"So many questions without answers..."

I realize I just posted yesterday... Sorry for the overwhelming traffic on here. I'm just a HUGE fan of Tenth Avenue North's song "Hold My Heart" at the moment. Chorus lyrics are as follows:

One tear in the driving rain
One voice in a sea of pain
Could the maker of the stars
Hear the sound of my breaking heart?
One light, that's all I am
Right now I can barely stand
If You're everything You say you are
Won't You come close and hold my heart?

I don't connect with these lyrics so much for my sake, rather for the sake of a dear friend right now. I get frustrated when people I love hurt each other. Have you have realized that the person you love is not actually who that person is? It seems as though masks keep getting in the way. For a casual acquaintance, I feel I can brush it off easier... but when it's someone I'm close to, it cuts deep and guts me.

As an idealist, I think I tend to believe the best about people. I want to inspire them to be what I think they can be, and I always hope that by seeing them in light of their potential, they will internalize that potential and live up to it. Granted, I don't see EVERYONE for the great person they could become - and in fact, I'm not sure I'm really all that good at helping people GET to their best prospect - but I think I still reject looking for the negative in folks.

This might be why it's all the harder when that ideal illusion crashes like a glass bottle dropped from a 10 story building. Why are we SO prone to putting up masks? Why do those masks hurt so badly? I feel caught in a conundrum - once I recognize the mask, I don't know how to interact with it, because I'm really not sure I know what's behind the facade. What I know pertaining to this beloved is apparently less than reality - so how does that interfere with my relationship with them? I'm a firm believer that love is not exclusively a feeling, it's also a choice and choices demonstrated by actions. In that sense, I still love this person. But I don't KNOW them. So now it's like loving a stranger that I've been living with for years.

I'm not devastated - this is far from the first time I've seen the mask slip and realized I was looking at a fake face, but I think I've run out of the ability to continue deceiving myself. I feel more like there's a dull ache in a small corner of my heart - which is why, for myself and for the third person involved in this drama, I'm praying for the Great Comforter to "come close and hold my heart."