In the time of dinosaurs, when the world was lush and vibrant, a love story unfolded across the sprawling landscapes of what we now call California. Among the canyons and cliffs of the Tuna Canyon Formation, where the bones of ancient titans lie buried in sediment, a tale of heartbreak and longing took form, one that would make even a T-rex shed a tear. The Cretaceous period was a time of grand romances and fierce rivalries—not just among megafauna, but also amongst the small, often overlooked creatures who shared this exquisite, dinosaur-dominated world. Pterosaurs, with their elegant wings and soaring dreams, flitted through the skies. Meanwhile, on the ground, the diminutive yet passionate Ornithopods were hopelessly enamored with each other, their hearts racing as they roamed the ferns and cycads. Among our protagonists were four Ornithopods: Gertrude, whose mottled green scales sparkled in the sunlight, and Barnaby, a dashing fellow with a flair for making her laugh. Their love was tender but stormy—there can be no romance without the specter of impending doom in a world where every shadow could stalk the unwary. As they paraded through their verdant paradise, breathlessly exchanging delicate nuzzles, the foreboding tremors of an impending cataclysm whispered through the canyon. Ah, but nature is often cruel. Barnaby, playful and carefree, would dash ahead in the hope of impressing Gertrude, only to find himself facing the hungry jaws of a lurking Allosaurus. Heartbroken and bereft, Gertrude continued on, her spirit broken but determined to preserve the memory of their laughter among the ferns. Each day, she mourned the empty space beside her, the theft of companionship that seemed crueler than the ravages of time itself. In Tuna Canyon, the tragedy of loss echoed through the ages. While the mighty creatures rolled in the dust, the sweeter, softer stories went unnoticed and left to fossilize in the rock. Gertrude, lonely yet resilient, forged a friendship with a nearby group of Ammonites, whose spiraled shells echoed tales of woe and wonder. Together, they mourned their loved ones, sharing their grief amidst storms of shale and the sun-kissed exposures that would be unearthed eons later. Over countless millennia, sediment blanketed their stories. When paleontologists finally uncovered these fossils, they were left with only the remnants of grit and gravel, the once-vivid colors of life now dulled into nostalgia. What became of Gertrude? Did she find love again among the flurry of small herbivores? Was her heart ever whole again? History, in all its unyielding impartiality, offered no answers—only unholy silence. And so, we stand over the Tuna Canyon Formation today as witnesses to a tragic romance buried under layers of earth. We sift through bones with reverence, but perhaps we should also bow our heads in despair for the love stories lost in the churning tides of geological time. For every gleaming fossil we uncover, we may just as easily unearth the heartache of creatures gone—and the realization that even in a world teeming with life, love itself can be as fragile as a feather drifting through the air, a delicate whisper destined to be swallowed by the void. Cretaceous heartbreak, it seems, isn’t limited to the brief lives of ancient creatures. It’s a continuum, threading through the fabric of existence and echoing forging through the eons, leaving us to ponder: is our heartbreak nothing more than an echo of theirs? In the great composition of life, we'll always be reminded that love—and loss—is as permanent as the very bones we uncover.