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I loved a man in a far away land with more than I knew I had...but everything has a beginning, a middle, and an end. Sometimes I wish change weren't so inevitable...but he and my Caribbean island of bliss will live in my heart and soul forever. But how do you let go when a piece of your soul is gone?

For over a year, I have loved this man with an intensity unmatched by many. He has been my rock, my guide, my soulmate. He understands me in a way no one ever has, yet...

Many people in my life would say, "I told you so." But at the end of my days, I will be glad that at least  I was never consumed by "what might have been." Though the immediate feeling is one of intense sorrow, I will one day be intimately and sincerely grateful for  the entire experience.

I never thought he and I would have a real relationship, but I liked the dream. I liked knowing someone in the world, no matter how far away, was thinking of me and loving me. I never expected us to not "move on," but I suppose I wanted a week to pretend, to pretend that our lives are parallel, that our cultures aren't vastly different, that our worlds are indeed similar.

But something happened along the way. Expectations were not met, and feelings were deeply hurt. We lost our way, completely. It's complicated, yet ironically simple: we cannot be together.

So, how do you find a new direction when your compass fails? For that is what my Caribbean boyfriend has been for me. I am devastated in the loss of the love of a lifetime, but relish the fact that I had it at all. And in the end, before he walks out the door, I ask if he loved me. And he says he does. Present tense, not past tense.

I am grounded in the fact that I get to choose whom I love, and no one or nothing else can take that away from me. And I am filled with the knowledge that the dream, the fairy tale, was real. It's just that The End of the story, as with all stories, has finally come.

p.s. As for Superman, I haven't thought of him once, and that was hope #1 for this trip.

How Can I Help You Say Goodbye by Patty Loveless