The Map That Leads to You

by J.P. Monninger

shrill

attendant was a young man with a triangular goatee.

snarl.

You said life happens here and now, and it’s a fool’s bargain to let something good go now in the hope of something better at a later date.

bona fide

gulley.

Only

when the heart needs rain.

aloud. He was a tall, severe-looking Australian,

I learned that love is not static; love does not divide. What love we find in this world is coming toward us and traveling away from us simultaneously. To say we find love is a misuse of the word find. Love finds us, passes through us, continues. We cannot find it any more than we can find air or water; we cannot live without either thing any more than we can live without love. Love is essential and as common as bread. If you look for it, you will see it everywhere, and you will never be without it.

know where he has to be. It’s spring, and he’ll be there. It’s here in

had given me hope and taught me to trust that life held surprises if you allowed it to reveal itself. You did not clutter it with camera shots and Facebook postings. You gave yourself to the situation.