"500 Days of Summer"...what it meant to me.

Yesterday we saw "500 Days of Summer".

I had high expectations and was enjoying it...but by the end I had no idea how much it would affect me. It was so important for me. I felt like I needed to see it. It answered questions, gave me closure and reminded me how lucky I am.

First of all, as far as my relationship experiences have gone, it was total role reversal. I was the Joseph Gordon Levitt character. I knew just what he felt like every step of the way. To be with someone so unattainable and so head over heels.

At the end of the movie, Zooey's characater (the quirky girl who doesn't want a commitment), ends up married to someone else. He says to her "how did the girl who didn't want a boyfriend end up someone's wife"? That hit me hard. That was my situation with a boy years ago in another state. I could not imagine him ever telling a girl that he loved her, let alone becoming a husband. And guess what he was right after we broke up?

I wondered for years how it happened. What was it that made him settle down? What made him propose? What made him choose her? What was it about me? I have never been able to wrap my head around it. I moved on, sure. But not having an answer always bothered me. I am the kind of person who needs to know why.

She tells him that she just knew.

She knew with this guy what she was unsure of with the other.

Oh. My. God. That's it. That's all and that's it.

You just meet the one that changes your life. The one that you can't imagine life without and there is nothing else to figure out. That simple. My years of wondering and analyzing were simplified and healed in that moment.

She goes on to talk about fate...which I absolutely believe in. She talks about the day she meets the man that will become her husband in a deli, "what if I had gone to the movies that day? What if I had come in ten minutes later?"

Again. Oh. My. God.

Here I am, sitting next to the love of my life. I squeeze his hand. I hold back my tears.

What if I hadn't come home from nyc to do the play where I met him? What if I hadn't called him back? What if?

The thing is...it is as it's meant to be. For me, for him. For the boy in my past.

I was reminded of the time when my heart was breaking and I thought I was going to die. I never thought I'd be able to get up off the couch and breathe again. I only wish I could have whispered to that girl that she would be okay. She would grow up to meet The One and be where she was supposed to be.

I wished this movie would have come out years ago! But again, for whatever reason, it was meant for me to see it yesterday. It had a hopeful ending. It was heartbreakingly beautiful, clever, funny and hopeful. It was perfect. I watched three teenage girls walk in to see it and wonder what they'll take away from it. What will anyone at any age and stage of relationship take away from it?

The amount of passion and love and attraction you can have for another human is pretty remarkable. It's always different depending on the chemistry of two people. As you grow and you experience more and can heal and look back on it...even the painful parts become beautiful, don't they?

xo Deena Marie