Dear Mr. Melissa Blake:
A reader posed a rather interesting question a few weeks ago...

How long are you going to write these letters?

Hmmm, I didn't know exactly how to respond. Maybe that's because, really, I've never given the question much thought. But I suppose it's one to think about. How long will I write to you? Another month? Another 6 months? Another year? Until we meet? Until we get married? I'm not sure. Usually, I cringe at the thought of uncertainty (as you'll learn, Sweetpea), but I'm OK with this unknown, at least for now. I'm not in any big rush to hurry up and finish writing these letters because writing them, actually, is half the fun. When I think back over all the letters (and there have been a lot, Sweetpea), I've honestly learned just as much about myself as I've learned about what I want for us and imagined what our life will be like together. Who says that has to end? Seems to me you can't ever really put a time table on that, can you?
Truthfully, maybe these letters don't have a definitive ending. Maybe it''s impossible to draw some neat little line and be able to say, "Yes, the story contained in these letters in complete." Because like these letters, life is never really complete. Our life story, I mean. I know, I know. There is a literal ending when we die, of course, but what about the time leading up to that? When can we say, without a doubt that, "Yes, I've made it. This is exactly where I'm supposed to be"?

Some say this whole life business is a linear process. I'm not so sure I agree. Because sometimes, we will regress. I know I have. Sometimes, we will jump ahead one step too many and get ahead of ourselves. I know I have. And probably more than once, we'll fight it every step of the way. Sometimes it's the scariest things in life that give us those special moments to reflect upon later in life, when we're old and gray and sitting on our front porch sipping our lemonade and chuckling at the crazy stuff we did as a bumbling youth - like the time I refused to eat lunch in the car in Arkansas on a 95-degree day out of principle. "Keep driving," I told my mother. Needless to say, I was near dehydration by the time we arrived at the hotel three hours later. Another lesson learned, I guess. What? I've never told you that story? Oh, just you wait, Sweetpea.
Searching. Exploring. Laughing. Crying. I suppose that's the transformative journey these letters have taken me on. And I don't intend to get off the ride any time soon, Sweetpea. Until we meet... xoxo

[Photos via Le Love

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