Not yet. Not today, and probably not tomorrow, but someday soon for sure. The PhD is mine and I am his; there’s a deep, deep beauty here, and we both see it.

The way I’ve been talking the last few days makes me want to reach out and smack myself. I don’t believe in this kind of love, I keep reminding my heart; people who just meet and BAM, “it’s forever” are not seeing reality.

Or maybe they are. I feel like I’ve been issued an invitation quite out of the blue for the coolest, most exclusive club; a club where everyone who’s in just knows they’re in. Where women wear ball gowns and men sip cocktails in coattails; where the lighting is just a little bit blurred, like you’re floating through an oil painting. We are hovering in an ethereal world somewhere above the me I was, the life I had, before. It looks like just clouds. Come around that corner, though, and there’s this whole new dimension. Now that I’ve been here, now that I’m in? Absolutely everything has changed.

I think this is what it’s like to be in love.

My parents are thrilled. My grandma told me she “could just tell.” This is forever; this is my story.

Don’t doubt this; live it, he wrote to me. That’s pretty much the plan.

Not so much the plan: continuing to tell myself that 3am is the new midnight. I need to kick this “drunk on love, who needs sleep!” mindset or I suspect I’ll be singing a “who needs employment, I’ve been fired!” tune.

He’s moving to New York today, and I’ve an evening with the Theresas penned in from long ago. That should be interesting. How are you? Ohh, great, work’s good, and hey I met this guy and he’s amazing and we’re madly in love and I’m definitely going to marry him! And no, he’s not Catholic and I’ve actually not been going to mass for at least a year! Surprise!

Like I said … absolutely everything has changed.