Floating in this dingy

Some days I am overjoyed at my decision to leave Canada and move to Australia. To start anew. To reinvent myself. To make new friends. To try new things. Some days it’s exhilarating and I find myself wanting to pinch myself to remind me it’s real.

But other days, days like today, I wonder why. I start to remember how green the grass was on the other side and start to ruminate on how much better I had it, how easy it all was, how supported I was and how many opportunities I gave up to move to the other side of the world. I would have been graduating from school this year with the vocation that I wanted with all my heart. And for what?

Love.

Love I keep telling myself. That’s why I’m here and that’s what comes with uprooting my whole life. And as much as I dislike the notion of the girl who threw away everything for a boy, that is very much what I did. And the boy is amazing. One of the most beautiful people I have ever met… and he puts up with my moaning and groaning, supports and encourages me and shows me endless love.

I have it good. I know.

But this thing in me is eating me alive. I am tired of waiting for all the pieces to come together. I feel like I am at the end of my rope with what feels like no support from the endless circle of support I had with me back home.

Community.

I do have it. I’m lucky for it. But with lock-downs and social isolation, my weekly community has vanished. And I feel lost, perhaps, more than ever.

How could this be the story? How could this be my story?

The story is not over, but it seems to be stuck in the same rut, lost in the same place out at sea for so long now that my stuckness is starting to feel comfortable.

Art.

She calls to me and I keep inside, walking in circles. I’m not good enough for her. Maybe I was when I was younger but I have nothing to give her, or rather, she has nothing to give to me.

She keeps calling.

And so I answered.

Today.

It’s been a while… I stumble over the keyboard and forget how to spell words like exhilerate… exilerate… exhilarate… auto-correct reminds me. A glimmer of hope and support amongst the holes in my thoughts. But I push past because underneath and beyond my grumbling words today is another post, and another one, a poem, a painting and then maybe something worth saying. Something worth seeing. Something worth believing in again. Oh how I long for the simple days of blind faith and dualism. Life is not so clear anymore.

But today I wrote. The first time in a long time. And maybe something has shifted. Maybe I’m starting to find my feet again, my fingers, the paddles of this dingy. And maybe, after all of this, I am heading somewhere.