last night on the way home from Griffith Observatory, a place where me and my boyfriend had been trying to get to for the last 4 1/2 years (just never seemed to work out for some reason), we were talking about something funny his daughter said. Then the thought hit me, how much he and I have been through together. We have made it through my alcoholism, some of the worst years of it he was there for, made it through my sobriety, made it through him finding out he had a 21 year old daughter and building a relationship with her, made it through a terrible illness with him, unemployment, me moving in, me moving out, numerous nervous breakdowns. We have both invested a lot in this relationship. This is Love. I have learned more about love, REAL love, universal, best friend, soul mate love from being with him, than I have learned from anyone else. We are lucky. Behind closed doors, we laugh, we play, we talk, we are grateful for what we have. We very rarely fight anymore. We have worked a lot out. A lot of people may look good from the outside, but behind closed doors it's no good. My life is not like that. And when someone you truly love is going through a very hard time, you don't bolt on them, there is no time limit to how long they are allowed to have to get it together. And you do that for eachother. You either accept things...or you don't. If there is more good than bad, you stay. Period. If you love, you stay. If they are your best friend you stay. Everything is not perfectly lined up on the outside, especially by some others standards, but, I am happy to be with my best friend. We accept and love eachother. Nothing is perfect, no relationship is perfect. But if it makes you feel good inside, and lucky and happy, and is realy LOVE....it's pretty rare.