Lila Tanzi was getting a manicure and her hair done when she realized she had to be the hero of her own story, even if it meant being a villain in someone else's.
It was spring.
Lila was preparing for the next day's prom.
Her boyfriend had just told her, "'I think we're gonna need to break up before I go to college.'"
Lila, who's only a junior at this point, is shattered.
She's trying to figure out what to do next.
And even though prom is the very next day, she starts to think if this relationship is going to be over anyway.
I think it needs to be done now, even if it means not going to prom, even if it means this boyfriend will be left without a date.
My mom and I talked about it and she was like I don't know, go to the prom, wear your dress and then break up with him.
And I was like, that's a good idea, but also I don't know if I want to see him.
She knows what she needs to do.
Sitting there, with perfect hair, perfectly ready for prom, she tells him her decision.
He says, so we're done?
And I say, that call was never mine to make.
We are done.
From the Boston Globe, this is Love Letters.
I'm Meredith Goldstein.
Before we get to today's story, I want to make sure you know that we have started a love letters friends with benefits club.
Our podcast will continue to be free, released on all platforms.
Nothing has changed, I swear.
I am grateful, as always, for your participation and your time.
And I really do mean that.
To do this podcast is a gift, and I am constantly filled with gratitude that you show up as we tell stories about people's lives.
The bravery of guests winds up helping me be a bit braver.
Like we're all on some invisible team rooting for each other.
I don't want to get sappy, but it means a lot to me that you're here.
And this is where I say if you want more of this and to support what we do, you can sign up to be in our friends group.
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Okay, business over.
Now for story time.
I want to take you back to 1995.
I was 18 years old.
I had bangs.
I was going to Syracuse University in just a few days.
I had a boyfriend named Kyle, who I'd been dating since the spring.
He was a junior, so he had one more year of high school left.
I knew that most likely, Kyle would not be joining me at Syracuse.
As for the idea of staying together forever, the odds were stacked against us.
Even though I knew this, days before I left, sitting on my childhood living room floor, I told him that I loved him for the first time.
He said it back.
We both cried.
And it was beautiful.
And somehow it seemed we'd upped our level of commitment at the most inconvenient time.
He made me a going-to-college mixtape which I forced my mom to listen to the whole drive to Syracuse.
It included artists such as Weird Al Yankovic and Easy E from NWA.
I started college and liked it and met a ton of new people, but Kyle and I were still together, or at least trying to be.
We spent my entire freshman year writing romantic letters, making expensive phone calls.
Remember, I grew up in the time before smartphones.
We were trying to stay connected even though I was living my own totally new and different life.
Then, when Summer finally came around again and I finally got to go home and be with him, that's when we broke up.
Basically, after coming home, I think we both realized how much we'd already moved on.
I found myself thinking that summer and for many years after that.
That maybe if I had broken up with Kyle before I left for school, we could have saved ourselves a lot of heartache.
And maybe even though I was being real when I said I loved him, I knew the breakup was inevitable.
The second I left.
Today's story is about high school romances and saying goodbye.
It's also about how to break up when you know you must and how to think about staying together even when it seems impossible.
I know some of you are going through this right now or have kids going through it, or maybe you just remember going through it.
This episode is dedicated to all of you.
Our guest today is going to take us on a journey.
Everyone meet Lila, who just graduated from high school.
Lila did a high school project shadowing love letters at the Boston Globe.
She told me while spending time with us that she had a story she wanted to tell on the podcast about something that happened to her a year ago.
Just so you know, Lila is going to study journalism.
Her interests include theater, Game of Thrones, speech and debate, and iced chai lattes.
My name is Lila Tanzi.
I'm 18 years old, and I'm off to college very, very soon to Northwestern.
This is a story about a high school relationship, so it seems important for us to know about Lila's high school.
My high school, it's a prep school.
Basically, it's known as a mini Harvard.
And I say that not to like be, oh my God, I go to a mini Harvard high school.
I say that to be like.
It is literally such a competitive atmosphere and there are so many cliques and it's so bad.
Like, not to say there aren't nice people.
There are so many lovely souls, lovely people there.
But it's the environment that's just so competitive.
Like, so many people there consider a B or a B plus to be a failing grade.
It's absolutely insane to me.
Lila's school is K through 12, and there are about 200 kids in her graduating class.
So over many years, people know each other too well, perhaps toxically well.
She says at no point does she want to date within her high school community because it feels stifling.
Which is why, during her junior year, she notices someone elsewhere.
He goes to a different school.
So I was in speech and debate.
It was the qualifying tournament for NCFL's, the Nationals.
In case you're wondering, the NCFL is the National Catholic Forensic League.
One of the missions of the league is to encourage and to assist in the development of articulate leaders.
Basically, they throw big events where students perform speeches in competition.
And I was in the same event as this guy.
I tell Lila we should use a pseudonym for this guy.
Because she is a Game of Thrones fan, we decide to call him Tyrion, as in Tyrion Lannister, my favorite Game of Thrones character.
Back to Lila meeting Tyrion at the qualifying tournament speech and debate event.
So anyway, we'll call him Tyrion.
So he was in the same round as me.
Like one of the many competitive rounds that you get to reach the finals and then qualify.
And I did my piece.
And, you know, as I was doing my piece, I saw him and I was like, oh, he's cute.
And, you know, he's making the little eyes at me and I was like, OK, like, I see you.
I see you.
Hello.
And so after the round, he went and then I watched him and it was kind of the same thing.
And so after the round we're just like walking outside, like I'm walking away, and he approaches me and he's like hey, I thought your piece was really, really good.
Like, you're a great actress.
And I was like, oh, my God.
Thank you.
Thank you.
And so then I was like, yeah, I thought yours was also really good.
And he was like, oh, thank you.
Thank you.
You know, the whole thing.
And so then after that, like I came up with some BS excuse to go and talk to him again, like about a rule that I didn't understand.
I understood it perfectly well.
And then, like he kind of saw through it but he was like no, I'll help you with this rule that you obviously understand but are pretending not to understand.
And then he followed me on Instagram after that.
And then I messaged him and I was like, hey, good luck with the rest of your rounds for today.
And he was like, oh, my God, thank you.
Turns out, Tyrion lives about a half hour from Lila.
They keep messaging and it's clear there's a connection and potential for them to actually know each other.
We were on Instagram for like a few days.
And then he was like, yeah, maybe we should like text.
And I was like, yeah, sure.
And so then we switched to text.
And then about a week later, he was like, do you want to grab like lunch on Valentine's Day?
And I was like, sure.
So we had our first date at Cafe Nero at Legacy Place on Valentine's Day.
Legacy Place, which is an outdoor mall in Massachusetts, will figure heavily as a setting in this story.
I very much recommend it.
Good movie theater.
Great movie.
Great hairdresser, too.
Solange Capri is, like, amazing.
I've never been there.
It's amazing.
Enough mall discussion.
Back to the story.
After their first date at the coffee shop, Lila and Tyrion have a second date.
Lila can barely speak because she's lost her voice.
So he came over to my house and we just like played pool.
I beat him.
We played pool.
We played Mario Kart.
We played all these things.
And he did a lot of yapping.
I did a lot of listening.
And then at the very end, we kissed.
And it was magical.
It was one of those moments, you know?
From there, it continues.
After date two, Lila is invited over to Tyrion's house.
And his family was very nice.
And then we were like sitting in his room.
He had like a couch in his room.
We were sitting there.
And he was like, yeah, I was wondering, would you want to be my girlfriend?
And I was like...
Yes, please.
And then he said something that was kind of like that kind of miffed me a little bit.
He said, yeah, let's enjoy these four months while we can.
Something along those lines.
This is where we must understand something important.
When Lila and Tyrion meet, it's still winter of 2025, spring semester of high school.
Like I said, Lila is a junior at this point.
She'll have a whole nother year before college.
But Tyrion is graduating, has already applied to colleges, and is waiting to learn where he got in.
Tyrion, in this conversation, has basically said, Lila, be my girlfriend and it'll be so great for four months.
And then the relationship will be over.
He knows he's got a really busy summer, and so does she.
So he's just assuming this is temporary, right?
It takes a bit for Lila to truly understand what he means.
I don't think I entirely consciously acknowledged it.
I think I was more like, huh, that's a weird thing to say.
And then, as I thought about it, I kind of came to understand oh so maybe he wants to break up in four months, or maybe he meant this by it.
And I eventually asked him like a few days later, I was like, hey, like love being your girlfriend.
This is totally rad, dude.
But what did you mean by that?
And then he kind of explained like, oh yeah, like I was thinking, like you know, in four months I'm going to be away in camp for like for weeks and we won't be talking.
And then there's summer and you'll be away.
And then I go to college.
So like, you know, realistically, like we would probably break up or whatever.
So like after four months, like, you know, we'd break up.
And I was like, I'm not comfortable with that.
Lila tells him that, while she understands the reality here, she doesn't want to enter a relationship that has a definite end date.
She wants to be able to go in, thinking okay, maybe the odds aren't great, but we're both open to the fact that anything can happen.
She wants both of them to be on board with the possibility that they could keep dating if the relationship is wonderful.
And so we kind of talked it out.
And I was like, yeah, like I would much rather just not have like a deadline for our breakup.
Like I would much rather just kind of go with the flow, see what happens.
And he was like, yeah, that works for me.
So he agreed to that.
And so we decided like, yeah, we're not going to do that.
And he apologized for making the comment.
Lila and Tyrion continue to date.
I ask Lila what this means.
What dating is like at 17 and 18, besides them all.
I'm a middle-aged person with no children, so I have to ask, do high school people text?
Do they sit on social media all day?
How are they in touch?
I'm a very big FaceTimer.
My parents know this and they're so annoyed with me because, like every second of every day, I'll have a friend on call and they're like Lila, turn off the phone.
But no, we were FaceTiming and we would call and stuff.
And we would usually hang out once or twice a week, usually once a week on weekends, because he had, like he played Ultimate Frisbee.
Yeah.
For the record, Jasmine is laughing at Ultimate Frisbee.
I am laughing at Jasmine laughing.
But we have no Ultimate Frisbee judgment.
In fact, Jasmine was laughing because she played Ultimate Frisbee.
It is cool.
We just didn't expect Lila to say that.
Back to the dates.
We might go to lunch somewhere.
And then after lunch, we might go to a museum or we might walk around a little bit.
And then usually afterwards, we spend like hours together.
And then we would usually either well, he would drive at the time because I couldn't drive.
He would drive back to either my house or his house and we would get out, maybe watch a movie there or something.
Around April, it gets to be the time that Tyrion has to choose where to go to college.
This is a very big deal.
The decision is between two schools.
One is close to home.
The other is many hours away.
Tyrion chooses the one that's far away because it's best for what he wants to study, and it was always his first choice.
Lila totally gets that.
She also knows that the distance on the horizon makes it that much less likely that she and Tyrion will stay together.
But they're both still in the mode of, let's see what happens.
But as the weeks go by Tyrion, who's in the thick of the excitement of senior year.
He's really busy.
And maybe he's not communicating very well about his busyness.
This is hard for Lila, who feels some whiplash and disappointment when it comes to Tyrion's availability and engagement.
We had a few squabbles about.
I felt like I wasn't getting enough attention and then he felt like he was giving me attention.
And I would do this thing where I would post things on my Instagram notes.
Like I think I posted the song Real Man by Biba Doobie about like 50 billion times because the lyrics is like I guess no one ever taught you how to be.
Like that kind of thing, whenever he kind of pissed me off.
And he noticed it.
He texted me one time.
He's like, hey, I don't like this.
And I was like, whoops, he noticed.
Lila who, let's remember, is a junior in high school when all of this happens, learns an important lesson.
Don't be passive aggressive.
It's not a good look.
After some communication, things do get better.
Mostly.
I mean, it's not perfect, but they do get into some kind of routine that works for her.
We were able to find a way of, like, you know, FaceTiming once a week at least.
Just keep, like, seeing each other, making sure to plan things in advance.
He would make sure to text first.
I would also make sure to text first.
We would keep communication up and...
You know, things seem to be going pretty well.
Actually in that month, like better than they had been, because we had sorted a lot of things out and found a lot of compromises for what worked for us.
Eventually, it's May.
What happens in May?
It's the NCFL finals, baby.
More on that and prom when we come back.
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We're back.
Lila met the man we're calling Tyrion, as in Tyrion Lannister, at a local speech.
Finals qualifying event.
The actual finals are in May, and in the spring of 2025, this event is in Chicago.
Lila and Tyrion both go.
What a romantic city, Chicago.
We would spend whole days together because, you know we I like to think I'm good at speech and debate, but I, you know I didn't make it to semifinals or any finals at all actually.
And so I had like two days where I was doing nothing and he didn't make it either.
And so he would like come to my room and we would just kind of like hang out and we'd watch TV and we'd like play on my switch or whatever.
And so like those are really nice moments.
And I actually felt the closest I had ever felt to him when we were in Chicago at that time.
They return home.
Everything is great, and there's so much to look forward to.
We had been planning prom, and he had already paid the money for it.
He had already filled out the forms.
Everything was said and done.
I had my dress.
He had his tie.
And I'm just going to give you the days.
The prom was on a Thursday.
On a Tuesday, I think I remember actually he texted me the infamous three words, can we talk?
And so, of course, I had the moment where I was like, oh, no, oh, no, no, no, no, no.
And so like, you know, I'm like, yeah, yeah, sure.
So we get on the phone and you know he like starts off by like saying how much he likes me and how much he likes this relationship.
And I'm like, OK.
Are you breaking up with me?"
And he's like, no, no, no, not at all.
I just think we should break up in 15 days.
He is very specific about this.
15 days.
That's 360 hours from the day of this phone call.
What did you say?
Well, I kind of just sat there and I was like, dude.
Dude, come on.
Like, I thought we like we already talked about this.
I thought we were kind of past it.
Like, I thought that this wasn't a thing anymore.
But then it's really actually been a thing all this time when you haven't been telling me.
And he kind of explained to me like yeah, like knowing I'm going to college and you know I'm going to camp in 15 days.
Basically, Tyrion is saying all of the stuff he said at the start of their relationship that he felt he'd need to be single when he left for camp and then college.
But back at the start of all of this, Lila made it clear she wasn't into that.
She didn't want to start this relationship if he knew there'd be an end date.
And now she suspects maybe even though he agreed to her terms, he's known the whole time that this would be over.
And now he's revealing this right before prom.
At first, she barely knows what to say.
She's sitting in her room when she gets that first message.
And she's thinking to herself, can I just smile and enjoy this for 15 days?
Does my brain even work that way?
Can I compartmentalize what's actually happening?
She starts to realize, even if I try this, it'll be so inauthentic, so unhappy.
I'll be so detached.
She tells Tyrion this.
I will be so detached.
Like I'm going to be the most detached you have ever seen me, because to put a deadline like that on a relationship is basically to announce that you don't really care about that person.
If you can detach yourself so easily from another person at a specific date, like a Google Calendar invite, then how much do you really care about that person?
So if I'm to date someone with the knowledge that they don't really care about me enough to like want to see things through with me, then I'm going to stop caring about them as well.
I'm not going to show them that much care because I'm going to be, first of all, hurt.
And I'm also like, I don't want to spend my energy on that.
As Lila explains this to Tyrion, she is clear that she really does feel like he's being truly insensitive by putting a timer on their relationship.
On this Tuesday, two days before prom, she's like, I gotta think about this.
I was basically like, yeah, like, I don't know if I can do this.
Like, just give me some time to think.
And then I hung up.
The next day is Wednesday, one day before prom.
Lila has plans to get her hair done at Legacy Place, as one does.
She goes through all the motions, all the while thinking, what am I going to do?
She's at the salon with her cousin.
I'm freaking out and because, like you know, it's prom.
I have this amazing dress and it's gorgeous and I really want to wear this dress.
Like you have no idea how pretty this dress was, oh my god.
But my cousin Jenny, I love her so much.
She's like the craziest black eyeliner every day.
I love her.
She's like constantly in her millennial emo phase.
It's great.
Um, It's feeling old.
I'm sorry, Jasmine.
I'm sorry.
I'm sorry.
No, I know.
I know.
I love her so much, though.
And she took me out and this is like from a movie.
I was at the hair salon.
She's in the chair next to me.
I'm like looking in the mirror.
I'm like, my makeup is done.
I'm getting my hair done.
She's next to me like this badass like woman who's my cousin.
And we're like, I'm showing her my texts with him and everything.
And she's like, girl.
I'll dump him.
And I'm like you know, Lila and her cousin go from the salon at Legacy Place to another spot that has veggie bowls.
I was having my spicy peanut noodles.
Really recommend it.
If anyone goes to Legacy Place and goes to Life Live, get the spicy peanut noodles.
They are incredible.
So we're sitting there and I have my nails done, I have my hair done, I look fabulous and I'm eating my noodles and she's across from me and I'm like
I think I'm just going to break up with him.
I have prom next year.
I can wear the dress then.
I'll have my life sorted out more.
I'll know where I'm going to college.
I don't want to waste my energy even more than I have.
I think it'll just be redundant for me to go to this thing.
I'm not going to enjoy it.
I don't want to see his face.
I don't want to think of him.
And that brings us to how we started the story today.
The moment that Lila realizes that, in order for her to be good to herself, she has to be the bad guy to someone else.
She knows in her heart that she needs to do what's best for her.
In short, the breakup starts now.
She cannot go to prom.
She just has to tell Tyrion.
I text him and I go, I'm ready to talk.
He says, okay, five minutes.
I say, no, I'm at the hair salon.
He says, okay, when can you talk?
This is where I'll say for the record that she has been messaging with Tyrion throughout this trip to Legacy Place over many hours.
It's a confusing back and forth.
Tyrion's basically been asking, what have you decided?
Are we going to prom?
And Lila is, if I am to be honest, mildly opaque about her next moves.
I know this because when I ask Lila if she still has these text messages, she says yes and she reads them to me.
I say, is there anything new you would like to say?
Him, not really.
Is there anything you want to say?
Me, only that I've made my decision.
He says, okay, when are you free to call?
I say, must we call for me to say yes or no to you?
And he says, I guess not.
And I say, I only want to speak to someone who wants to talk to me.
If there's something more to say, then we can find time.
And he says, wait, what's happening?
Can you just tell me what you want to do because I can't read your mind?
And then I said, if you have something more to say to me, then let's talk.
If you don't, I can easily communicate my answer in a text.
He says, please communicate in a text.
And I say, you already made the decision to break up in two weeks.
I don't want to abide to that timeline.
He says, so we're done.
And I say, that call was never mine to make.
We are done.
Lila also tells Tyrion that in dumping her this way, with a timeline based on his camp schedule and his college schedule, it makes her feel like she was a fling.
He says, that's not fair.
You have meant something to me.
But she's not feeling respected.
They stop communication.
Then, later that day, Lila picks up communication with someone else.
His mom had been a very big support person for me.
Like, I went to her for a lot of things and I loved her so much.
And so, when we broke up, I felt that it was only right that I should text her and thank her for everything and be like hey, like I'm probably never going to see you again.
But thank you for all the things you've done for me.
I'm sorry that things didn't work out with Tyrion.
But you were such an amazing person to me.
And just thank you.
So I sent her that text.
And she wrote back.
And she's like, is this a prank?
Prom is tomorrow.
And I was like...
And I was like, no, this is no prank.
And she was like, huh?
So it turns out Tyrion never told her anything.
Lila tells, well, I'm going to call her Mrs. Lannister.
She tells Mrs. Lannister, I don't want to give you my side of anything here.
I just wanted to thank you.
If you need details about this breakup, talk to your son Tyrion.
And then she talked to him and then, you know, it ended up with her kind of being like you know, you two should go to prom together.
Like, anyway, like it would be like kind of remiss for you not to go.
And I'm like, I agree with that sentiment, but also no.
Like, I feel like it's remiss to put a timer on a relationship.
Um, so I, so I, I very respectfully said like, you know, I prefer not to do that.
Like that is not like, it's not something I'd like to do.
Um, but thank you so much anyway.
And she was like she tried to convince me a little bit more and then I was still like no like no no no, thank you.
After I finished talking to his mom, he texted me, Tyrion texted me.
Tyrion basically tells Lila, look, my parents are very upset about the timing.
They want me to go to prom with you tomorrow.
Can you please go to prom with me as friends?
And Lila is like, I don't want to.
She'd be going to make sure he had a good prom, but she'd be a mess.
She knows she wouldn't enjoy it.
By the way listeners, you might be thinking why didn't Tyrion wait until after prom to tell Lila he wanted to break up with her?
The answer is, I do not know.
Lila doesn't know.
Jasmine doesn't know.
We're all actually pretty baffled.
Lila does suspect it's because this issue had been nagging at him and maybe for some kind reasons he wanted to get it out of his system.
It doesn't matter.
The point is, he didn't wait, and now he was asking Lila to power through this event, even while feeling heartbroken.
But she will not do it.
Regardless.
At some point during all of this, Tyrion's mom is like please, he does not know what he's doing.
And we have this conversation where she's like, oh, he's like a silly boy.
He doesn't know what he wants.
And, you know, I don't like no hate on his mom.
Jasmine, stop it.
I should say Jasmine and I start side eyeing Tyrion's mom, because pressure Lilo to go to prom and saying he's a boy who doesn't know what he wants is, as Jasmine puts it, hashtag boy-mom shit.
Lila wants to make it clear to this audience, though, that she really likes Mrs. Lannister.
The awkward texts continue and through these back-and-forth conversations with Tyrion and Mrs Lannister, Tyrion winds up admitting to Lila that he's actually only pushing prom at this point to please his parents.
At least that's what he says.
It could be that he wants to go, but at this point, he's had it.
So Lila then tells Mrs Lannister, your son is actually trying to get me to go to prom, to please you.
Lila even screenshots a Tyrion message and sends it to his mother.
And finally with that, the conversation ends.
Did he go to prom?
I don't know.
I assume not.
Like, he lost his date.
Fast forward a year to Lila's graduation month, class of 2026.
Jasmine and I sit with Lila in our office studio.
Lila, who's now 18, tells us this story with a perspective she didn't have when it was all happening.
One thing she now very much understands, senior year is busy and it's a messy, emotional time.
It's hard to manage relationships in this moment, even friendships.
She thinks of when Tyrion called her saying, can we break up in 15 days?
And while she still believes that was not the move, she can now see how scattered and excited and overwhelmed she is as she lets go of high school.
I think he just wanted a clean end to that.
And I could tell he was very stressed about it because he he had a very big, loving family.
And, you know, leaving that kind of thing behind for college, it's hard on anyone.
I'm an only child and I, like I've cried at the thought of leaving my parents to go because I'm going to a college in a different state.
And I've tried the thought of even being in a different state.
So, like being in this position now, looking back, I can see why he was so stressed and I entirely empathize with it.
And I can see why he was so like, had so many emotions in that moment, and how it might have come out in that way.
The second thing she admits is that some of her anger about the breakup the way she felt she'd been a fling was less about the expiration date on the relationship and maybe more about how she was treated during the relationship.
Is it fair to say that leading up to this conversation...
After the first conversation where he's like yeah, we'll have four months, and you're like that's not how I roll.
Do you think if he had really behaved incredibly well for those four months...
Really thoughtfully.
And there were never days where you had to post a passive aggressive song on Instagram.
Would I have stayed with him?
Or would you have felt as reduced to a fling in quotes?
It seems to me that you were kind of already getting a little fed up on and off.
Yeah, I absolutely was.
So it's not like he had your benefit of the doubt.
Like I'm just wondering if he had called you and said in tears saying in 15 days I go away and I am.
I know I made this promise to keep an open mind and I am struggling with that.
And if he had like treated me well.
Yeah, the whole time.
I would have stayed with him.
I would have reassured him.
I probably would have driven to his house and given him a hug.
But if he had said that after treating you incredibly well and said...
I still would have done that.
Fifteen more days.
You would have been.
I want to add, I'm so empathetic to his situation.
I get very passionate when I speak, so it may sound like I'm angry or whatever.
I'm not.
You're just on the speech and debate team.
Yes, I am.
I am.
Thank you, Merida.
Thank you.
But it's like like I completely understand why he was so freaked out and I understand where he was coming from and I understand that feeling of wanting that clean like perfect divide.
It's not something that I would like, but I understand wanting it.
When Lila and I prepped for this episode, she casually mentioned something about how she was seeing someone.
But she's also leaving town to go to college.
I wondered if that meant that she's changed her mind about being open to a relationship with a predetermined expiration date.
But nothing has changed on that front.
I don't want to be somebody else's Tyrion, you know?
This sounds really funny to say.
But I mean, it's true.
And so I was just kind of like, I kind of made myself a promise.
I was like, you know...
When I date someone, I date to be serious.
And so my thought was unless I am dating someone who is also going to Northwestern, then I don't want to date that person.
At the time of this interview, Lila was seeing someone she'd met at an event for incoming Northwestern students.
It's not that she's signing up for forever, by the way.
She's just thinking, let's keep an open mind, because we can.
I ask Lila what it means to balance the understanding of a probable reality with the less likely possibility that a long-distance post-high school relationship will work.
Because I still wonder would it have been easier if I had been more practical and broken up with my high school boyfriend Kyle, before I started school?
Or maybe it was sort of cool and necessary that we held on hope for a full year and did our best as long as we could.
Maybe going through it together is why we're still friends now.
I was not somebody who was going to wind up coupled forever with my high school boyfriend.
Like, I knew a lot about myself that I had intended to be single as an adult, but I love Kyle.
And...
I was like, we all love Kyle.
And so I was like, we're staying together.
And I was incredibly romantic about Kyle.
I remember sending him all these notes from college.
And then it became very painful because I was building this new life and it wasn't very present.
And I...
He was in a world I knew that I missed.
But I also probably should have said at Thanksgiving, as so many people do this is as hard as people say and I want to give us both freedom, but I wanted to have my cake and eat it.
I loved him, and I didn't... So I'm always looking for...
It doesn't sound, even with Tyrion, like if there was a wrongness here it was about.
It was just her situation.
I don't think either of us.
I mean, obviously, both of us did things wrong.
We were we were teenagers.
And I think all teenagers, everyone in relationships, regardless of who you are, will do something wrong.
Like that's not something you can get away from.
But I think that it was just our situation.
I think that what he did was entirely valid.
I understand his emotions.
I understand his feelings.
Jasmine, stop it.
Jasmine disagrees.
Do you now see the moments that he didn't have time for you as, oh, he was actually really busy?
Yes, I do.
I do.
Because I've seen those same moments with myself and my friends have texted me being like hey, like you haven't responded to any of the reels I've sent you for like 47 hours.
What's going on?
And I'm like, oh, my God.
Hi.
I think another lesson here is that with all breakups, time gives us perspective.
Another thing is that when you're young, sometimes you take a big swing and make a promise.
And you can't keep it.
And it hurts.
And you do your best to be kind and to forgive.
Easier said than done, I know.
So what advice would you give people who are wondering how transparent to be with somebody else about their inability to commit for long term?
People who are wondering is the person I'm with going to be able to give me time if they're a year older and going to college?
How do you have conversations about this?
How do you have conversations about this?
And should you or should you just let it roll?
Like what advice what advice would you give to yourself from last year?
One of my she's my one of my best friends.
I love her so much.
She's a junior right now.
Her boyfriend is a senior.
And she has been like she was texting me nonstop, like completely worried about it.
And I think that it's a little bit, I wouldn't say unfair, but I don't think it's the kind of thing that you should get advice from other people on what to do.
It's the kind of experience where you know there are some things that you can be taught, and then you learn them, and there are other things that you have to experience, and then you learn them.
This is the kind of thing I feel that people need to experience on their own terms.
So I feel like, especially being on this podcast, like whatever I say, it'll be like oh, if I say, stick with the person, do whatever you can to be with them, then I don't want people to just to just blindly do that.
If I say, break up with the person, people shouldn't blindly do that either.
It entirely depends on the context of your situation.
It entirely depends on how you feel, depends on how they're treating you.
So I would say, If what you are doing feels right to you, and if what you are doing, If it makes you happy, your happiness should be your priority, regardless of what that means.
Lila does say some of this is about knowing yourself.
She had this real understanding even at 17 that she didn't want any relationship that was designed to be temporary.
Some people are so good at having a meaningful summer romance, knowing it's meant to end.
Some people are excellent at transiency and letting something be special just for a while.
Lila knows she's not that person.
Even if it requires suspending all disbelief, she wants to be able to say, this could work.
Let me see this through.
There are people who move through the world in a way that is very ephemeral.
And it's kind of what you said.
It's like they look for experiences.
They look for things to grow from.
They look for good memories that they can hold on and look back to.
And that it's so beautiful for someone to move through the world in that way.
I think it is very beautiful.
And there are people who just don't, who don't want that, who want to have experiences but who don't want to have that impending ephemerality.
I hope Lila's words make sense to everyone contemplating their high school relationships before college.
And to anyone staring at a calendar, I say, make the best of summer while it lasts.
Love Letters is a production of the Boston Globe.
This episode was produced by Jasmine Aguilera.
Story edit by Veronica Chow.
Special thanks to Linda Henry and Brian McGorry.
Remember, Love Letters now offers a premium feed for our friends with benefits.
If you sign up, you'll get an extra episode a month.
The first is available now, as is our extended cut of this episode. with more Lila.
See the link in our show notes or visit globe.com slash love letters slash friends with benefits.
That's globe.com slash love letters slash friends with benefits.
And it was like a pop song about graduation and people like...
Yeah.
We had together.
Yeah.
I feel like I'm getting serenaded right now.
Friends forever.
I'm Meredith Goldstein.
Thanks for listening.
Your gay elders are calling, pick up.
Silver Linings with the Old Gays is a podcast hosted by four larger-than-life personalities sharing wisdom, laughs and a little lovingly earned side-eye after decades of life experience.
They talk about everything from health and aging to relationships, queer culture and the moments that shape who we become.
It's honest, hilarious, and surprisingly heartfelt.
So if you want stories that are as entertaining as they are meaningful, check out Silver Linings with The Old Gaze, wherever you get your podcasts.
