i sorta knew it was forever
I hate summer. I’m from an ever worsening climate disaster of a tropical paradise but you could call it what it is: a swamp. You and I always talk about how summers aren’t like they were when we were kids—both of us spending hours in different bodies of water and avoiding our moms with the sunscreen. Now it’s hot. It’s humid. It’s disgusting. We call ourselves indoors kids with a sense of pride. Wake us up when the air is crisp, when you can wear clothing without sweating through it.
Yet that’s exactly where you came from, the heart of summer, an August Leo if I ever saw one. The summer before we met, I saw the movie Beginners (2011) in theatres one afternoon on my own, a revelation for many kinds of people but especially for me: a lonely only child who wasn’t sure what I was looking for. The movie put into words something I understood deep down: I wouldn’t settle for a giraffe or anything at all except a lion. I had no idea what a lion was then but I’d know it when I saw it. Pretty soon, there you were.
Falling in love is easy, especially with you. I’ve fallen in love with you more times than I can count. You are kind and generous and funny and brilliant. You’re silly and gentle, you’re thoughtful and creative. We’ve spent almost 18 months constantly together and we’ve had our testy moments but I’ve fallen in love with you for some reason or other every single day, in small mundane ways that feel altogether important, like the vegetables and fiber of our relationship. Putting together this mix, this project, this overwhelming behemoth of a birthday gift, has had me falling in love with you again every single time I heard from yet another person who loves and likes and respects and admires you. Seeing you not just from the perspective of being your wife or the person who sees you every day reminded me how special and incredible you are.
Like I said, falling in love with you was easy, the most wonderful surprise of destiny; letting you know and love me every day was and is the most terrifying decision of my life.
you must decide to risk your heart for love to find you
I pushed all of my feelings down for years and smashed into other people without letting my walls down. It was huge and risky to even think about being vulnerable, asking for what I needed, opening up in ways where you’re not in control. Everyone jokes about the mortifying ordeal of being known but it’s Ari Aster levels of horror for so many of us. I let you love me right away but did I let you fully know me in my messy and damaged and traumatized ways all the time? No. Do I even struggle with this now, with the fear that something will be the final straw that pushes you away? Absolutely. It’s a risk but it’s worth it every single day—you are worth every risk, this is worth any risk.
I’ve known you for all of your 30s. I’ve seen you become you but who am I kidding? You’ve always been you. You’re just getting better, you’re getting more comfortable, you’re showing off as you run circles around the rest of us. We are not where we thought we’d be a decade ago but somehow this is even better. It feels like a gift to face the completely unexpected again and again with you and not just get through it together but grow and become better together in the same direction, in ways that complement each other. I know it’s because we’re lucky but I also know it’s because we face whatever comes our way—we take the risk together, hand in hand. You are my destiny but we are a decision we make every single day.
I was a girl when we met. Maybe not technically but emotionally that’s where I was. A lot of loss, a lot of tough stuff, but still in a reactionary, defensive place about everything; it’s something I occasionally struggle with still. You and I are not the people who say that one of us saved the other or even saved each other—we aren’t those people. But you are the person who told me I could save myself, who stood next to me as I figured out who I was and what I wanted. I don’t think I become who I am without you or at least not with this much love and this quickly. Thank you for loving me unconditionally; thank you for showing me what it’s like to be loved unconditionally.
You put this song on one of the first mixes you made me and I loved it. You’ve gifted me with so much perfect music over the years that this slipped into a pocket of my brain for a few years where I forgot about it. When it turned up in this month’s People’s Pop poll, it swam back to me and I remembered the very specific feeling of falling in love with you despite my past, my fears, my absolute terror of being hurt or harmed or just actually known. More than that, I remembered how lucky I am to even know you let alone go through life with you. The world’s on fire, a pandemic rages on, capitalism is destroying us all, but my life, our life, makes sense every single day I wake up with you. You’re my summer, the one we used to have and love; now we’re together in the water, sun warm on our shoulders, avoiding the terror of being alive at this moment in history just for a little bit, just for a little longer.
when you’re with me it’s always summer
