Biting the bullet.

I've been lucky in that for many years I've been surrounded by people that know me very, very well. Sometimes that's wonderful because they know the context of all my stories, they know the characters of my life. Sometimes I have hated it because I can't hide. My face gives me away every time.

Recently, relationships have shifted. There are new characters in the primary plot line of life and some of the regulars are appearing less often. It's change at it's most fundamental. Even though it's been a tough adjustment in some places, I know that it's just as it should be in a lot of ways. 

I have a man in my life that's taking up a good deal of my time and emotional energy. He doesn't know all my stories yet. He doesn't know why one flippant comment from my mother can set me on edge or why seeing a rainbow in the sky completely makes my day. I realized just the other night that it will always be that way unless I start to tell him my stories - big and small. The small ones aren't hard - the time the chipmunk came up the toilet, the time I almost got thrown off a train in Slovakia in the middle of the night. It's the big stories that are hard. The ones that don't easily fit into conversation. The ones that aren't witty. I've been holding back a bit because I was scared to be vulnerable. 

Yesterday I bit the bullet. We sat on a blanket in the park and I told him parts of my hardest story. And you know what, it was ok. He heard me. He didn't run away or laugh at me. Being known may just be worth the risk.