If we are Real Life friends you probably already know the top level details of this post, but I want to put the timeline and my feelings in one place.

Three years ago when I started dating Blue Eyes he was just starting a new work project, a project that took him 300-400 miles away, to the middle of No Man’s Land, he would work there during the week and come back on the weekends. For our budding relationship this seemed kind of perfect, actually. Nothing could move too fast, I had no guilt or hangups of not hanging out with him during the week which was already packed with classes and homework and friends. Besides, he told me, this project was only 9-11 months in No Man’s Land. In my mind that meant that if we were still dating in 9-11 months it would be a good time to take our relationship to “the next level” (whatever that meant), and if we weren’t still dating then it wouldn’t matter anyway.

Ha. Hahahahaha!

Nine to eleven months, huh. Wrongity wrong wrong.

In 9-11 months we had dated, fallen in love, got engaged, and picked a wedding date. The project was not even close to halfway over.

In the last three years Blue Eyes has put over 150,000 miles on his work truck driving back and forth from No Man’s Land.

Two weeks ago his project was reaching it’s final stages and I was very much looking forward to seeing him every day (for our entire marriage and most of our dating we never saw each other for more than a few days at a time, and except for a couple of vacations never for more than 5 days in a row. Neither of us really knew what would come next, but for a little while, at least, he would be home. We would finally be together. It could have been a few weeks, or a few months; we both knew his line of business would most likely lead him to another project in the middle of nowhere, but for a little while we could pretend we had a normal life.

And then, the most amazing week happened, first after New Year’s. While finishing up in No Man’s Land Blue Eyes got the call from his boss giving him his next project assignment, for an enormous-to-his-industry project that is 15 minutes from our apartment. He was scheduled to start the next Monday.

FIFTEEN MINUTES!

He will be here for almost two years.

That same week Blue Eyes finished up the never-ending project in No Man’s Land, and moved home. We celebrated, we laughed, we cried, we held each other. And on Sunday afternoon instead of packing a bag and driving the 4-6 hours to his office, he and I snuggled and had dinner together, we fell asleep with our legs all entangled, and Monday morning we woke up together, did the one-mirror-one-sink do-si-do, and both went to work. And—get this you guys—that night? That night we did it all over again.

It’s been a week and I still kind of feel like it’s a fairy tale, like I’m just waiting for someone to pull the rug out from under me, for Blue Eyes to be sent far, far away again with crappy cell phone service, not enough internet for video chat, and long, long stretches of loneliness.

I don’t know how long it will take me to get used to having my sweetheart here with me, it will for sure take some adjusting. We are both so used to doing our own thing, it will take some tweaking to do more than our own thing just in the same room. We’ll figure it out, and I’m looking forward to figuring it out.