Is forever enough, is forever enough?

It constantly occurs to me that I don't give you enough of me. It's not for lack of trying; it's just that so many other people and things demand so much of my time. So I give myself to you in pieces, thirty-second snatches of all my love.

Still, you are here. Still, you don't complain. Still, I feel you buoy me up, even when you're not here.

I can't explain to you how much you mean to me, how you bolster my sanity. My occasional weekends with you are the glue that keep me held together. Sometimes tenuously, perhaps, but always together.

I love you, ok? I've loved you for a long time, and I expect to keep loving you as long as I live. I love the way you make me feel, and the way you make me smile.

Not too long ago, you sent me a text message that said "Come laugh with me?" I thought that text message summed up everything about who we are, about what we are together. What we love to do, and what we bring out in each other.

Laughter.

When I left our hometown, when I came to medical school, I knew it would be hard. I knew it would be hard being here. I knew it would be hard being away from you. I knew the work would be hard, the life would be hard, the atmosphere would be hard.

I didn't know how hard it would be. I didn't know how much this place would challenge me, would threaten to tear me apart.

I love you because you keep the forces that rend at bay. I love you because you send me messages that say things like "Don't take any shit," and "Everything will be fine, darling," and "Show me your tits." And I save them all.

I love you because you tell me to drink cranberry juice when I feel sick, no matter what kind of sickness. And you always make sure I feel better, insisting all along that it was the cranberry juice that did it.

I love you because you are silly, because you send me emails at 4 in the morning about puffins, and how you want one. By the next day, you've named our theoretical puffin "Brigadier General Waddles," and by that point, I can't do anything about it. Which doesn't matter anyway, because by that point, I want a puffin too.

I love you because you are what you've always promised you would be: loving, caring, attentive and there for me. I love you because you've never wavered, because you led me out of darkness, because you've been the one, and that is simply it.

I'm not saying that it's always perfect. I acknowledge that we have rough days, and that I sometimes end up yelling things on the phone, like "I can't do this" and "You are making me feel crazy."

It's true, sometimes--very rarely--you do make me feel crazy. But most of the time, I just feel crazy about you.