This morning I'm headed to Charlottesville, Virginia for a couple days to visit my friend Patrick before he moves to Connecticut for a new job and to be reunited with his husband after a year of long-distance.

Charlottesville is such a special place to so many people I love--it was Patrick's home for ten years, where he met Chad and started a life together with him; it was where Shawna took a post-bac program before med school; it was where Rob and I first really lived together, on our own; and it was where I went through what I look back on now as one of the hardest times of my life--getting over the death of a childhood friend, dealing with depression and anxiety, modifying my diet in a life-changing way, finishing graduate school, wondering what could possibly be next.

But it was also one of the best times of my life--morning trail runs with my best friend, followed by farmer's markets or big pitchers of mimosas, afternoons spent paging through the University of Virginia's gorgeous libraries, living across the street from Patrick and Chad, working at a sweet little coffee shop, coming to the beautiful realization that Rob was the man I wanted to spend the rest of my life with.

And then, suddenly, it was time to go. We packed up our stuff and I dropped Rob off at the airport for a month-long school trip to China before a six-month stint training for his new job in DC. I headed back to my parents' house on the lake with no real plans for anything; missing Rob, missing Charlottesville, with no clear vision of the fun and amazing and love-filled life that was in store for us.

Lately I've been thinking about all the other "ends" in my life--some sad, some happy, some both--that were really just wonderful beginnings: The end of long-distance when I finally joined Rob in Minneapolis. My last day at a job I really thought I needed. The end of our time in Minnesota. And so many others. Almost nothing lasts forever--but your heart can break and mend and grow more than you ever thought possible.

"There are far, far better things ahead than any we leave behind." --C.S. Lewis

On Sunday morning I woke up to a drizzly rain and that fresh smell of air that whispers promises of spring.

I poured a cup of coffee and Ender and I went outside for a walk, where it suddenly dawned on me that I had never done this before--the warmer air, the rain, the coffee, this dog. We are on the precipice of a new season in a new city, once again, and that means so much to me--new memories to make and routines to establish, but this time with the feeling that we are possibly here to stay, not just passing through for one summer, one fall, one winter, one spring.

Spring has such a familiar smell and feeling--it reminds me of chilly April mornings in Charlottesville, where I worked as a barista every morning and drank iced coffee all day while I wrote my master's thesis from the old kitchen table we borrowed from my parents' basement. Sunscreen and Shawna and Patrick and Chad and Rob--I had such a little family of friends right there in the neighborhood. We went out to dinner and ran together and had so much coffee and the occasional bucket of mimosas on a porch somewhere. Looking back on it now feels like such a dream--so idyllic, so long ago, so far from reach.

But more than that, the beginning of spring reminds me of Roanoke, and sitting outside at the lake wrapped in a blanket with a cup of coffee in my hand. Of sweet Rocky frolicking about, even at the ripe old age of fourteen. Weekday sushi lunch dates with friends and entire Saturdays spent downtown, just wandering. Wet grass and that early morning haze, hovering above the lake's surface. Our life at Smith Mountain Lake was something I always hoped--but never actually attempted--to emulate in my own home.

Nostalgia has always been a big part of my life, but lately it feels like more of a crutch than a source of peace. My family is changing and my parents have plans to sell the dreamy house on the lake that I have used to create and then safeguard so many memories over the past ten years. So much of me is in that kitchen, the bookshelves, scattered around that big open living room, gathered around the table. While I know that our lives are not where our parents live, I've still been struggling with the new, blank canvas that is stretched out ahead of us.

At what point do we have to stop looking back for comfort and start creating something new to stand on? There will still be coffee and friends and family and my sweet husband to wake up next to and that smell of sunscreen on my skin after a warm day spent outside. It's a new place, a new season, a new opportunity; and it can be either scary or inspiring. I'm leaning toward the latter--finding the hope that lives at the bottom of most things and using it to move forward--both because I want to and because sometimes, I have to.

The night before Thanksgiving in Roanoke, Virginia (as I am sure it is in other cities as suggested by this article in The Onion) is often a bit of a high school reunion. You run into a pretty large number of people who look familiar to you even though you don't know their name, but if you arm yourself with a couple close friends you've stayed in contact with, it's usually a really good experience.

I write a lot about college and how much it made me into who I am today, but I tend to skip over high school. I really loved my time growing up and going to school where I did, but for some reason going back and and seeing old friends that I've lost touch with sometimes makes me feel a little melancholy. We met up with friends of mine on three occasions this weekend and had the best time, but on Saturday afternoon I found myself flipping through old yearbooks and feeling a little bit sad. Part of it is because almost a decade has passed since I graduated and it doesn't even feel a little bit like that length of time, and the other part is that I don't feel at all like the person I used to be and I wonder if I'm the only one.

Lena Dunham said she missed her high school reunion because, first of all, she was at a diner enjoying some delicious rice pudding when she should have been on her way over, but also because she wanted to avoid past incarnations of herself. "Everyone's nice!" she said about her classmates, but she still didn't make it to see them after ten years. I'm actually looking forward to our ten year reunion, but I kind of identify with what she's saying.

High School Megan was a bit of a goodie goodie and thought nothing looked cuter than a polo shirt with the collar popped. She had little to no anxiety, but she lacked a lot of experiences. She drove a Volkswagen Jetta with a license plate that said MEG JET and put a lot of sugar in her coffee. I love her, but she kind of embarrasses me sometimes. Nostalgia usually feels so good on me, but when I reminisce on high school days I sometimes feel like I'm shrinking. 

College and grad school and Minneapolis all played huge roles in shaping me into the person that I am today, but high school laid that foundation and gave me some wonderful friends along the way; and I forget about that sometimes. E.E. Cummings said "It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are," and he was right, but I don't think you have to venture out and never look back.

I hope this weekend brought you exactly what you needed.