it was a long, drawn-out goodbye

it took me over seven years to get here, but i've finally arrived at goodbye. my patience and love have allowed me to weather the maelstrom for as long as i did. though now that i think of it, it was perhaps my hopeful heart that tethered me to that place. as if that relationship was ever fair, could ever be reasoned with. you fight with it, it promises change, and you endure more heartache because there might come a day when it holds you in tender, protective arms. it should have ended years ago. there was a foot out the door and one day left until uncertainty. and i turned around, back into the purgatorial sameness of invisible bruises and deep cuts.

oh sure, it wasn't without its moments of happiness, of laughing out loud at our ridiculousness. we could be content sitting in the dark, holding hands and guessing at each other's expression. we'd make up games built on make-believe to distract us from the truth that this wasn't working out, that this just wasn't going to last. sometimes the lies we told each other were so fantastic, so impossibly beautiful, we let their unattainable reality carry us away on pegasus wings.

but there comes a time (doesn't there always?) when enough is enough. and you find the strength in yourself to walk away, to jump without parachutes, to dive into deep darkness. fear of the unknown becomes less scary than wasting away in destructive comfortability.

and so here i am. day two of unemployment. and i couldn't be more content.
(get back to me in a month or two when i start worrying about paychecks.)

but for now, i'll bask in my liberation and revel in pursuing open opportunities.