… the half with the good stuff. I just want the fun, the feel-good parts. You know the parts of you that appreciate me, compliment me, validate me, mirror me. The parts that make me laugh, that fill me up. That make me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. The part of you that agrees with me. That likes to do what I like to do or if not, does it my way anyway. Just give me the easy half. That is all I am interested in.

Anything else, well … you can keep that part. I don’t want to have to think anything deep or heavy – much less feel. I don’t want to struggle and be challenged. I don’t want to have to negotiate and compromise. I don’t want to have to know about or live with your imperfections. And pleaseeee, put that mirror down. I am not interested in your pointing out my flaws.

So, just half, please. No full engagement for me. No genuine contact with our cores, our true selves. No real, messy, entangled, arduous human relationship for me. No, thank you. Rather, let’s just pretend. We’ll keep it light. Create distance. Bounce back to our safe spaces. Avoid real conversations. Whatever it takes, for God’s sake … but I am not going there. To those places that regress me to an experience of longing that feels insatiable; to feelings of hurt, rage and disappointment that I would rather not know about (much less show you); to spaces of dependency that involve risk and olden pain.