Dear Tell All: I’m graduating from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in May and planning to spend the summer at home in Minneapolis. I don’t have solid plans for fall but am looking for full-time work while applying for graduate school in 2020. Meanwhile, my girlfriend has already been admitted to graduate school and will head to the East Coast after spending the summer with her parents in Milwaukee.
We have an amazing relationship even though we haven’t been together long — just since last fall. I think we might be soulmates, but we haven’t seriously discussed our future. She’s ambitious and firmly set on her career trajectory, so there’s been no talk of coordinating our post-graduation plans. At the same time, I think she treasures our bond and (however vaguely) plans to be involved with me for the foreseeable future.
I’ve considered moving east in the fall to be with her, but I’m worried about bringing up that possibility. It might be that I’m more into her than she’s into me. I’m terrified of broaching the subject with her and getting a negative or noncommittal answer — a blow to my ego. I also don’t want to seem presumptuous, like I’m nailing down our future before we’re ready for that kind of commitment.
As the days tick down to May commencement, what should I do?
Bachelor of Hearts
Dear Bachelor: Now is no time to worry about your ego. Now is the time to go all in for your potential soulmate. Luckily, you can do it without overdoing it.
Here’s the plan: Instead of spending the summer in Minneapolis, ask your girlfriend if you can spend it in Milwaukee. Propose that, rather than living with her parents, she live with you in a sublet. That way, you two can see how it feels to have a higher-level commitment.
If it works out, you can move with her in the fall and apply to graduate school from the East Coast. If it doesn’t work out — well, the relationship probably wasn’t meant to be. But at least you won’t have to spend the rest of your life wondering if it was meant to be.
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