Of Love and Lenses

She was the kind of girl who’d do anything for a photograph, and do anything to stay out of one.

He believed in the beauty within everything.

She stood on the edge, the sun beaming down on her, her hair blown askew by the breeze, face half hidden behind an SLR.

He watched from a close distance – she would be the piece de résistance to his collection.

She’d always been the one to turn away, shun the camera when it came for her.

He found her entrancing.

There was something about the connection they shared – the one she refused to acknowledge. It was something he couldn’t explain. Yet like the motion of a fast shutter, she’d move in the corner of his visual field and he’d be frozen. Something about her made his world stand still.

Sneaking up on people for that natural look had taught her enough and her reflexes were so on edge that he’d never been able to even get a blurred motion trail of her on camera. She was a shadow – here one second, gone the next -  always there, a haunting.

She spoke not a word but her beauty spoke to him. The light in her eyes with the rays of the morning sun, the small smile that played on her lips when she viewed life in playback mode, the essence of peace and magic she seemed to radiate at those fleeting moments when their gazes happened to converge.

There was something about the way he looked at her that gave her tingles. Maybe it was that gentle, reassuring smile he always seem to have on his face when he saw her. Maybe it was the fact that unlike anyone else she’d ever met before, he actually seemed to care.

She turned, he looked, he smiled – she smiled back.

It was almost as if she was calling to him. He couldn’t see her anymore from where he stood and so he moved closer. There she was, standing on the edge like she always did, smiling to herself. The smile that stopped time. When it felt as if though the world around them was standing still, he lifted his camera and clicked. He looked down at the LCD and then at her, her small smile that was almost invisible, but present, nevertheless, as always. It was what he always imagined – nowhere as captivating as she really was, but close enough.

There it was – beauty.

Watch your back.

The world is full of evil. One wrong turn, one blind eye and that could be the end of life as you know it. Tread with care. And watch your back.

1 Corinthians 13 : Revised

“Love is patient; love is kind
and envies no one.
Love is never boastful, nor conceited, nor rude;
never selfish, not quick to take offense.
There is nothing love cannot face;
there is no limit to its faith,
its hope, and endurance.
In a word, there are three things
that last forever: faith, hope, and love;
but the greatest of them all is love.”

Love is patient if you are not taking up too much of its time, love is kind when it has a reason to be.

Love will envy another if it is not satisfied with what it already has.

Love will boast out of pride – and also out of arrogance. Love will be rude if something gets in the way of its happiness.

Love will be selfish in seizing the best of everything for itself, will not only take offense but give it back.

Love will surrender if the pain is too much for it to bear.

Love’s faith is easily shaken and will not withstand the elements.

Love will give up hope and cease to exist, much less endure, if times are too trying and the winds of fate are too strong.

In a word, there are three things that are meant to last forever: faith, hope, and love;
Faith so easily shaken, hope so easily shattered,

And love, so easily lost.

HOW

The question is not who we choose love but how we choose to love them. 

We can love anyone, it's one of the few things on this earth where the choice is freely ours. But how we go about it is another story all together. 

People claim to love someone with all their hearts. God, you can love someone with all your soul and the very essence of your being.  Your love for them could consume you to the extent that you are no longer living to love them but loving them to stay alive.

But are you loving them right? 

Are you giving them the love they deserve?

Most importantly, do they deserve your love?

You may think that someone is the one for you. All the signs may seemingly point in that direction. Everyone might tell you that it's going to last forever...until you get hurt. Then you realize that they were never worth all the trouble, they were just a waste of your time. 

I am in no position to dispense such 'advice' and these are mere ramblings. I have zero experience in the field yet most pieces are compiled on empirical evidence - none that is mine, of course. 

Exteral Scarring, Internal Trauma.

Ramble.

People say one thing, mean something else and do something entirely different.
Who do you believe?
Or do you believe? Better then to just not believe anyone.
What you don't know won't kill you. 
For a while, at least.

Off.

Loyal as a dog, the saying goes. Or something to that effect.

Well, Sam.F was right. You take the time to listen and then it's that same dogged loyalty that turns around and breaks you down. And the worst part of it is, your loyalty blinds you to everything that is really going on. It blinds you to the extent that you keep making the same mistake - over and over again.

Life's a bitch.