REACHING THE SUMMIT

I used to think of life as a hill I had to climb. The only goal was to reach the top. And the top was where the ultimate reward awaited.
So every day, to me, was another step toward the goal. The only thing was I never really thought about what that goal, that reward, might be. I'd never really sat still long enough to ask myself one vital question: What is the real point to life?
I was as misguided, in a way, as many mount climbers: I was climbing my hill "because it was there," without pondering what the point was in that.
If you've ever climbed hill, however, you often can't really tell you've reached the top until you hit that point where you realize you are already going down the other side. And I didn't realize I'd reached the summit of my hill until it was too late and I already was heading back down the other side.
Because it turns out the pinnacle of my hill, and, thus, my life, was to find the one I was born to love. Isn't that really the point to life? To find someone to love and then to love them with all of your heart? Doesn't everything else pale in comparison?
So while climbing my hill I find her and I do love her with all of my heart. And without knowing it, I reach the summit of my personal hill. Only I don't get to stay there. I don't get to plant a flag, take a photo and record for posterity this achievement. Because before I even realize it, I am not just heading down the other side, I am falling down it, getting bruised and battered along the way. Because she, without intending to, has pushed me down it by choosing not to stay, not to opt for love, but instead picks security and safety over the unknown realm of love.
After rolling back to the very bottom, to the depths of the deepest valley, I now must decide if I want to rescale this hill, climb my personal mountain again. Do I have the desire, the energy? Do I even have the time to reach the summit again? Or will I try, and fail, to reach love again? For that matter, is love even at the peak of my mountain anymore? Or would this be just another fruitless and vain effort to grab for something that is so far beyond my feeble reach, a mountain too high for me to ever scale?
I don't have the answer yet. I'm still in the valley, assessing my aches and bruises and looking up at a cloud-wrapped summit, wondering if this climb is worth it. Wondering if love is still waiting for me there.