Diegetic Sight & Sound

730 Days

Two years ago today, I got an unexpected email while eating tacos after work. It was from someone I’d followed on Tumblr for awhile, but hadn’t ever interacted with off the dashboard. Ashley lived in DC at the time, but had recently left her job and was looking into grad schools — in London. I’d recently ended a toxic relationship and would soon be let go from a job I loved. Safe to say we were both looking forward, to discover our future-selves; though I don’t think either of us was actively looking across the country (soon to be across the world) for a relationship. But that is what we found ourselves happily in just a few months later, before we’d even met face to face.

The two of us, separately together, continued to undergo life changes: she did in fact move to London (where she knew only one person) and set up shop in a tiny flat, relearning how to learn and making piles of new friends. Meanwhile, I lost my grandmother and then two months later, my mother. She was my rock, even from 5456 miles away, and even still before we’d breathe the same air.

Finally in August, the day after my 25th birthday, she arrived here in LA for our first digital-less encounter. All our nerves and anxiety evaporated upon first contact. We’d only been talking for 5 months but even in that first moment it felt like we had known each other for years. 

Fast-forward to last year: I got my first passport so I could take my first trip out of the states, and she was the reason. Six days from now I will be in London once again. In a city I adore with a woman I cherish. If she hadn’t emailed me 730 days ago to ask “why haven’t we talked outside of Tumblr yet?” I have no clue what my life would be like, but I’d lay down my bet on “nowhere near as awesome.”

—
_{photo by Jeremias Carroza, found via film-grain}