and the soap opera of my romantic life continues

Being 34 years old and the mother of 4 children, I would so like my life to be about something other than romantic relationships right now. Actually, as I think about it--it mostly is. I feel very balanced. I pray and study my scriptures alone and with my children daily. I find ways to serve others on a regular basis. I do homework with my big kids and homeschool my 5 and 3 year olds. I work out. I go to school. I dance. I laugh. I write. Yet in the time left over.....

There is this relentless, gnawing, empty space in me still waiting to be filled. That divinely placed longing we all have to be with someone who loves, supports, and completes us. I sometimes wish I could make it go away. It can make me feel weak and helpless and less capable of just doing everything for myself, but I don't seem able to do much more than push it down for a time--and it keeps popping up. Like a person needing food, water, shelter, and sleep before they're able to progress, I am finding it increasingly difficult to settle into my life until I can get this issue of "love" resolved.

It's pushing right up against two years since my separation/divorce now. Any hopes I held on to of patching things up with Brad have evaporated. He has moved on....way, way on. I continue to extend the offer of "maybe, just maybe?" to him when I feel my heart telling me to do so, but he doesn't even respond anymore.

Here's my current track record and dilemma: Though we continue to maintain a friendship, the sting of having to let Haute Cakes Mystery Man go is still there. I do feel at peace with where I am now but it was sad to invest nearly 11 months into something I thought was going to end *happily ever after* only to have it cut short because I chose to put my boys' needs first (as it should be) and not move them away from their dad. Then--I knew it was a bit of a gamble to go into a relationship with Green Eyes knowing about our differing religions, but I decided it was worth the risk. (More on how that's all going later). And now, now another man has asked to have a chance with me....my best friend.

I was wondering if I should really write about any of this on my blog. Yet it is so pressing on my mind right now that it's hard to think of anything else. Besides, writing through things magically gives me more clarity than I can ever achieve just sloshing all this stuff around in my big bucket head. Any suggestions or feedback I get from caring readers who have been on all or portions of this journey with me is just icing on the cake.

So, over the next two days, I'm going to lay out the predicament I am in and hope that as I write.......an answer comes.