How Did I Get Here?
The story of how my break up was the best thing I knew I needed… but took six months for me to follow through with.
***
When I packed my bags last January to move from Los Angeles back home to New Orleans, I had no idea what my life would look like.
What is life without him and his dog? What is life like cooking meals for one? What is life without having to lie and say you’re in the mood when you’re not?!
Verdict: pretty dang incredible. But I didn’t know that then. In truth, I was devastated, and my heart was, for the first time in my life, positively broken.
The decision to end my relationship of nearly four years was not an easy one to make. It actually took me six months to decide if parting ways was the best thing to do. I became accustomed to having a partner, someone who would be there to help me if I needed it, someone to travel with, someone to split the grocery bill. I got wrapped up in living our life that I forgot completely how to live mine.
My ex-boyfriend and I met in New Orleans in 2015. He moved to Washington, D.C. for work, and I followed. Two years later, in June 2018, we moved from Washington, D.C. to a town outside of Los Angeles. He was military. He moved a lot.
A couple of weeks before the cross-country move from D.C. to California, my ex took me to Puerto Rico for a weeklong trip to meet his extended family and celebrate our three-year anniversary. I was beyond excited. I couldn’t wait for him to show me where he spent his childhood. I couldn’t wait to explore the beaches and eat delicious food. But, most importantly, I absolutely, positively could not wait to meet his family.
And I did.
And it went really, really well.
For an entire week, we spent our days running through the streets of Puerto Rico, hopping from town to town by car, boat, and even airplane. You went to school here?! You worked there?! You had your first kiss HERE? I’d say, as I marveled at the new world I was discovering. We drank Medalla Lights and listened to live music. We snorkeled, drove through winding roads in the countryside, and kayaked on the bioluminescent bay. I got a manicure with his mother and drank coffee with his father in the mornings. His cousins were sharp and made me laugh, his godmother reminded me of my own, his uncles were loud, and his niece was adorable. I met his younger half-sister and both of his grandmothers – one of which gave me her blessing.
I felt comfortable. I felt accepted. And, even though I was in a new-to-me environment surrounded by strangers who mostly spoke a language I could barely interpret, I felt at home.
There is a moment, however, that is still embedded in my memory from my time in Puerto Rico that I soon hope to forget. Not because it’s unpleasant, but because it is no longer mine to have.
I was sitting on the patio surrounded by his entire family, mingling as lunch was being prepared. His father looked at me and asked, “What are you drinking?” I held up a glass of vodka and coconut water, which was a concoction I was introduced to by my ex’s cousin, and a drink the whole family enjoyed. His father grinned from ear to ear and walked up to me and hugged me tightly.
“There you go, girl,” he said. “You are good for my son.”
He said this several times throughout our trip there. You are good for my son. Take care of my son.
The part I want to forget isn’t the joy that swept across his face when he realized I was drinking the family’s drink, and it isn’t the part when he told me I was good for his son. The part I want to forget is the moment when I thought that he could one day be my father, too.
And the part where I wanted it and sometimes still do.
On the evening of July 4, our three-year anniversary, I hoped we would get dinner in San Juan, just the two of us. I imagined an entire scenario of strolling down the cobblestone streets hand-in-hand and dining outside at a sweet, romantic restaurant. Maybe we’d share a bottle of wine while we fantasized about life in California. Maybe we’d reminisce on the years we had shared together and the trips we had taken to Ireland and Germany and New York City. Maybe he’d tell me that this trip, for him, had been perfect.
My fantasy took control, as it sometimes does, and I envisioned him proposing. I could see it so vividly.
We’d be walking back to our hotel after dinner, slightly buzzed from the booze and trying our best to navigate the winding streets, like that one time in Ireland the year before after the sixth Guinness did us in.
“Where are we going,” I’d ask.
“Trust me,” he’d say.
And I would. I always did.
He’d lead me to the part of town that overlooked the San Juan Watchtower. It would be nighttime, and the sky would be filled with music from locals playing their instruments on every street corner. He would hold me and tell me how much he loved me and how special this trip was for him. We would kiss. I would stand on my tiptoes and hug him tightly around his neck like I always did.
And then he would kneel down on one knee, take out a ring, and he would ask me to be his wife.
And I would have screamed yes.
But none of that happened.
Instead, we argued on the evening of our three-year anniversary because no plans were made. We didn’t have a romantic dinner with a bottle of wine. We didn’t take a nighttime stroll through the winding streets. There was no Watchtower.
We went to bed that night facing in opposite directions, and I knew, on that summertime evening in San Juan, that he was not the one for me. He was not the man that I would marry.
Six months later, on New Year’s Eve, we ended our relationship. Two weeks later, I packed the final box into my car and drove away from the blue and grey house we chose together. Four days after that, I arrived in Louisiana and slept on my mother’s sofa. Two weeks later, I moved into my new house. And, now, five months later, I am launching this website, writing my first novel, and living and practicing what I have preached for so long, which is:
You are worthy when you are single.
You are worthy when you are not.
You are worthy of living a life that makes you proud.
You are worthy of living a life that excites you.
You are worthy of living a life that gives you energy and makes you cry tears of joy and not tears of sorrow.
And you are worthy of a fairytale happy ending that has absolutely nothing to do with a partner.
And if you’ve a broken heart, know that it will not last forever. There is beauty in pain. There is light in darkness. There is life on the other side of heartbreak that is even more incredible than being proposed to in Puerto Rico. Because the life on other side is all yours. It’s all for you. And it is waiting.
I’ve been living back home in New Orleans and embracing my single life now for seven months, and I have never felt happier or healthier. I am grateful things didn’t go according to the plan I had just one year ago, because then I wouldn’t have any of this. The good stuff. You know the stuff.
Today is July 4, 2019. It would have been my four-year anniversary.
Instead of celebrating what would have been, I am celebrating what is.
So, Happy Anniversary to me!
Today, on July 4, 2019, I celebrate the relationship I have with myself and the woman I have become since leaving behind a life that no longer served me.
Today, I celebrate my worth. It is infinite, because I am infinite.
Today, I celebrate my talent, my voice, my remarkable strength, and my passionate heart, for these are the qualities that carry me when I feel like I cannot take a single step more.
Today, I celebrate that heartbreak I experienced seven months ago. I nurture it. I wrap it in a big, satin bow and flaunt it like it’s strutting down a runway.
Because it is part of me, and, therefore, I love it.
Because it has led me to me, and, therefore, I needed it.
Because it shook me to my core, and I needed to reawaken my potential.
Take your broken heart, make it into art.
So, that’s exactly what I did.