There's a Lobster Behind the Fridge.

I wrote this blog in my head while driving to yoga this morning and I have a feeling that it's not going to come out quite right. I mean, I sometimes try really hard not to write about things that are really personal to me (hence the recycling rant below) but at some point I just have to do it.

I was wearing our orientation green t-shirt and we were sharing a bed in Venice, Italy. I had known something was wrong for awhile, but admitting it at this point was impossible. I remember wishing I could go back in time to when things were good and clear. I think I've written about the break up with my college boyfriend and me before.

Months later, on a fall it's-getting-really-cold-soon night in Boston we were on my front porch at five in the morning arguing about being in each other's lives. He was too polite to tell me to just let go, but that's exactly what I needed to do.

I have this weird reoccurring daydream where I'm talking to my son or daughter (it changes, depending on the day) and we are up in my attic (it's the scary wooden one in Leesburg where I used to creep around trying to find old toys I had grown out of or Christmas gifts my mom had hidden from us) and we are going through a box of old pictures and we stumble onto this picture of me and another man and my son or daughter asks: Mommy, who's that? It's seriously that corny and unassuming. And I go on to explain who it was, that I loved him at some point in my life but that I love their dad now. And that's it.

I will be the first to admit I'm not the best at letting go of people in my life. After that argument on the porch we decided to not talk for a couple of months. Let things heal a little. It took our best friends wedding in North Carolina to bring us back together as friends.

And after that I dated my boyfriend from Boston for a year longer than I should have, to be honest. I didn't love and respect him the way he deserved and we both struggled with letting go in the end. And now he's got a job in Las Vegas and he's driving across the country on his way to take over the lease of my apartment. Even though I'm staying around Vegas for a little while longer, I'm excited to have another friend in this city. We can start over new.

I just got back into town last night from New Mexico. My mom and dad and sister were there, and we stayed in this little, Southwestern-style apartment. I knew my parents could hear the argument in their room, but I didn't care. I was back on that porch in Boston, but it was New Mexico vs. North Carolina in this one. Deciding to hurt each other. Because honestly, it was time to let go and I hadn't recognized that.

I woke up the next morning with most of all a sense of relief. My current daydream consists of an awkward Annie Hall moment in a bar in North Carolina months or even years from now. And I've had this one before. We are both exactly where we want to be in life, and after a great conversation over beers we finally relax, settle in, and then one of us has to go, so we stand up together, awkwardly sway in front of one another in an attempt to pick sides in a hug, and then turn and say good-bye. And this is at the very least.