anchor.diff:  ____
   
   
  -I have found it difficult to describe to someone what it is even like to be so long without it. People do not believe it. 
  +I have found it difficult to describe to someone what it is even like to be so long without love. People do not believe it. 
   
   Those same people who will tell you with great air of wisdom and authority of the importance of coming to terms with being alone will look in abject disbelief and respond with blank platitudes when I tell them that, for instance, every single romantic pursuit in my 34 years on this planet has ended in heartbreak.
   
  -The very notion of what that might feel like seems to so terrify them that the flee into cliche rather than confront the thought. 
  +The very notion of what that might feel like seems to so terrify them that they flee into cliche rather than confront the thought. 
   
   I do not judge them for it. I fled myself, in a way. I knew from a very early age that what I wanted more than anything in this world was love, and when more than a decade of my life came and went with only one disappointment and loss after another, I simply gave up for another decade. 
   
  
positive.code: 
  We love to cling to pride and declare our independence, to declare that we stand alone, but no one truly does. 
  
  And when that need is deprived, or warped, or broken and we stop believing that we can be loved, that is when we begin to walk a dark path. We cut ourselves off, from our emotions, from our humanity, from our fellow humans. We hurt ourselves. We hurt others. Sometimes, we can't even go on living. 
  
  
  [quote, The Arctic Suicides]
  
negative.code: 
  When I came out the other side, I found what had been keeping me alive: I still wanted love. And I was damned if I was going to die before I found it.
  
  Now, here on the other side of one of the greatest chances I have ever taken in my life, a chance I took ultimately in hopes I had found it, I once again found myself facing that same realization. I came all this way to find love and, ultimately, found only fantasy. Time to keep looking.
  
  
  [quote, Jim Butcher, Dead Beat]
  