I poured iced coffee into a jar yesterday afternoon and thought about Virginia.

It was 40 degrees and sunny outside, and my apartment was clean and I had fresh tulips sitting on the table, still waiting to fully bloom. I love living in Minneapolis, I really do. There's something about the city and the people and the food that makes me feel extremely understood.

But I don't have anyone to run with here, no one to drop by for tea on a random afternoon. These past six and a half months with Rob have truly felt like a blessing--like a chance to make up for the time we might have lost over the year that we were so far from one another--but there are days where I think we both would love to just have one or two of our best friends around for drinks or a laid-back weekend brunch.

I know that at some point, I will have to stop fantasizing about the time I spent as a student, because there is never going to be another time where all of my friends can drop what they're doing to just hang out. Shawna and I won't always just have an hour or two in the middle of the afternoon to meet for coffee, or decide to drink a pitcher of mimosas on a porch, or go on a quick run down our favorite trail in Charlottesville. There isn't a realistic new version of the story where Tina and her sister and I go to lunch and then spend the rest of the afternoon all cuddled up together in my bed, watching some episode of Grey's Anatomy.

But these are my favorite memories--the ones where I meet my mom for lunch every day and hang out with my dad on the lake every weekend; where almost all of the people I love are just an arm's reach away. I carry them with me everywhere I go, to every place I'll ever call home. And maybe one day, I can return to that world for good and put them down on a mantle somewhere, where they will be safe and I can start to make new ones.

Minneapolis might understand me, but Virginia knows me.


This post is in response to the following prompt: "What's been on your mind? What have you carried and gnawed over?" (From Old Friend from Far Away, page 154.) If you've written a response of your own, please share it below in the comments! 

It smells like winter to me, that lotion, so once I put it on I crossed my arms over my face and breathed in deeply, remembering the really tall but wobbly air mattress we used to sleep on and the kitchen with barely anything in it that he shared with two other guys. Chilly afternoons with friends and dinners out in DC, loud bars at Halloween and high heels at holiday parties, sad Sunday afternoons filled with naps and extra kisses and four hour drives into the night.

They were days full of friends and full of fun, but they were days that sometimes felt as though they'd never end; like we'd always be separated by our jobs and the cities we lived in.

But now we have this place together, and though it sometimes also feels transitional, there are flowers in vases and all of my books are on a shelf and we share a car and say things like, "What do you want to do for dinner?" because after a day of work, we are together. And I wake up on Sunday mornings with nowhere to go and I put water on the stove for coffee and think, this is our life. And it is so good.

I'm visiting Rob in Minneapolis this weekend, which will be the last time I visit before I live there.

It's hard to believe that almost half a year ago, Rob booked a one-way ticket to take advantage of a great opportunity and that, for the past five months or so, we've been separated by airports and layovers. And it's even harder to believe that it was a year ago that he packed up and moved to DC, and I made the decision to stay put and see where his first project would be located.

Minnesota was never something we planned on, but it happened, and in the long run, it's going to be so, so good. I am thankful for this year of distance--it gave me the opportunity to land a great job, make some amazing friends, and become more independent than I ever thought I could be.

There is a lot of joy and excitement in this move of mine, but that does not mean that the transition will take place without some sadness or a few growing pains. I've never lived much more than a two-hour drive from my family and most of my friends. And then there's Rocky. The past year that I have spent at home with that dog has been such a gift.

In January, a vet diagnosed him with kidney failure and gave us a grim three to six month life expectancy. Now, six months later, he's no different. He runs, plays fetch, swims in the lake, and makes me laugh every day. Sometimes he has trouble getting up after a nap, but he's 14 years old; and although I tried, there's no use putting my life on hold to maybe watch him die. I think he'll be around for plenty of visits to come, and I have to stop making decisions (or, rather, refusing to make decisions) based on fear, which is something I have become very good at so far in my adult life.

So here it is! I turned in a formal letter of resignation at work yesterday. I'm hitting the road with my mom and my brother at the end of July and should be moving in (and seeing The Postal Service play live!) by August 2.

Minnesota will be my--finally, our--home for at least the next year. I am excited and scared and so incredibly happy. It's bittersweet, to pick up and leave everything you know to be with the love of your life every day. To be in Virginia with your family, and say "Minnesota!" without any knowledge of what comes after that. But I have faith in so many things, and there's room in my life for a new adventure.


*Custom image c/o Purple Duck Handmade.

There is a distinct feeling of weekend mornings, especially those in spring.

They are cool and wet, sometimes rainy, mostly smelling of sunscreen, and if you've ever spent a year or two living with a man who is now halfway across the country from you, then they can be lonely.

Spring comes back to me every year, carrying memories tied to scents and songs that remind me of some life I used to have. The most recent life that has been visiting me lately is the one last year where I hardly made enough money to pay my rent each month and daydreamed about a job with a desk and no beverage cooler to organize; one that wouldn't chip my nail polish every time I reached into the sink to get an espresso cup.

Two years ago (which is amazing to say, because that Christmas does not feel two years ago yet), I got a beautiful watch for Christmas, and I put it in its little box on my dresser and waited for the day that I could wear it to a job where I was neither a barista nor a graduate student, and could wear a watch that was not waterproof or a pretty shirt without fear of spilling something onto myself.

It's almost been a year since I moved back home, I thought yesterday as I drove away from the office that allows me to dress up and wear my watch without fear, the one that challenges me in a new way every day. A year ago, Rob and I were packing up the apartment we shared together in Charlottesville. We were going out for brunch and taking walks around our neighborhood together.

When I think about the distance to Minnesota, or even just to DC, I am amazed and sometimes appalled that at one time, I had Rob in the same city, living at the same address, eating dinner at the same table, falling asleep and waking up in the same bed as me, every day. I don't know if we realized, at the time, just how good it was. We definitely didn't realize, at the time, just how far away from each other we'd end up a year later.

Things then might have been simple and easy and full of love, but they weren't nearly as promising as the things we have now because of our sacrifices. Now things are complicated and hard, but still full of love, which is the thing that I am quickly realizing matters the most.

There is always something about this specific place in time, now, that is so difficult to grab onto with anything but impatience.

Here's to patience.

Minneapolis is quickly becoming one of my favorite places. Rob living there has a lot to do with it, sure, but the place is just cool. As I sat in the airport waiting for the last leg of my travels, I had a thought that I've never had before:

I'm so glad he took this job, because otherwise we would have missed out.

Remember that bright side I was talking about a couple of weeks ago? I've jumped on it with both feet.

I'm excited to show you this custom piece that Kaitlyn of Purple Duck Handmade drew for me. She sent me the print in the mail last week and I can't wait to find the perfect frame for it. (Confession: I was totally inspired by Betsy's beautiful blog design before explaining to Kaitlyn what it was that I wanted.) She did it! It's simple and well-done and just beautiful. 

I landed at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport late on Thursday night. There was snow on the ground but it was dark and I didn't get a very good first look at these incredible cities.

On Friday morning we woke up together and I took Rob to work in case I needed his car for something, which I really didn't, because after driving through a McDonald's for some breakfast and coffee, I ended up spending the day writing and unpacking boxes; decorating little corners of his apartment and maybe sort of pretending that I was moving in, myself. I had lunch delivered and took a shower and did something fun to my hair and at 3:30, left to pick Rob up at his office because he's done at 4:00 and that's awesome.

We planned our evening and the next day mostly around the food we would eat. After hearing that Minneapolis and St. Paul are something of a foodie haven, Rob compiled a list and we got right to it. Dinner on Friday night was at Yumi's Sushi Bar, and Saturday consisted of an amazing breakfast at Modern Times, a delicious (and almost completely Paleo) lunch at Brasa, and a romantic tapas dinner at Solera (get two orders of the dates--we did).

Good morning from the Land of 10,000 Lakes! My flight got in late last night and we're just getting going. Rob has to work today, but was told to take his time getting in, so I'm dropping him off at his office so that I can have his car for the day!

For having such a busy weekend full of movers, baby birthday parties, snow flurries, late nights, and early mornings, we certainly found some time to sit down and get cozy to do nothing before Rob's Sunday morning flight out of town.

This morning, Rob and I sat down together by a window in the Roanoke Airport's little cafe with a cup of black coffee and a plate of greasy hash browns as we waited for his flight to Minnesota.

"What if we got something that was just mixed with a pit bull?" Rob asked, in regard to the breed restrictions of most apartment complexes. The discussion of our future dog is just one of the hypothetical conversations we have. I don't know if it's a coping mechanism or what--because as much as we'd love to plan out the rest of our lives, the truth is that we're really just taking it two weeks at a time now. I have a flight booked for mid-February to visit him in Minnesota, and then in early March he'll be coming to Virginia for our anniversary. And then we'll plan another month.

Rob hasn't even landed in Minneapolis yet, and already I get so many supportive and uplifting comments from you guys, telling me that my positive attitude for this whole thing is inspiring; it's what's going to get me through. I appreciate all of that so much, but I'm not really sure if "we'll figure it out as we go" is just something I say or if it's really enough for me so far. I look at families with a parent in the military who gets deployed, and friends with fiances in different countries, and I still feel like I have a pretty good deal in all of this.

But as lucky as I feel, I still fell apart this morning as he packed up his bags and put on his heavy winter coat. I still cried over our shared plate of hash browns at the airport, and I still felt a little lost as I walked to my car after hugging and kissing him goodbye at the security checkpoint. Only taking it a few weeks at a time can be really simple and effective, and it can also be really overwhelming.

So here I am, on my own on a Sunday morning, feeling a bit overwhelmed, but determined to make the best of it.

It really feels like it was just last week that Rob moved into his room at the Residence Inn, but it was the end of August. And in early October, he moved into his apartment in Arlington. DC was always meant to be a temporary stop for Rob, but I'm surprised at how quickly this time has flown by.

Rob is flying to Minnesota this morning to look at apartments.

I think it was late November when it first came up--there was a huge opportunity for him in St. Paul, and the project would give him a ton of experience, and the company really wanted him to do it. It was exciting, and I was so proud of him, and they want him to start on February 4th, and it didn't really feel real until last week.

It was equal parts fear and denial that kept me from saying anything, both here and in my daily life. I mentioned it to a handful of people when I needed to talk about it, but that was it. I've learned, after almost six months of being apart and having great jobs in different cities, that too many people ask me too many times, what are you doing; what's your plan?

What do you mean, what am I doing? I'm at work. And we're making it work.

Yesterday afternoon it started snowing and it didn't stop until late last night, and I cuddled up on the couch by the fire with a cup of hot chocolate and tried not to think about how fun these nights usually are when you aren't alone.

My office is opening late this morning, so I took a walk with my dog through the dusting that's already starting to melt. I thought about the snow here, and the snow in Minnesota, and my Rob, and how this is going to be really hard, but eventually really good. With hope and faith and love and boots and Dividend Miles, we'll figure it out.

More than any of that, though, was coming home to someone and telling him in person about your day. Not on the phone or in an email, but actually face to face, with hot chocolate, and your hand in his.


I say a lot of the same things over and over--I love the rain. Fall is magical. I miss Rob. It's all true.

Our weekend was really nice. It started with a lazy Friday night at home. My parents had gone to visit my brother at school, so Rob and I sat on the back porch with my dog and drank red wine, snacking on sweet potato chips and goat cheese spread onto thick slices of salami.
After a morning of coffee and eggs, we got in the car to visit Sean on our way to northern Virginia. We stopped for lunch in Farmville and I had a Bloody Mary and some wings before getting back in the car to go to Rob's brother Dan's house.