endings

After work yesterday, a group of us went to the usual spot: a dive bar a block from the office. A friend from Universe City was in town, and he met us there. 

We moved on to pizza in a (supposedly) haunted building and played arcade games in a dark room full of blue light. My bubble guy died over and over, and I came in third of four in pac-man, ahead only of the friend so drunk that he kept moving the pac-man joystick aimlessly long after his pac-man had disappeared off the screen.

I think I lack the hand-eye coordination most male North Americans develop as children due to the video game craze.

After my friends drifted off to eat more food and return to their hotel, I stopped back at the office for my library books. 

Books in hand, I walked alone to the central square, where couples take pictures of themselves in front of the mammoth Christmas tree. I stood there for a few minutes, taking it all in. The air was warm enough that I didn't have to rush. 

It was beautiful: the fog, the tree, the lights, the people. I wondered if it was the last time I would ever stand in that square under the holiday lights.

Very often lately, I look at parts of this city that I love so much, and I wonder if this is the last time I'll see them.

When I flew to the Mitten, I wondered if this was the last time that I would fly out of Gone West when Gone West was home.

When the sun shines through the windows at the tea shop, I wonder if this is my last sunny day in Gone West. 

When I walk through the marble hallways of the building I've gone into just about every day I've ever worked in Gone West, I wonder if I've been in some of those rooms for the last time.

The fact is that some of my last times in this city have already happened. I resigned from my job yesterday, you see, because I took a job back in My (US American) Hometown. 

I'm moving back to the Mitten.

"It's like breaking up with someone when you are still madly in love with him," I told someone, yesterday.

"But you know it's the right thing to do," she said, as a statement, not a question.

It is.