Friday, March 9, 2012

Propped Up On A Shelf

I have learnt so much in the past month. Leaving my home - the environment I have grown up in. Surrounded by comforts and support. Smells, textures, paths, faces, places that I recognise. That is so easy to take for granted. Familiarity is often a best friend. When you need a place to fall, you know exactly where to go, who to see, what to do, how to express yourself.

Strip that all away and you are left naked, quite vulnerable and exposed.
So how do I go to that place and hear that sound and digest that smell when I need that best friend, familiarity? Pardon me, I would like some directions here? Oh, you're unavailable? Okay...

And in kicks strength.

Just when you start to feel that squirmy and uncomfortable wave, she is there. Before it crashes, overwhelming you with uncertainty, loneliness (and no doubt a panic attack), she is there. Warm and calm, she wraps her arms around me, sits me down and says, "Don't be silly. You don't need the things you've always known. You need a challenge. You need to find your own path now. A new one, that you carve out with all your own beliefs and traditions and quirky patterns. You are never alone. Just trust in yourself and you will never be alone."

I sit thoughtfully and inhale these words, knowing that she is right. She is my strength, and she never seizes to fail me, even when I expect her to. Perhaps I just need to embrace that now, instead of wondering when she will falter. Strength never falters once you have absorbed that faith into your bones.

There are plenty of things that change once leaving your home permanently. A holiday doesn't compare. You cannot know the tasks you take on, the new places you must rely on to become the new familiar. The air that engrosses the spaces around you.

Your home is where your heart is. Mine will always be sitting propped up on a shelf in my childhood house in my home town. But for now, I am happy to take a piece off that shelf and place it in my new home, giving it all the heart I can possibly loan from it's original shelf.

Forgive me, for I am becoming independent in a way that I thought I already was. I suppose you always think you've grown up, until you grow a little more.




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