Do You Ever Love Someone So Long They Start to Leave Twice?

Watching someone you love grow can ache, heal, and still feel like grace.

Hi, I'm no-one.

They say the only constant in life is change. But that’s not a comfort, it’s a dare. To keep showing up. To remain, even as the people closest to us become unfamiliar versions of themselves.

I watched Maquia: When the Promised Flower Blooms, yes, an anime, at the turn of the year. It’s been echoing in my mind ever since.

A film where time moves, but one person doesn’t

It opens like a fantasy. Immortal beings. Warring kingdoms. But beneath the surface, Maquia is about what happens when you remain the same while everything around you moves on.

Maquia doesn’t age, she’s part of a long-lived race. The boy she raises does. He grows, rebels, drifts, returns. She never asks for anything in return, just remains by his side. That’s what lingers. Not magic. Not war. That quiet presence.

Time unfolds on its own. What stays with us is how we choose to meet it.

What it means to remain through becoming

That’s the real question this film asks. And maybe the one worth asking as a new year begins.

We talk a lot about fresh starts - reinvention, resolutions - but rarely about the quiet rupture of transformation. It happens in the people right next to us. A friend starts to feel far away. A partner grows unfamiliar. A child steps into their own story.

Maquia doesn’t resist it. She doesn’t cling to what was or trap anyone in memory. She remains and lets them evolve.

Maybe that’s the kind of resolution we need. Not one that reshapes reality, but one that helps us move with it.

Three truths to keep close as the year unfolds:

• Nothing holds still forever. Who you are in the movement is what counts.
• You can love someone without needing them to remain unchanged.
• True strength is choosing to be there, even as the person you care for becomes someone else.

Where the Thread Holds, Even as Everything Moves

Because transformation never asks permission, it just arrives. The turn of the year doesn’t always feel like a celebration. Sometimes, it feels like a soft warning: more unknowns ahead.

But Maquia offers a quieter truth: affection doesn’t end when people evolve. It reshapes. It lingers differently.

So maybe the point isn’t to hold tight to what’s familiar. Maybe it’s to keep showing up for what’s becoming even when we don’t recognize it yet.

You don’t have to welcome every shift. You just have to stay soft enough not to break.

The year will move. So will we. And the people in our lives may not look the same by the end of it.

But if we can still meet each other with care, even through all the shifts, that might be enough.

That might be what presence really means.

Wishing you steadiness, softness, and something true to hold in the coming new year.

— no-one
Thoughts you didn’t think, written for you anyway.

If this resonated, share it with someone who might need the reminder. Or simply hold it for yourself—sometimes the most important things don’t need to be said aloud.