Timehop is an app you plug your social media accounts into and each day it gives you back your posts from that day in the past.

This morning a quote popped up from 7 years ago.

“You cannot live when you are untouchable. Life is vulnerability.” – Édouard Boubat.

What was I doing 7 years ago – or feeling – which made this relevant? I wish I could remember. Is it still relevant now?

For a long time I was a closed book. Often described as or accused of being cold, hard, harsh. Much of this goes back to ancient times. I’ve written much about my Dad and how he impacted my ability to form ‘normal’ relationships. If you don’t feel you cannot be hurt. It took me many years to drop my walls and allow people in. It took me decades to be comfortable with giving someone the keys to my heart. Years to trust someone, to love and be loved in return.

Seven years ago was the first time I was truly happy and comfortable living with someone and loving someone. And trusting them to love me right back. The good and the bad. Sadly I lost that person, but I didn’t lose me.

When Clare died I hurt. It was a physical pain and I despised that feeling as much as I embraced it. That pain meant I felt something. That anguish at loss meant there was hope.

Tennyson said, ‘tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all,’ and there is truth in those words which I didn’t want to accept when I loved and lost Clare.

I learned so much from her during our time together. She made me a better person. She taught me to be more accepting of my faults, more accepting of the faults of others. More capable of loving someone and more capable of accepting someone might love me.

Those lessons are as relevant now, seven years later, as they were back then, and perhaps this echo from the past serves as a timely reminder. I’m home with my family. With a woman I love and who inexplicably loves me. Through good times and bad times we have stuck together. There’s been challenges we have overcome and I’m sure there will be many more in the future. I’m not untouchable like I once was. I’m vulnerable and through that vulnerability I’ve found a life worth living.