Move Equals Death?
When we decided to leave New York for Rhode Island last spring, we made a one-way decision, knowing we cannot go home again, once we leave. When we committed to Wheeler for Sophie, it was the first irrevocable decision in a string of decisions. We started the process of selling our house and of finding a new place to live. We began telling our friends and it was exciting, and they participated vicariously. Everyone contemplates a move to a new place; fewer actually make the move. People share your excitement, merging it with theirs, at first. They probably do not lie awake in bed at night, sleepless, second guessing themselves. This is the difference between someone else's dream and your own reality.
The limbo has lasted a while too long now. It has been about ten months, stretching on and on. Our resources, always thin, are back down to none. I have yet to find a job. Sally is still in South Salem with the dogs. School has worked out for Sophie, thank goodness, although we are now $20,000 further in debt. My sense is that we have made a good "large view" decision, but that it is just taking longer than projected, and that I have lost sight of the goal. As far as it goes with the friends in our old town, we are dead and gone. It really is not much different. You die, you move. You are buried, you are out of sight, either way. You are gone. Although it is a non-terminal sentence, it is like my Uncle Courtney, with Alzheimer's disease, or like someone with cancer of the pancreas. They, you, we are culled out and segregated from the daily flow of humanity that we once swam amongst. They are like the dead, still walking, One ceases to be anything but a memory. It is a lesson to learn, or to remind oneself of often. Count your friends. There are truly very few. Stay in contact with them; make an effort to remain in touch, not only when they are needed, and do not count them for granted. Focus on your own survival, that of your own nuclear unit, hunker down and "keep on keeping on." as the song says.
The limbo has lasted a while too long now. It has been about ten months, stretching on and on. Our resources, always thin, are back down to none. I have yet to find a job. Sally is still in South Salem with the dogs. School has worked out for Sophie, thank goodness, although we are now $20,000 further in debt. My sense is that we have made a good "large view" decision, but that it is just taking longer than projected, and that I have lost sight of the goal. As far as it goes with the friends in our old town, we are dead and gone. It really is not much different. You die, you move. You are buried, you are out of sight, either way. You are gone. Although it is a non-terminal sentence, it is like my Uncle Courtney, with Alzheimer's disease, or like someone with cancer of the pancreas. They, you, we are culled out and segregated from the daily flow of humanity that we once swam amongst. They are like the dead, still walking, One ceases to be anything but a memory. It is a lesson to learn, or to remind oneself of often. Count your friends. There are truly very few. Stay in contact with them; make an effort to remain in touch, not only when they are needed, and do not count them for granted. Focus on your own survival, that of your own nuclear unit, hunker down and "keep on keeping on." as the song says.
posted by Stonechuck at 12:30 PM
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