life on the lamb continues
Nine or ten years later, here I am again, looking to rebuild hope and believe in the possibility of accumulating positives.
Nine years ago, my then-partner and I moved into my current home in a small town in Western Massachusetts. It remained our home for eight years, before our relationship ended just about this time last year. Now, my landlords are selling the house, and I am moving over the course of the next month, quite unexpectedly.
The last two months of our relationship - when we had broken up but were still living together - were both beautiful and heart wrenching. In very different ways, the process was one of the hardest things either of us had ever been through. Now I find myself confronted with all of the feelings of last year's agony and the grief of loss, simultaneously grieving this home again, in a new way. Goodbye, now, even to the memories which inhabit this place. (I cannot call them ghosts yet, for they still feel incredibly alive to me.)
I began this blog toward the very beginning of our relationship, when he and I lived separately and were just beginning to date. At the time, I lived in this same town, but in a big, communal household with a couple of farmers and some other people, more and less transient. He lived south of me, and we spent a lot of time together, as new lovers do.
My housemates at the time farmed lambs and chickens, and slaughtered these on our property, selling the meat to locals. My ex and I purchased a quantity of lamb together - perhaps half, perhaps a quarter? The idea was mutual, but he was the mastermind when it came to cooking (one of the great honors of my life was getting to witness him go from careful but amateur cook to noteworthy and even astonishing chef over the years). We made such things as lamb prosciutto and steamed lamb buns, evidence of which is documented here.
I was young and hopeful and, thankfully, naive, though not without all of the flaws that would eventually infiltrate our relationship and contribute to its heartbreaking, unpredicted dissolution.
Anyway, we moved into this house, where I live now, somewhere between six months to a year after all of this lamb business began. Child that I was, with stars in my eyes, I started seeds for our new gardens, diligently watering the sprouts and documenting their progress. It was the first time in my life that I had taken on the task of truly tending and nurturing for the long haul. I felt blessed to have found a partner totally committed to me - and a wonderful one at that - and grateful for the opportunity to build a home. Of course, there were times of difficulty and strife, but right now, I am taking some time to connect with that youthful part of me who really believed in the worthwhileness of growing something new. Who really believed that it meant something to put down some roots. That these plants, physical and metaphorical, would come to fruition.
This past year, in light of all that has happened - which I will certainly write more about - I have found it difficult to believe in beginnings. There have been glimmers and even profound experiences of new growth already, and yet a part of my heart feels as though it has necrotized in response to so many losses. Losses which were the result of my own actions, my own mental health issues, my own thinking and choices. I cannot bring my old world back to life. I think, though, that I am finally ready to accept (again) that I can fertilize and nurture more life. That it can be worth it. That I can be worth it. And so, in defiance of nihilism, I think that this year, I will again start some seeds.
Thank you to the universe for helping me to remember this blog. Thank you to the springtime for helping me to remember hope. Thank you to my mind, for helping me to remember everything good. I have been praying for a path out of the darkness, and I feel my prayers answered in the sense of possibility and acceptance (of grief, of regret, of loss, of sadness, of gratitude) I feel today.
Until soon,
xo
