Two weeks ago I was settling in for a visit to my parents’ farmhouse in rural Ontario - still numb from the idea that my wife and I might be separating.

Last week I was preparing to say good bye to Carolyn as she left for her own trip to Toronto, to spend time with her own family.

Today, I find myself wavering between a few different emotions. One side of me wants to preserve all that is good. I want to keep the house, keep as much in it as I can, and go about my day-to-day life with as little change a possible.

The other side of me wants to purge. Sell the house, and sell many of the things in the house that I don’t need. Get a small apartment across the street from where I work. Sell the motorcycle, downgrade the Mercedes to an inexpensive Toyota or Honda, and live simply for a while. As one wise person told me - “the lighter the load, the easier the travel.”

In short - take some time to regroup. Think about what’s important, and what I want to do with the rest of my life. I’m 32 years old; there’s still a good 50 years ahead of me before I have to worry about pushing daisies. Once I get my life to a simpler state, I’d take some time out and go for a few long trips.

It’s exciting - and impossibly difficult - to think about this. One of those impossibly difficult moments came the other day when I was looking at apartments for myself. As I toured the little pad, I instinctively turned around in the kitchen to ask Carolyn what she thought. It took me a moment to stop and remember the context - and I had a little meltdown, right in front of the sympathetic leasing agent who has probably seen this before.

I’m starting to learn that love hurts like this because what we had (have?) was (is?) special. It would be far, far worse if it didn’t hurt this much; even if our marriage is over, we have a lot of good memories to cherish, and we’ll be better people for having enriched each others’ lives. As hard as this is right now, it’s not an experience I would trade for all the money in the world.