An open letter to my ex-boyfriend,

You were the one who knew me better than I knew myself.

I met you in a time where everything you were was exactly what I needed. So you coming into my life and changing just about everything, wasn’t for nothing and that’s something I’ve always known.

As much as I could sit here and talk about everything that went wrong and why, that wouldn’t be fair to either of us. What it comes down to is you taught me so much and I taught myself even more throughout the course of our relationship.

You taught me to stand up for myself, to grow a backbone and realize that putting myself first every once and a while wasn’t a bad thing. You taught me to live in the moment, to love someone so genuinely and to live for the adventure of every day.

I taught myself that you can’t accept less love than you deserve because that’s all they can give you. I taught myself that in a relationship I shouldn’t have to worry about lies and betrayal, that finding happiness within myself is the most important thing and that I can’t base my happiness around someone else.

It seems almost unfair to try to write down all that we had and how much you meant to me, like I can’t quite get it right. It’s like trying to capture a moment through the lens of a camera that just doesn’t do it justice. This seems ironic as most of our relationship was captured through the lens of your GoPro, I’ve come to realize our relationship was a lot like a camera.

The lens: is vital to a good picture, it lets in the amount of light wanted by the photographer. Our relationship varied in amount of light, we had ups and downs as any relationship does. What is important is finding a balance. When the dark starts to outweigh the light, that’s when you know there is a problem that cannot be overlooked.

The viewfinder: is the main visual source for taking pictures, meaning you can manipulate the angle, profile, etc in order to make the image match how you view it. Our relationship was just that, we went with our own perspective of how a relationship was supposed to be, how it was supposed to work and captured it.

The body: is the base, it holds the entire camera together. I see this as our bond, how we felt toward eachother helped us stay together despite being 150 miles away from eachother most of the time. The knowledge that we were in this together was what kept me going when things got tough, as I hope it did for you.

The shutter release: is the length of time the shutter is left exposed. This is all about timing and unfortunately for us we were in two completely different places in our lives, you starting a new chapter and me a finishing a different one. We weren’t on the same shutter speed, causing our picture to turn out obscure.

The memory card: stores all the information. We made so many memories that for me will last a life time; you made every day into an adventure and our time together count

Lastly, the flash: It goes off when you’re ready for the photo to come together and sometimes it’s clicked too soon or when you least expect it. To me, our relationship went in a flash, things took a turn for the worse and it ended. As much as I have always blamed you for this, I no longer do.

Our relationship was filmed through the lens of your gopro for so many people to see, but only we can attest to what it was and what it no longer is.

Wishing you all the best and hoping you still live for the little things.