The end.

This has been a summer of change. While we set out to capture the experiences going raw, so many other things were in transition at the same time. Madeline started working full time, I graduated and will be starting grad school on Monday. We've learned so much about ourselves and have grown in so many ways.

The biggest change occurred several weeks ago, though, and we've been dealing with the aftermath ever since. After 5 years, Madeline and I have broken up. It was swift and sudden, unexpected and devastating. Certainly we struggled with our fair share of friction inherent in a relationship, but I truly did not expect things to end this way.

Dividing a shared household is messy. I am moving out, into my own apartment, in one week. I am taking the two older cats, Ruthie and Naomi. Mad is keeping Fred and Ethel.

I am heartbroken, but committed to strength, creating a new life for myself and starting over. I am thinking about starting a new blog, single-girl-takes-on-the-world-kind-of-thing. Some cooking, some decorating, knitting. I will not post a link here, but leave me a comment or send me a message if you'd like to be notified. It's just an idea at the moment, though. It may not come to fruition.

The end of a relationship is like a death, in some fashion. The loss of what was, of who we used to be, and everything we had. There is no opportunity for reconciliation. We crashed and burned rather spectacularly. But I deeply mourn the loss of our potential. I wanted so much more.

I want to end this blog with a memorial of us when we were happy together.

November 2004, one month after we began dating:

May 2009:

The end.

-Eloise