Chess

I want to be loved.

No, I don't care anything about that cheap, tired old thing that men call love. I want to really be loved by someone. I'm very independent, so it's weird that I keep having these serial monogamous relationships that eventually end and I have to deal with that, but someday I want to know that I don't have to compete with a porn site. Someday I want to know that I don't have to compete with the memory of an ex-wife. Someday I just want to feel loved, without paranoia, without accusations, by someone who is so secure in themselves that they know with every shred of their humanity that I love them in return and will never do anything to hurt them on purpose.

I said I wanted to be single for the rest of my life, just focus on writing books, painting on canvas, working, taking care of my granddaughter, and making digital content. That was going to be my focus. Yet, I find myself remembering a teenage version of me; the one who still had the desire to be loved by someone who placed my needs above their own. I've not found that yet. I'm not on a quest to find it, either. I just want it.

I have to know about things. It's a natural curiosity that came with me from a past life, I think. I was born curious. I want to know more than just how a thing works, I want to know why it works in the first place. It's like chess. Before I learned how the pieces were set up, I had no idea how intricate the game was, and how interesting it is that I've been playing it my entire life in the real world.

No, no, I don't move "pawn" pieces around in order to manipulate the human world, that's not what I mean at all. I mean I am strategic and I think about things a lot and not only how it will impact me, but how it impacts other people. The game is as much to move yourself into an advantageous position as it is to keep those who are against your growth from forming an alliance to force you to retreat. I'm good at that. I've had to be good at that.

All my life I've had to position myself strategically where I can either advance or hold my position without losing cherished parts of my life. Sometimes it was a good thing, and sometimes I was at a stalemate and had to advance a knight onto someone's bishop, and remove him from the board. It was not because I wanted to, it was because they had positioned the bis

hop to take my queen; to put me in "check" or to in some way counter-move so I could not continue my way forward. I regrette

d having to do that, but watching that shiny black powerless bishop, standing alone and defeated at the side of my 64 squares, was in its own way rewarding and empowering.

The king and I will still be standing when all the knights, bishops, rooks, and pawns have been stacked beside the board. The king and I will be standing tall together, holding the rest of the world at bay, proudly, with our chests out; the rest of the world in "check", while we are inseparable. That's my dream. That's my goal. Someday, I shall have it.