“And there ain’t no talkin’ to this man
He’s been tryin’ to tell me so
It took a while to understand the beauty of just letting go
Cause it would take an acrobat, I already tried all that
I’m gonna let him fly”
~Patty Griffin

I live each day as if I belong to him. But I come home to an empty, quiet house. The silence has become deafening and churns the anxiety and the overthinking until I’m lost in the wild crashing surf – knocked around by my doubts – by past losses and heartbreak.

I’m gonna let him go.

I don’t want to know anymore – if she exists, who she is, or what she has, that I don’t. I don’t want to know why. I’ve tried to talk myself into being okay with this – with this – No-Man’s Land we tip toe in and out of. You can wait this out, I whispered over and over again to myself. But I’ve been here before. You’ve been here before, I remind myself. It all looks so familiar.

So I’m gonna let him go.

Letting go isn’t an easy, snap of your fingers decision that *poof* makes it all go away. There’s an active, conscious decision to do so and sometimes it’s a daily decision – particularly when you love a man that can’t, doesn’t, or won’t choose you.

I’m gonna let him go.

In a few days, I fly to the coast. There’s a decision to be made – move back for good and face the future and all it brings – by myself – or stay in place, wondering if he’ll find his way to me. I fly into one of my favorite cities in the world and then drive three hours south. I don’t need to take that route. But I need to take that route. The highway hugs the treacherous cliffs. The winding road and the slow pace it takes to get closer and closer to my Granddad’s house, offer a kind of therapy that others pay thousands for. Those cliffs are a harsh and entirely stunning reminder that we are just a mere blip in time. The grandeur of it all puts things into perspective. Or at least it used to. I crave perspective. And like the humidity has come to do in my adopted home, I pray the cool fog seeps down into my bones and clears my head and heart.

Because I am gonna let him go. But I’m going to need some help with that.