A sense of place
Two things I paid great attention to yesterday:
I finished reading Charles Frazier’s Thirteen Moons while alternately dozing into NyQuil hangover naps, sipping hot lemonade with maple syrup, mediating altercations between the teenager and the preschooler and staring out the window at the maples on fire. Goodness, they take my breath away.
I enjoyed snippets of fantasy — living deep in the mountains as Nina does. I picked up the book on her recommendation and it did not disappoint. It also made me long for a more wooded, rustic life. With steep inclines and difficult angles to traverse. Long vistas enshrouded in mountain mist and sun sparkles. Romantic, yes. Ohio, no.
I thought a lot about place yesterday. I’ve written about this before, but am too lazy to look and link. So apologies to you if I repeat myself. I’ve never lived anywhere as an adult long enough to feel I’m home. I’ve not lived anywhere except for that one year in New Hampshire back in 1993-94 where I felt stirrings and hints of home. Home in the sense of place on earth, landscape, weather patterns, topography. I really am a New Englander at heart, and very much miss the warm pine groves and sandy soil of my youth. The area I grew up in has become too much of a suburban wasteland—over-developed, under-planned. Just like most of the country. Strip malled and chain restauranted. Just like most of this area. I wouldn’t want to move back there. But into the north, yes. I could live there.
I also felt that sense of belonging when I lived in Northern California back in the late 1980s and we trekked up into the Sierra Nevada range for day trips. So yeah, mountains. At some point in my life, I hope to live in the mountains. Even more than I long for the ocean. Really, I love to visit the ocean, and long for a nearby body of water, be it river, pond or lake. And mountains. But that may not happen and I need to turn my attention to what ground I stand on today and for the foreseeable tomorrow.
Looking out at the property we bought here in Kent, I’m happy with our little place, even though I feel so out of sync with most of what lies beyond our boundaries. Yes, I’m building a life: work, friendships, partnerships. But I always feel as if I’m doing so with one foot out the door, keeping my toes touching down on some yet-to-be-revealed place. I wonder if it will ever feel like home in that bigger sense, or if I will ever let go completely and give myself over to it without question, without saving the best of me for some nonexistent future?
We’re in as good a place as any right now while raising children. Chris’ business is growing. I have viable work. The kids are getting decent education. A small city with a growing art scene and alternatives to the drudgery and blind-sheepishness of mainstream life. Things are changing here. Inside and out. The kids are thriving and eventually they’ll be off in their own lives and who knows what that longed-for time of children grown and responsible for their own lives holds. Maybe middle life will bring me to a place in the woods nestles in mountains near a clear river. A room to write. Space to think. Time to breathe without sucking in the next item on the to-do list. So I’m 40 and Lila is 4. I’m looking at a late mid-life freedom, but it is as it should be, no matter how stifling that feels to me right now. And maybe middle life will find me loving all we’ve built here and not caring a bit that it’s Ohio and not New England. That would be fine too.
Ohio. Midwest. So flat and unremarkable to me in so many ways. Yet teaching me so much about how to be in the world. I’m seeing again that sometimes the yes is buried underneath the layers of no. Sometimes I can get to that yes by shaking it all up and making big changes. But I think for right now the best thing to do is to sit still, be quiet and listen.
"All through the long winter, I dream of my garden. On the first day of spring, I dig my fingers deep into the soft earth. I can feel its energy, and my spirits soar."
~Helen Hayes
November 11th, 2007 at 2:02 pm
I’ve been wondering about Thirteen Moons. Maybe I’ll pick it up. I like to hear your thoughts on place, thinking about it so much myself right now.
November 11th, 2007 at 3:05 pm
My thoughts seem to be running in similar waters. Place is extremely important. I have been burying myself in the trenches of my life, kind of waiting for the fallout of catastrophe to be done with me. What I’m realizing is that it may never be done with me, and I may as well settle in to what life is and make it the best here and now as I possibly can and stop waiting for some indefinable change. All the change I really need is in myself.
It’s one thing to realize this and another to act on it. I’m just beginning to act on it and it feels good. I am lucky to be in the geographical place I long to be in, but the life I’m living, the house I have, have all felt like pit stops. What I’m realizing is that this is it. Right now, right here. Like you, I think it’s smart not to reserve the best of ourselves for the possibilities of the future, which may never come. What we have for certain is this moment.
I’m going to try to put forward the best of myself. It’s not an easy road when you’ve been holding back, but who knows what else might flower if we do?
November 11th, 2007 at 5:14 pm
Know what you mean about place. When I moved from Montreal to Boston I thought I’d never feel at home here. Even now, after thirty years!(ack), it’s still not my place, but I can say I like it now. It’s fine and I’m probably here for a reason! When I go back to Montreal, as I did last week, I immediately feel I’m back home and walk around smiling. It’s just my place, it and London—feel the same there. Something about the loopy energy of those cities. Now I just try to focus on the gratitude like you are—it’s the way forward. That and the second home! A girl can dream! Mine will be a wee house in Montreal near Blvd St. Laurent!! Central and funky and cheap. There you go! And the first home will be by the ocean north of Boston. And, and frequent trips to London and the English countryside, of course. Occasional trips to the far east. Got to get those dreams in place. Nothing can happen without them!
November 11th, 2007 at 6:05 pm
Oh my. I have written about place and longing and belonging so many times I fear my readers will revolt and run the next time I broach the subject. While I’m a born and raised Midwesterner and adore where I’m living now, I still long for that mountain cabin life, too. But I’m also feeling really happy to have decided to make this our home while we raise our kids, digging in to have the house remodeled in a couple of years. Your last paragraph just nailed it so wonderfully.
November 11th, 2007 at 11:04 pm
Nice pink blanket in the background. Funny how where ever home is those pink blankets seem to find their way into our lives. These days I’ve been using mine to wrap me and little Santo up during his early morning nursings when it’s just a tad too chilly in the air. Thank goodness for Nana, we’ve been carting her around with us all these years, she was always a little bit of home for us.
xo and hope you are feeling better.
November 12th, 2007 at 2:06 am
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November 13th, 2007 at 1:28 pm
I think this is my favorite post of yours because it resonates so much with me right now. Plus, it is beautifully written. My husband and I moved to Erie, PA for his work at a university and neither of us our happy here. Sure, we made friends and I am starting a wonderful new job but still. Something is missing. I miss Vermont where I grew up and met my husband. I always felt so close to nature, the mountains, and a progressive political environment. Even Utah felt good to me because of the magnificent mountains just a short drive away. Here we find the white bread, chain store, uninterested populace that do not fulfill our needs. My husband talks often about missing the Green, White, Adirondack, and Wasatch Mountains because there he could decompress. Unfortunately, it is a long drive for us. Now we are looking to move either back to New England, out west or even to Canada. For now, we make the best of it, make it as homey as possible, and do what we can. Thanks again for this great post.
November 16th, 2007 at 2:47 pm
Honestly? I read “strip-malled” as “strip-mauled,” which I’m deciding to credit you for.
I wish I could shake out my own yes. I have my reasoning for why “here” is best, as do you, but I want to get to the point where I really do love it in spite of what I told myself I thought. I don’t think that will ever happen. But I’m OK. After seven years, knowing it won’t is almost better than hoping it might.
November 18th, 2007 at 10:58 pm
I love the idea that there may be a yes buried under layers of no, in so many areas of my life right now.
Does autumn hit you the same way it hits me? It’s like the whirlwind of summer is over and there’s such a built-in excuse to reassess… well, everything.