would then excitedly post these examples of who I now was to my Myspace page.) I started limiting my wardrobe to pieces that would look best with the group’s punk aesthetic (how we stalked around the grocery store getting looks!) and drank my weight in 40’s or cheap champagne every night. I hung up before saying goodbye now, as one of my new friends did, and found myself in questionable situations like having promised to help someone’s friend move out of a drug-addled Hollywood building, only to get wild harassing voice messages for months. Less than a year and a half earlier I’d been a girl who danced emotively to Ani Difranco. I loved literature and my childhood cats and offbeat humor with my brothers. I was evolving and trying to find my place in the world, but I’d hardened and this wasn’t meant to be the final stop. 

The afternoon after our date, Raphael called. I was at my friends’ apartment and dashed to the parking lot to answer. “Helloo?” I said, already trying to remind him how funny I was. “Can you believe how much we liked each other?” he asked, laughing. My heart both rose and sank, and the rest of the conversation looked like me numbly trying to get off the phone, and the coming weeks entailed me avoiding his calls, maybe picking up once to lie about how busy I’d been, and eventually him understanding my silence for what it was and never calling me again. Isn’t that a sad ending?

I had a similar, but slightly less devastating scenario less than a year later. A nice, so cute young man ALSO walked into my shop, and we went on a magical date and he brought me soup when I was sick and I told him he should come to Portland with me someday but soon panicked and stopped answering his calls. Not long after Raphael I’d gotten a DUI and some internal shift had begun — I’d started hanging out with co-workers who would become lifelong friends, and I was myself more —  but some things were still the same old. 

I would hear occasionally that Raphael had visited my work on my days off. Two years later I’d be on a brief stint back in Portland when my best friend would text that Raphael was in my old shop. I would stop what I was doing, call my friend and demand that he immediately handwrite a note reading something like:

RAPHAEL, 

I’m so sorry I was so awful to you. I really wish I hadn’t been. I really hope you’re good. Love, Sarah

As requested, my friend would repeat on loop precisely what Raphael had done about the paper he’d been handed, which was kind of look at him weird … read it … look at him indecipherably and a few minutes later … walk out of the shop.

When I was about twenty-seven I’d be outside the juice bar in Silverlake and see Raphael ambling down Sunset (only a few feet from me!) with a baby strapped to his chest. He’d grown up, looked like a man now. We made eye contact and I’m fairly certain he didn’t recognize me — I’d gone through many looks by then — and then … well, that was that.

In the time that had passed I’d undergone a few relationships, many casual dating situations and several karma-like instances of the same behavior I’d offered Raphael and others being delivered back to me: undeniable, powerful connections leading to someone running … it was making me a little sick. At twenty-nine I’d be meeting Nolan, the father of MY children, and I would try to do that (run) but he’d gently push back, eke his way in and we’d go on to live very happily together.

It’s easy to comment how when I was young, I knew nothing, but many of my issues have stuck around as long as I’ve been willing to ignore them. It’s been difficult dismantling the belief that people I date should fit into how I think my life should be: Raphael was authentic, and the jaded persona I clung to with my friends would have needed confronting with him in my life. Or Nolan — when we met I was so certain he didn’t align with my hyper focused pursuit of indie film success until I (fatefully) realized I wanted to have children with him. Mostly, though, it comes back to self-love. To this day I harbor crafty suspicions that people who want to love me are surely out of their minds for doing so, or a debilitating fear that if a particular love isn’t to work out, I somehow won’t be able to handle it. Yet I’m more aware than ever that if I’m too afraid to sit with myself and to allow love in all its articulations — to live my life with me fully in it! — there will always be continued possibility of my future self realizing down the line, “You missed it.” 

I don’t want to miss it. 

When I was five days past my thirty-ninth birthday — only a few short months ago — I met a man at a party who would quickly become a close friend. We wound up working on the same theater production, were both in open relationships and immediately established a dynamic where we went deep, honest — no fluff. I told friends I had a strange little crush; I hadn’t thought I was attracted to him but there was just something about him … I couldn’t put my finger on it. The first time we kissed it became wildly clear that we had a strong physical connection, and it was one brimming with love. He and I hadn’t known each other long; I felt uncertain about the situation and often imagined myself holding one, if not two, protective hands in front of my chest around him. Early on he used the word “we” and I launched into a lengthy tirade. He let me know he could make time for me once a week and I actually laughed. Why would we need to see each other so often? 

About a month ago I told him I couldn’t look at him anymore because my feelings had become so gushy, it felt like love poured visibly from my eyes. (Isn’t anyone keeping watch in there? I ruthlessly inwardly demanded.) I’ll say that letting someone in — even a person I wasn’t thoughtlessly chasing; someone I’ve really taken time to sit with — has been frightening, painful and often “two steps forward/one step back.” I’ve had to look at my tendencies of resistance, my fear of having good things — and of one day, losing good things — and very often felt off my rocker and not up for any of this. Yet over the past few months my life has undeniably become better. Brighter. Having another beautiful, supportive partner has shown me all that is possible when you follow a deep inner “yes.” 

I can’t claim to know what the future holds, and some days it feels like nine steps back. This person is patient; he’s made it clear he’s here for friendship if it ever needs to go that way — has made it clear he’s here for ME. In the meantime my therapist continues to commend me for “choosing living!” in the face of the inherent uncertainty we sign up for when opting to exist truthfully with someone — for saying yes to a life that may go against the grain and come with insufficient blueprints, but also offers payoffs by way of increased love, community and connection. 

In the face of the unknown, choosing living feels like an act of insanity and also total love — love not only for another, but also myself as I continue to trust myself and surrender as much as continues to feel right — to stretch, to grow, to unfold.