Reminds me of something I wrote 11 years ago (and published here when I joined 4 years ago) as my Self Portrait Essay (circa 2013):

"I am a romantic. I believe in the existence of idealized love. I want it. I will find it. I want to grow old with my best friend, I want to walk down the streets of forever arm in arm. I want to sit on a park bench reading a book, her head in my lap reading her book as I stroke her hair. More important than sharing our highpoints, I want to share the mundane, and each other’s pain. That to me is true unconditional love....Those who say this doesn’t exist say so because they don’t have it.

I want the intimacy — the connection. “The purpose of a relationship is not to have another who might complete you; but to have another with whom you might share your completeness.” (From Conversations with God — Book 1)."

I'm still looking. Or waiting. As I'm not really looking. More, keeping my eyes open.

That self portrait covered a lot of ground. I added this intro last year:

"Do you fondly recall your firstborn? I speak not of children but of personal writing. This is mine and I love it more than anything I have written since. Doesn’t mean it’s my best piece, but it’s damn good, and some of it certainly feels downloaded and foreshadowed much that has followed. I covered a wide range of topics from heavy — substance abuse, depression, suicide, and codependency — to light — love, my children, my favorite foods, and my favorite music and lyrics. A true self-portrait in essay form. The good, the bad, the ugly — and the beautiful. I wrote it in December 2013. Published it on Medium in 2020. As Conni Walkup Hull reminded me yesterday when I read her You Don’t Need Permission to Tell Your Story, You own everything that happened to you, this is my story. A few of you have read it. I share it now with all of my subscribers (at least the ones that Medium will not fail to email) and I hope you enjoy it and get something out of it. I did. It’s my story."