“There is nothing about love that rolls along. Love is neither tepid nor something that meanders. It is a tidal wave. It is an avalanche. It is molten lava in your veins. But all of those have their triumph and then settle. And it’s in the moment that they settle and you look to see the environment around you to know if you see something that is truly beautiful or if it is destruction that is unbearable to live with. Both are life changing.”
I walked down the road where the houses reminded me of Pride and Prejudice, Interview with the Vampire, and The Secret Garden. It was a hidden spot, my favorite spot to dream of being a ballerina and walk whimsically along imaging myself living in each house. This secret street was in the middle of a nondescript neighborhood that bordered what was once an undesirable neighborhood. There were ruby tulips lined up by the hundreds, the air smelled or iris's, I remembered my childhood. The next street was filled with scarlet poppy's, lemon and cream colored roses and lavish houses where I imagined artists and writers lived. I flashed back to a guy I once knew with onyx hair who was as mysterious as the occupants of the houses. He gave me a brass ring with a captivating green stone and faded Japanese letters stamped on the inside, which I never noticed until years later. It was the sweetest and only sincere gift ever bestowed to me from a guy and I felt the ring held such an entrancing presence that almost every stranger commented on it. I would flush as I accepted the compliments and eventually stopped wearing it because it reminded me so much of someone I never knew.