WWW.MOMMYEVERAFTER.COM

My dears,
Like the rest of us, Mommy, Ever After has now grown.
From here on out, you can find us at

www.mommyeverafter.com

I can assure you, it will be bigger and better
(and brighter!)
than ever.
Follow the trail of feathers…

Would certainly make for an interesting campaign…

When I was 28 years old I got glasses.

Some people in my life would say that this was my dream come true.

You see, I spent my childhood (and possibly some of my adolescence) wishing desperately to be bespectacled.

The Great Glasses crusade began when I was in first grade and my two-year-old sister got glasses for extreme farsightedness, that caused Accommodative Esotropia.

Basically, in order to try to see clearly, her eyes crossed as a form of compensation.

This is exactly the exact same issue that both of my kids have, and also that my mother was diagnosed with at the age of three.

One day, while I was at school, my mom got a call from the school nurse; she was calling to inform my mom that I had failed the eyechart test that they give as a standard;

you see, I was perfectly capable of reading all of the smallest letters, but miraculously unable to make out those in the large print.

Get it? Yeah, so did they. And you know what I did not get?

Glasses.

Last winter, when I went for an eye exam, the doctor told me that I was mildly farsighted and had an astigmatism. I would need to wear glasses all the time.

It was more exciting in theory and in first grade.

And if you’ve seen me around or in photos you will see that I am not so great at wearing them.

I now have to wear them to do all of the writing that I do on the computer, but my husband is constantly reminding me to put them on, as he watches me squint and struggle to see.

Case in point: Tonight I was doing my standard baby bedtime bottle routine, while flipping through my Instagram feed, and I came across photos of a new nail polish collection from Essie.

I was taken aback;

it was the middle photo that caught my attention first – – well, really the caption, which I read as “Double Breastfed” and then some word I could not quite make out.

I am as avid an advocate for breast-feeding as you can get so I was equal parts excited and curious.

I checked out the name on the first bottle.

“Oh my god,” I thought, as I read “Bump up the Pumps”.

Was this really happening? A whole collection of nail polish meant to encourage breast-feeding women?

I checked  out the third and last bottle in the photo.

A bold cranberry red with shimmer.

“Jump in my Jumpsuit”.

that one struck me as odd – – I couldn’t figure out what it meant. Baby wearing? Had Essie really gone this crunchy?

so I looked back at that first bottle, the photo in the middle, and squinted my eyes as hard as I could to focus.

“Double Breasted Jacket” it read.

And then I laughed at myself, realized that now, by some miracle, it is just that old elusive large print that I can read clearly, put my baby down and my glasses up.

I guess my days of faking the eyechart are over…

unless I want to start asking the ladies at the nail salon for polish named for breast pumps.

I would write more but my computer is not turning on so I have been forced to type on an iPad which has been quite a challenge… Because I can’t see the letters…

so I will just go on coming up with my own creative names for now polishes of the future;

starting with “Glasses for Asses”.

A great miracle happened t(here).

There is this thing that happens as you grow up;

your family traditions stop being the rituals you have customarily shared with your parents and elders, but they start to evolve, slowly, into things that are perhaps unique and new.

Last night was the first night of Hanukkah.

Instead of celebrating with parents or family members or friends, as we typically would, it was just the four of us. My little family.

And really, that is how I remember celebrating Hanukkah with my family of four as a chlid. Sure, I remember the big family gatherings, but my most vivid and evocative memories are of chanting the blessings with my parents, wearing matching flannel nightgowns with my little sister, (always with ruffles at the seams) and instead of singing “Az ‘egmor beshir mizmor, Khanukat hamizbeakh.” I thought that it was actually “Azegmore, and hear me snore.”

So last night, after dinner, my daughter got dressed in a flannel nightgown, with ruffles at the seams, and I held my son as I chanted the blessings (since I am really the only one in my house now who knows them all). And it was different, but it was lovely. We have a mountain of presents for my daughter, from grandparents, great-grandparents and friends, but last night we gave her our “big gift”: a blanket that has a hood that looks like a cat and glows in the dark. She saw a commercial for it on the television and had been asking for it for weeks, and so when she pulled this 19 dollar gift out of the Hanukkah bag she squealed with delight. And I could tell that she really appreciated her gift. It didn’t get lost in a sea of excitement and wrapping paper. She wore it and folded it and watched it light up. And every time I checked on her last night, she was in a different position in bed, cuddling her new blanket in some way.

It was a strange feeling, to be the grown up in all of this; the one to light the candles and say the blessings and give the gifts. And it stuck with me throughout the night. As I was tidying up the kitchen before bed, a penny fell from the sky. Now, I don’t know that it actually fell from the sky, but it fell from somewhere above and knocked me in the head before landing, face up, on the ground beside me.

A penny from heaven. A 2014 penny, at that, which seemed particularly apt in the light of yesterday’s words about this past year.

We are growing up around here. And that’s ok.

Happy Hanukkah to those who celebrate,

and to anyone and everyone else, I wish you a year of light, love,

and maybe even a miracle or two.

What a sweet way to start the day!

It is 7 o’clock in the morning, I have not yet set foot out of bed, yet the delivery man has already come to my door with a magical Hanukkah present and I just don’t even know what to say besides:

It is official;

I have a Fairy Peepmother.

Just like I always say,

I have the BEST Peeps.

Thank you, thank you, from the bottom of our hearts,

the middle of our tummies

and the insides of our teeth!

Let us celebrate.

This morning, I woke up to a pleasant surprise. I got an email from an old high school friend–

Well, really, if I am being honest, she is an old high school friend of my husband’s; to me, she was just this incredibly beautiful and cool Senior whom I looked at and admired from afar. Come to think of it, to this day, I don’t know that she knows this; that my Freshman friends and I would look at her Senior yearbook portrait in awe. She is that pretty. But she’s also nice. And fun. And brave. And my husband’s high school friends deserve a post of their own, so look out for that.

She sent me this article, to give, as she said, “a little bit of mojo”, which is amazing.

The article talks about how 2014, for many, was an awful year; for some, their worst yet.

I would raise my hand with those people. I say it all the time. This has been the worst year of my life. But the also the most meaningful, for sure. And that is what this article is all about. The author could have gone into my brain and taken the words right from inside my head. If you know my writing, you will see.

She writes,

“Because 2014 was hard for many, many people.

For you, it might be going down as one of the worst years you can remember.

For you, it may have brought you to your knees more times than you could count.

For you, it may have left you breathless … hopeless … tired and weary.

But before you eagerly slam the door on 2014, I ask you to look down at your hands.

See that dirt under your fingernails?

My friend, that is beautiful. That is remarkable. That is significant.

You could have let go. But you didn’t.

You could have given up. But you didn’t.

You hung on.

You hung on.

And here’s what I believe:

I believe 2014 was not your worst year, but possibly your greatest.

Your Year of Greatest Strength
Your Year of Greatest Faith
Your Year of Greatest Hope
Your Year of Greatest Patience
Your Year of Greatest Risk
Your Year of Greatest Determination
Your Year of Greatest Courage

Just look at that dirt beneath your fingernails.

That is what you are made of.

Isn’t it beautiful? Isn’t it remarkable? Isn’t it significant?

It was your Year of Greatest Survival.

And you lived to tell about it.

Thank you for holding on.

Let us celebrate.

Let us celebrate.”

Just as I wrote last month, this year, all I want to do is to live and to do so fully. My poor friends; You should see how many emails they get from me about Christmas cookies and Secret Santas and our New Year’s Eve menu. How many screenshots I send with inspirational quotes and love notes. But the fact that I can not only feel but feel excitment? I am holding onto that, I am holding on with every ounce of strength I can muster.

And so it was a normal Tuesday morning this morning and we were up early, and we are supposed to be on a tropical island,

but instead, I was cuddled up on the couch and my daughter was across the room, and my son was playing on the floor and my husband called from the kitchen that we were out of coffee. He would make a run to the coffee shop and get us all treats, he said.

And when he left, I called my daughter over to me. “I want you,” I said, as I held out my arms to her and then wrapped them around her, kissed her face, and snuggled her close to me.

“I want you to be happy,” was her reply.

Let us celebrate, indeed.

(This morning’s coffee was sponsored c/o Twin and Go Go)

Could be a whole heck of a lot worse.

Well, it may not be our thwarted big family trip to St. John, but I’m cozy, under a blanket, listening to my main man’s music,

working on THE NEW WEBSITE

and OMG do I have a story for you as my big premiere.

I literally could not make this stuff up.

Stay warm and stay tuned.

Stay Tuned and Get Pumped! (is what I was going to say.)

Patience, my dear ones. For I am off to a happy place, where I will be celebrating my 8th Engagemaversary in that very same spot.

…is what I had written, yesterday,

prepared to publish today,

as I would now be off to St. John, via St. Thomas, with my entire family; Parents, siblings, kids…

It’s funny. Just last week, Jordan said, “The way to virtually guarantee that a child will get sick is to schedule something that you really want to do.”

And it has been no secret that we have been sickie little chickies in my house for the past month.

But weeks of sick days and doctor visits all kind of came to a head yesterday when I crashed, unexpectedly, at 3pm, woke up two hours later in excruciating ear pain. I have been suffering from TMJ on my right side, but this pain was on my left. And I couldn’t hear out of my ear. Weird.

So, I shook the sleep out of my head and rallied to give the baby his nighttime bottle, give my daughter her kiss goodnight, and I told my husband that something wasn’t right. All of the local urgent care facilities were closed and all my doctor besties were stuck without otoscopes (I just wanted to see if I was crazy), so we found a Care Stat location a little ways away and I got checked out.

I told the doctor about my TMJ. “First let me look at your right ear, or your ‘good ear’,” she said.

“Yup, this ear is infected.”

Then she moved onto my left.

And all she said was, “Whoa.”

That’s never what you want to hear from a doctor.

So I have a double ear infection, but on my left side it is pretty severe, and I am prohibited from flying for a week. Which means that we had to cancel our trip to our happy place.

It’s ok. I was most disappointed for my daughter and parents, but we have made alternate arrangements so that my kids will be taken away on a fun family trip, just the four of us, that involves driving, and no change in elevation that will perforate my eardrum.

I walked out of the urgent care office, into the Krispie Kreme two doors down, and ate a hot glazed doughnut right off of the conveyer belt. Because, really, what else was there to do?

So, I will continue where I had left off yesterday before this all went down (when I thought I would be leaving you for St. John):

Please don’t think I would leave you hanging. Oh no.

Because we have some big changes on the not so distant horizon; my home for the past 4.5 years,

http://www.mommyeverafter.wordpress.com,

just got quite the makeover. We are moving on up people.

Very soon, this blog will be located at…

http://www.mommyeverafter.com

You can visit the site to countdown to our big launch on December 22. There will be ads! There will be new categories! There will be a feathers! This is forrealz.

And I realize that my audience here is mixed; some of you have been here from the beginning, while others are newer to the land of mom. So I am leaving you with some old favorites. And the fun thing is, they lead you to other old posts. You have almost 900 of ’em to wade through as I wade through the ocean. (Editor’s note: I don’t even have to say it. Frowny face.)

Let me take this opportunity to say thank you.

This past year (and I am getting choked up) has been the hardest in my life; I am so grateful for the support I have received from YOU. You have empowered me to tell me story and motivated me to help others. Thank you. I would not be here without you.

So here you go. I’ll be popping in here and there over the next week, but to tide you over:

Something motivational

Something sweet

Something musical

Something nostalgic

Something comprehensive

Some Important Insight

The craziest call to the pediatrican ever. (Really, ever.)

The second craziest call to the pediatrican,, ever. And it’s a close second.

Something Happy.

Something Hard.

Something Hopeful.

See you on the flip side at http://www.mommyeverafter.com,

the home of everything ever after.

Kale shakes and I are getting a divorce.

Irreconcilable differences.

It has been a disaster from the start.

Today, I decided to try again.

And I was so proud; I took our picture sharing this smoothie that tastes like tropical fruit and salad and was planning to say something like, “Kale, Take two! Woo!”

Oh, look at us. Drinking our superfoods in harmony.

But, being home with a one year old and all, I didn’t get a chance to publish that post.

Instead I was chasing the baby and playing trains and trying to wrap gifts and was chatting on the phone with my friend about her son’s school conference when…

Yup.

I told my friend and hurried off the phone to clean. She couldn’t believe that it had happened AGAIN. I texted my husband.

I think the universe is trying to tell me something.

From now on we give kale the cold shoulder.

Kale, it was tolerable while it lasted. But, I’m sorry. It is over.

You’ll be hearing from my lawyers.

Be there and be square.

I made it no secret on here (and in my life) that I was quite nervous about expanding our family. We were a perfect triangle.

I remember taking an autumn trip to the beach house with the fairy godparents and sitting on the couch for hours, literally, listing the reasons why I was scared to have another baby. My bestie and her husband (who is also a bestie, so don’t get it twisted, babe!) do not yet have children of their own, but she is an incredible psychologist, so she was perfect for the job. She sat and talked me through it, holding my hand.  And, wouldn’t you know, as I am typing this I am remembering that she did the exact same thing 10 years before, in the exact same spot of that exact same couch. Obviously the subject matter was different, but we sat on that couch for hours and hours, as she held my hand and we shared secrets and dreams.

In any case, my list of fears about having a second child was scattered. Some of the reasons included:

The repeat C-Section. I loathed my spinal the first time around, as it made me feel paralyzed and unable to breathe (and wasn’t aware that I could opt for an epidural). Selfishly, I was terrified to go through that again.

I had been warned countless times that having two children isn’t double the work, but 100 times the work. That is scary.

And then there was the anxiety; I was nearly crippled by anxiety at times during my first pregnancy, doing “kick counts” and googling things like “Does a baby get hurt by being jumped on by a 25 lb dog?” and “Do blowdryers scare babies in utero?” I also vaguely remember a brief freak out over Tonic Water and the safety of Quinine during pregnancy.

I also had a fear that I could have a crazy, wild, messy, rambunctious, high energy child. I could have a boy.

But, most of all, I feared the change in our family’s shape. We were a perfect triangle; We had our system down, we were a  trio.

(*Note: In trying to come up with the equivalent word that means the same as “pair” but with three people, please be careful with the terms that you Google.)

My daughter was my everything.

(I should mention that as I typed that sentence, she just popped her head into my bedroom door, clad in pink, fuzzy footie PJs and said, “I just needed one more mommy kiss. And after you’re done writing about me, read this Ariel book I gave you. It is the best. And maybe later, I will check up on you, and sneak up on you, very quietly, and give you a new book.” and blew me a kiss.)

With my daughter, everything was magical. Her nursery was an enchanted garden. She had a tutu collection. She was dainty and delicate and darling.

I was scared to push my luck.

And so, that night, that Fall, my friend and I decided that it was clearly not the right time for me to have another baby, and that maybe, one day, I would feel ready.

And I waited. And I waited. And I waited for that day to come.

And then something happened.

We moved into a new house, in my dream neighborhood (where both my husband and I grew up) and all of a sudden, I just felt ready. It took years, but I got there.

He was conceived instantly, came out early, and I loved him instinctively and deeply.

And then all hell broke loose.

I was not able to care for my son in the way that I had for my daughter; I was a wreck, had to be medicated which forced me to wean him at 10 weeks (after having nursed my girl for 18 months) and I completely lost it for awhile.

But, to be honest, it wasn’t because it was hard. It was never really hard having two. I realize that when some people have their children very close together it can be insane. But for me, having a second child was not harder than having one. The bright spot in a bleak year.

Slowly, though, things have changed. And if you read here regularly, I think you will have noticed a perceptible shift in how I write about my son;

I recently declared him to be the best thing that has ever happened to me and I named him as my true strength symbol.

Over the past year I have woken up to many people and many things. I now look at life in a completely different way and hold those dear to me closer than ever before. I tell my friends I love them every day. I try to show my husband, in some way or another, how grateful I am for him. And I adore the hell out of my kids.

Every time I pick up my son, every single time, I kiss his face. I know that despite a rough start to things, he knows that he is loved.

And just like it went with his sister, I have become obsessed with him. Even with all of his crazy antics (and, truth be told, he is literally the personification of the fear I listed above) I gush over his toothy smile and sweet kisses and how he loves to nuzzle into my neck.

And I think I kind of took this change for granted a little, as though it was a natural shift that just happens.

But it didn’t really hit me until Sunday. It was the afternoon and the whole family was in the living room, the Eagles were on the TV, my daughter, husband and I were on the couch and my son was sitting with my brother in law on a chair eating goldfish. The three of us cuddled up and my husband remarked about how cozy and nice it felt. But I didn’t feel that; I felt incomplete. It was like our family’s hole had morphed from a triangle to a square and no other piece would fit. Without my son, we just weren’t whole.

And I didn’t have to force it. Not at all.

***

Believe it or not, despite my depression, I don’t cry a whole lot.

Today, my son and I picked up my daughter from school in the carpool line, and when the door opened and they saw each other, they literally squealed with delight. And she insisted on sitting in the extra booster seat that is right next to his carseat, and my two children were lost in fits of giggles as I watched them through the rear view mirror. And tears streamed down my face.

This was love. Love of the purest kind. Love of the truest nature. My team.

And all I felt was gratitude.

Biologically speaking, we won’t be any new sides to our family’s shape.

But oh my word, how blessed am I that I get to spend my days with this dainty girl who never ever stops talking,

and this sweet boy, who will cause destruction at every chance he can get,

and that when they say, “Mama?” I get to answer.

I am so in love. This is what life is all about.

I’m gonna make you fall in love with Brett Dennen

if it’s the last thing I do. No, really. He’s so awesome.

And I can safely say he is my second favorite enormously tall, bespectacled redhead.

I just discovered this version of one of my favorite songs–one that we perform in my band–so I thought I’d share the love.

Heart emoji.

The story of two girls, the story of two women, and everything in between.

Where to begin? I sit here, hands tracing the keys of my laptop, but I don’t know how to start our story; to really tell our story in a way that will do it justice. It probably won’t make sense to anyone else. But it does to us, so I guess that is all that matters.

As our mentor’s mentor, Ernest Hemingway, said, “All you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence that you know.”

And so I shall try:

I saw a girl, once, sitting on the ground of the third floor of an old, musty school building and she looked like the most beautiful and interesting thing, and I was desperate, instantly, to get close to her.

***

I have written many stories on here, about my childhood and adulthood and parenthood, about things joyful and sorrowful and fanciful, but there is one piece of my life that I have left almost untouched.

I did not have a traditional college experience. I started off attending the Honors Program of a big state school, so that I had tiny, elite classes, but also giant, cheering crowds of football fans (which was supposed to be the best of both worlds) and I stayed there for a year and a half straight.

It was there that I fell in love, with reading literature and with a boy from a tiny town in the Mid-Hudson River Valley.

It wasn’t a perfect fit for me, but I have some fond, nostalgic memories; of running in a storm of icy snow to catch the school’s busline, so that I would make it in time for my seminar on Jewish Cinema; of walking into crowded frat parties, with their smell of stale kegs and the feel of sticky floors and air; of being selected to sing in the school’s talent competition my first week as a Freshman; of buying a beer funnel and leaving it in a tax and buying funnel cake and eating it at Arts Fest; of watching the Friends series finale and sobbing on the floor of the dorm room two doors down, which always seemed to smell like popcorn. And the list goes on.

But after a year and a half, I left school and the small life that I had built there to travel abroad to Barcelona (where I would experience many new things, the most important being Twin (obviously).

Upon my return home to the states that May, the summer after my Sophomore year, I decided that I did not want to go back to the big school, 3 hours from home. I had just lived in a vibrant, colorful world, and couldn’t bear to go to a place where there were no tall buildings. I don’t mean to say this disparagingly. People live and breathe for the school that I attended. It just wasn’t for me.

And so I transferred, to a satellite campus in Philadelphia, where I was able to remain in the Honors College.

This was the best academic decision I have ever made.

I entered into a class of five. There were five of us in the Honors Program. It was so intimate and astounding and life-altering…

but I have gotten ahead of myself.

On my first day of classes at my new school, where I knew no one, I felt nervous and detached. I had made the choice to trade these huge, crowded cities for a mere two buildings and a duck pond.

As I had already declared myself an English major during my Freshman year, my first class was one on literature, with this incredibly smart and dynamic, dark-haired professor who spoke with great passion about American Popular Culture.

And after that, I trekked up the stairs of the old building that housed most of the Liberal Arts classes,

and I found my way down a small, corridor, to a tiny corner classroom.

And there she was.

Sitting on the floor with a spiral notebook, I saw this beautiful, and elegant and impossibly chic looking girl. And as we introduced ourselves, we realized that we had been previously “set up” by mutual friends, but just so happened to have met coincidentally that day. She was one of the five in my class.

My honors class was like “The Breakfast Club”. Really. We were all so different, but got along beautifully. There were four girls and one boy: One quiet but sweet Information, Science and Technology girl, one Class President type, studying business and ruling the school with her sparkly, kind demeanor, a shaggy haired boy, shy and pensive and incredibly bright, and then, the girl. She was a fellow English major. She liked words like I did.

And at the helm of our happy, mis-matched group was a Hemingway scholar like no other.

She was the author of a book about the “Lost Generation”, the group of colorful expatriates who gathered in Paris, often at Gertrude Stein’s salon after World War 1 (or, as they thought, The Great War), like Hemingway, Fitzgerald, T.S. Eliot and Jon Dos Passos. Note: I am oversimplifying this incredibly, and for that I am sorry. But if i were to continue to try to define the Lost Generation, this post would turn into a novel and I wouldn’t be able to see straight.

Our Professor was a personal acquaintance of the Hemingway family, and she knew it all. She introduced us to his short stories, novels, memoir…and to the color and life of that time in history.

Why does all of this matter?

It matters because this band of early 20th Century misfits seemed to mirror and our little Honors band of misfits, and learning with my class, in this tiny classroom around a boardroom style table

changed my life.

Because it brought me a soul sister.

I wrote this week about soul friends, and from the moment we met, the beautiful girl from the hallway floor and I formed a bond.

I admired everything about her, and the closer we got, the more I liked her and marveled at her.

I loved her sense of style, and the way she furnished her apartment (it seemed so grown up to me, with her fancy lamps and dressers painted with flowers and her own cats!) and her incredible work ethic. Her brain. Her insight. Her intellect.

The next two years, she and I worked closely together, as we were in almost all the same classes, and our Hemingway Scholar Professor became the mentor for both of our Honors Theses.

It is funny to say this, because I had a long-term relationship for the first half of college, met my Twin during Sophomore year, met my husband during Junior year and became engaged to him during my Senior, but this girl, to me, is like my one, real college friend.

I realize that I am in the minority, as I see my friends so connected with their former sorority sisters and roommates, but for me it was different. As I told her today, it was quality over quantity. And she’s it.

And over the years since college we have woven in and out of each others lives. There were times when we were inseparable, seeing each other several times a week and talking for hours on the phone; and other times that years went by without a date; but it never mattered. Never ever. Not once has she missed calling me on my birthday, and when my daughter was born, we brought her downtown to meet my dear friend in her gorgeous city apartment.

In the past few months, though, I will say that we have connected in a way that is so profound, it is almost impossible to describe. I was talking to her today and I said, “It’s funny that you’re the hardest person I’ve ever tried to write about.”

And she replied, “Because words don’t do it for us. It’s deeper. Ironic…”

and I finished her sentence with, “because we are both all about words.”

We have not seen each other in years at this point, but are planning to reunite soon. But until then we speak every day, and we are just there for one another in this impossible, indescribable way.

And, you may ask, if it is so hard to describe, then why are you writing about it?

And I would reply, because I love to tell stories; that is what this is all about. And this is a big part of my story. And she is a muse; a radiant character, and she deserves to be a subject of some sort of art, and this is a (terribly inadequate but) fine place to start.

I had asked her to show me pictures of her apartment, as I have always been so amazed by her style. And she sent me these photos and told me to look closely.

Hanging prominently in her apartment for the past two years are two sketches that I made for her the year after we graduated. In the top photo, it is the drawing of a cat, stretching. In the bottom, it is a girl’s face, with red lips.

When she showed me this, gobsmacked is the best word I can use to describe how I felt. I drew her these pictures because I love her and I shared them with her because I trust her, but this is not me being modest when I say I that am not an artist. I am not very good at drawing. But for her, these pieces were special enough to hang in her home, her sanctuary. I am humbled beyond words.

There are many stories in my story; the story of how divergent paths can lead you to the same place as someone with whom you’re meant to be; the story of how friendship, when true, prevails over all else; the story of two young women, who met at twenty, are meeting each other, a decade later, and falling in love all over again; the story of passion; and the story of college, and how it looks different for everyone.

I saw a girl, once, sitting on the ground of the third floor of an old, musty school building and she looked like the most beautiful and interesting thing, and the closer I got to her, the more she unfolded, and the more stunning she became.

I always say this to her,

that I am a reader and not a writer,

so I will leave it to one of the greats to wrap up our story for now.

But I just mean on the computer,

for I believe our story together has only just begun.

Their eyes met and in an instant, in an inexplicable and only half conscious rush of emotion, they were in perfect communion.

F. Scott Fitzgerald.