There comes a time when what happened in your marriage is simply a sad, sweet story. And what happened in your divorce is its sad sweet climax, followed by the sad, sweet denouement of co-parenting. And you love those stories as you love your dear, old dying dog who has defended every threshold you have crossed for the past 13 years. After all this time, you can allow what happened to be bent and broken and hopeless and heartbreakingly beautiful. You can allow the stories to settle their stones into your path.

There comes a time when you can actually say, “I love you and I release you. You are free to go,” and mean it through your sobs because you know in your bones that everything and everyone we love must eventually be let go. There comes a time when there is nothing left to forgive because the facts have been washed clean of blame by years and tides of tears. There comes a time when you sit with a cup of tea in the grass, your dying dog panting beside you, as the roses exhausted with bloom drop their petals. You can breathe in and out the sweetness. The sadness. The sweetness. The sadness. You can let it all be.