Seven gray hairs. There they were, laid out emphasized on the black pillow right in front of me. Megan had plucked them out of my head the morning of my 23rd birthday. She held my face in her hands and said in the most genuine of tones, "Babe, gray is so beautiful on you."

"Then why the hell did you pull them out of my head?" My head still stung where the cluster of gray once had rooted itself.

She gathered the grays and drew them close to my cheek. "So I could hold them up to your eyes and imagine how beautiful you'll be when you're 60."

There was no question why I was wrapped in Megan's arms that day and every other day. She was the most kind and passionate lover anyone could hope for, and she was mine. I toted her around like a little-leaguer wears a medal after a championship. People would know about the prize I had won, even if they didn't care to. She did the same for me. Our love was obnoxious almost all of the time and we had no shame in that. We had the kind of love that others' are not lucky enough to share. It was the most mutual, honest love that could ever exist and was exquisite.

The I joined the Navy.

We wrote to each other every day while I was in bootcamp. She did not postmark the letters with her name as to remain genderless. Fellow bootcamp recruits wanted to know why I was getting an obscene amount of mail. Who cared that much about me? "Do you have a boyfriend back home? What is his name? How long have you been with him? What's he like?" After a few weeks of the pronoun game, I had to come up with something. I started calling her Murdock. It was random, but so random that it wasn't questioned. It worked and it stuck.

"Murdock is smart. Murdock works at a tattoo shop. Murdock is an artist. Murdock plays the base." I never called Megan "he" because she deserved more than that. Then came the question I was dreading.

"If you two are so in love, then why don't you have any pictures of him?" I asked Megan to send me a picture of her with a guy, any short, tattooed, dark-haired guy, so I could pass him off as my "Murdock." She snapped a Poloroid of herself posing with some random guy in the tattoo shop. I opened the envelope, looked at the photo and knew that this was where the lying really began.

I lied every single day about Megan from that day forward while I was enlisted. After losing any amount of integrity I had, and with a stiff prompting from my senior chief who had heard a rumor that I was a lesbian, I wrote a letter proclaiming my sexuality. The day I wrote that letter I had more pride than leather-clad bears dancing on the biggest float of the parade. I knew who I was and I didn't have to hide it anymore. Three weeks later I was discharged under Don't Ask Don't Tell.

Megan and I stayed together throughout the duration of my enlistment. She was my rock. My best friend. My (phone sex) lover. My everything. Once I was discharged, I felt like Megan was my Only-thing. Where had my sense of self gone? My pupose? My drive? My tenacity? My pride? It was as if they had all been discharged from my personality.

The feelings of shame and failure that conincided with the Navy discharge were unexpected and overwhelming I was not the same prideful person that I had been before. I had tucked my medal under my shirt because I had grown accustomed to hiding it. Instead of wearing her like a trophy, she became a weight around my neck. I resented Megan for supporting my discharge. I became upset with her for loving me when it was devastatingly obvious that I did not love myself. I broke up with her because she did not hate me.

It took years for me to regain my sense of self-worth and pride. Having a bad relationship with yourself is much like having a bad relationship with someone else. As long as you learn from the relationship, you come out stronger and more in tune with your own wants and needs. I know what I am worth and I am aware of what I have to offer. I am quite the "catch" if I do say so myself. I know now that I am worthy of being someone's trophy. When I find the right woman I plan to stand on the highest podium with her and let everyone know that she and I won first place.

I have Megan and myself to thank for this perspective of love. Without her love, I wouldn't know that love like that is possible. I've seen it in movies and read about it in all the 'Twilight' books, but love like that, (minus all the vampire stuff), really does exist.

Through the years of self-reflection, Megan and I have only spoken a handful of times. It is usually short and in passing. I ran into Megan two years ago while I was visiting home.

"Hey, how are you? Long time, no see. I like your hair," she said.

"I'm good thanks. You like it? I'm thinking of dying it black. My grays are really starting to show."

"Don't color it. Gray is beautiful on you."

She smiled and walked away. We haven't spoken since. As I write this, I'm still rockin' the gray hair.

Kristen