The End; The Beginning

What a miserable week. Starting to say goodbyes to friends that are leaving London, many of which I will not be seeing again for a very long time. I myself am moving flats tomorrow, leaving my beloved Southbank behind to stay with friends in West Hampstead before returning to Canada in a couple weeks. I still haven't booked a flight, which is ridiculous, and adds so much stress to an already stressful enough chapter. My last dissertation meeting with my supervisor is tomorrow. I'm not prepared. I'm overwhelmed. And just trying to get packed is too much for me. How did I accumulate so much stuff? And how can I pack myself neatly into two suitcases?

The icing on the cake this week has been the break-up. Our two-month was (uncelebrated) about a week and a half ago. Things haven't been as good lately, nor have they been bad, I've just assumed that the problem was the typical British emotional unavailability, and that once that was overcome things would be better, like they were in the start. But I think I secretly knew that wasn't the problem; it just wasn't meant to be. I can tell myself that, but that hasn't changed the fact that I've been shocked twice now to find myself in tears, both times when talking to my sister on the phone. I'm not sure whether I'm crying over the break-up, even, or just the disappointment. This year in London has been so amazing, and simultaneously so laden with disappointment. I think part of the reason I was hoping this relationship would last over the summer until I returned to London in September, was just to finish the year with a blazing victory. To return home triumphantly in love. But there's no triumph in a love that isn't meant to be, and I know my heart will catch up with my head soon enough in that regard. I know I'll get over the ache, as I always do. It's always just so sad saying goodbye to people. Because yes, you say goodbye to all their bullshit and their ridiculousness and the things that piss you off and drive you crazy, but you also say goodbye to the qualities that captured your heart in the first place, and the ones that redeemed them in your eyes for so long, and the things you know are specific to them, specific to your time together, and untouchably special despite the way things turned out.

Sorting through all my junk and papers yesterday, while listening to a break-up mix CD I made for a friend in the spring, I came across a ticket stub for Breathless at the BFI from our second date, when we first held hands, a ticket for High Gate Cemetery, the day we had our first kiss, and a pamphlet from the Wetlands Centre, the date that confirmed things for me. It's been a great fling. And I think thinking of the beginning yesterday made me so much sadder about it all, but also so much more aware that things are no longer as they were.

And so begins another transitionary period. Yet another one.