Bea V. Larsen . . . .Commentaries |
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Bea V. Larsen is a Senior Mediator at the Center for Resolution of Disputes in |
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Moving On This entry was posted on 1/19/2008 11:05 AM and is filed under Personally Speaking. Recently I considered moving to a new home. Close friends had found the perfect place for them to live, within a cluster of five small condominiums nestled at the base of a wooded park, close to downtown, yet secluded. They phoned and suggested I consider living there as well, as another unit just across the courtyard was now for sale.
A long hiatus from work over the holidays had left me with a heightened sense of what post-retirement loneliness might be, and we had talked about this. I was moved by their gesture, for it came along with a tender offer of the help I might need as I grow older, friends close at hand if my car won’t start, or if my human apparatus begins to fail. I warmed to the prospect of this new shelter, both the roof and their arms. I went to look around. The site of their new home is the very neighborhood Len and I lived in for over forty years. The park at the top of the hill, seen from their windows, was the place to which we walked together several evenings each week. Our children had rolled head over heels down the steep slopes on new spring grass and sledded on snowy winter evenings. So this would mean a return to loved surroundings. Then why once there, peering through dark windows into this promise of a new haven, was the idea abandoned in a blink? I was enveloped with a cloak of sadness, and I knew this was a move I could never make. Needing to explain my change of heart, both to my friends and to myself, on return home I listed the pros and cons. There were many, but one alone outweighed and made the others irrelevant. At the house in the park, the memory of my former life with Len arose at every turn of my head, his absence a constant presence. In my cozy loft, Len never lived. I bring him in at will many times a day, glance at his pictures, even have imaginary conversations from time to time. But here he comes by invitation. Then his presence, not his absence, is the essence of my mood. Here I have some control. Each of us chooses to make the past a part of the present in different ways, accommodating to our unique circumstances and needs. Today, I feel strengthened by this recent experience, able to recognize and then act on my feelings, to manage my life looking forward, determined to create my future security in new ways, even if more alone. CommentsDisplay comments as (Linear | Threaded)
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