I try not to worry.
I know life is going to bring yet more lumps and bumps and complications our way. It always has, always will. I try not to worry about it, though, because by now I guess I've figured out that I can make it through damn near anything.
Whenever things are going really well, I have learned to accept that this will not always be how it is.
Whenever things are going horribly and violently askew, I know that it won't be this way forever.
Mostly, though, life is an amazing watercolor composition of dark tones and bright, together on the canvas in equal measure. For every brilliant thing there is a lumpy thing, for every painful jerk on the leash there is a soft touch and a loving voice. We move forward and back at the same time in the most amazing dance there ever was: life itself.
Life was here before I arrived and it will be here long after I am gone and all will still be well in this world because -- well, because. It will be well. If I go through any single day that doesn't contain both a smile and a tear then I won't believe that day was complete. I would relive every pain if that's what it cost me to also relive every sweet, berry-luscious moment of joy. I would once again hold my raging child just to be able to once again hold her still-slick body, cord pulsing with shared life, against my naked breast and meet her eyes for the first time. I would cradle the body of my beloved dog and throw lumps of dirt on her once again while the tears flowed if it would buy me five more minutes of kneeling on the floor next to her generous body and putting my arms around her while she licked my face. I would go through every single broken heart and every lonely, tearstained night if it meant that I could experience the piercing, jolting, amazing realization of how incredible it is to be together with you.
The moments stream across my conscious mind in kaleidoscope fractals of ruby and gold and lapis, and as I remember every joy and every sorrow, I am comforted in the knowledge that life as we know it can be counted on to bring us both, though not always in equal measure.
So much in life is good. So much in life is pain. I need them both, without them I don't know how to breathe.
