house of hope

I have written before of my daily reading of Thomas Merton. This morning, once again, something he wrote speaks to me. He talked about the fact that all the sights seen and experiences had at the Abbey were influenced by the mood he was in when he first arrived there on his journey to become a monk.

How true.

I was thinking about that concept as it touches upon my new home. When I moved here I felt freed...almost un-imprisoned. This place is imbued with hope (and not just my dog, Hope) and peace.  

When I am here, that is exactly how I feel. 

Peaceful, free and hopeful.

And perhaps that is exactly why I am finding happy again.

my unicorn, she's a beauty

I've been meaning to write this post for some time but haven't gotten around to it until now.  The picture above is a charming piece of art done by the lovely Tera over at Olive Hue Designs.  In the midst of my late-winter, I'm-getting-a-divorce funk, I commented on this picture and mentioned to Tera how much it spoke to me at that point in my life.

Lo and behold, she sent me a copy of it.  As a gift!  I tell you, this lady is awesome.  I've purchased items from her before for Younger's birthday and the birth of a friend's baby.  She also sent me beautiful shoes one time.

So I went and had my unicorn framed with a bit of panache (Tera...that's a metallic pewter mat) and she's hanging in my master bath, where I can see her as I get ready every morning.  

Now some of you might be thinking...um...Leslie, why do you keep mentioning a unicorn?  There is no unicorn in the picture.  

Well, folks, that's because no one sees her.  After all, the piece is titled "No One Sees the Unicorn".  You can look at the original here and then maybe you will understand.  

Thank you so much Tera.  I feel like the unicorn has brought me a little magic.  Life is good.  I'm happy.  And I'm lucky to have a friend like you!

building home

I am in the final stretch of moving into my new place. The move started in February...and is just ending now.

This new place feels perfect. I've spent a lot of time recently thinking about houses and home. Concepts that, from the name of my blog, you might understand are important to me. While only temporary, this place does feel like home.

The townhouse community I live in is not unique and has no real character. I have no privacy...but I feel safe...and that is a trade-off for privacy I'm willing to take. Right now, at this moment in my life, I like living inside a buzzing neighborhood. Children chase each other on their bikes, basketball games break out in the cul-de-sac, I can hear the sounds of a friendly barbecue across the street, and the ice cream truck drives through every single evening. In some ways, the physical aspects of this place make me think of Seeger's rendition of "Little Boxes" (yes, it's really Malvina Reynolds' song, but I prefer it sung by Seeger...with The Decemberists as a close second). But right now I can set aside my distaste for architectural homogeneity and just live.

I knew that when I moved, I needed to create a home, not just a place to live. I needed to be surrounded by the things I love. I shed the things that really didn't matter. Certain items that mattered some, but not that much, have been packed in boxes for some future home. But mostly I needed to create a space of peace, where I feel serene, where I can look around and find comfort.

This space needs to be me...it needs to represent my life with my girls...not be some shadow of my former home. The challenge was in taking these existing things and making them new. I have surprised myself with the things I have pulled out to incorporate in my home...things like my Grammy's teacup collection. My mother grew up disliking her mother's collection, so most of them were sold at the auction following the sale of Gram's home when I was still a child. But Gram kept a few. And while kind of fussy...and not really "me" at all...I pulled them out of a box and sat them out...because they are comfort. They take me back to being with Gram. They are a cup of contentment, if you will.

I have filled the walls with pictures. Too many pictures, really. The chickadees' first birthday portraits and the stages of their early lives hangs in one space. In another, is black and white photography of family....the ancestors. Everything from my great-grandmother's portrait taken with her girlfriends in the late 19th Century, to my parents' wedding picture.

I am usually one to let some wall space just be empty. But here, I needed something different; a cocoon, of sorts. So...the merits of empty space be damned...you will wait for me until the day I am willing to pack up those teacups. This is the home I need right now. It feels good and I am at peace in this place.

out, damned spot

If, one day, you should find yourself in your former home cleaning up your ex's blood...well, trust me, you're gonna go all thinky.

First, let me set something straight. No, I did not kill him. *insert wry smile* He's taking care of that day-by-day all by his big self. Killing his liver slowly.

The story Wasband tells me is different than what the evidence would indicate (yes...damn lawyers...we examine this stuff). However, the short and sweet of it is that last Friday or Saturday he fell down stairs, splitting open his forehead with a 4-5 inch gash through hi

s left eyebrow and shattering his right wrist. He was alone when this happened and lost consciousness. I'm not sure how long he was out. I assume alcohol played a role...I wouldn't have thought so because of the hour but because he's lied about how it happened, I figure drink tripped him up. He was out long enough they were worried about a brain bleed at the hospital and made him alert his family (which he decided was him daughters...he didn't bother to call his parents or sisters).

After he regained consciousness, he walked up the stairs to the master bath and dripped blood the whole way. This would be...of course...across light carpeting. We close on the sale of the house next week and I'm thinking they wouldn't be happy with blood crusted carpeting.

So yesterday, while my parents helped with the final packing of my things over at the house, I got down on my hands and knees to scrub up yet another of his messes. (Yes, I probably sound bitter, but believe me there is reason.)

It's hard for me to be in the house. There are plenty of good memories...mostly memories that revolve around sweet moments with my girls...but the end was startling and eye-opening...a carousel ride of monsters. That old fear knots my stomach when I am there. I am exhausted when I leave just from the strain of holding myself together.

But unlike Lady M., when I was uttering "out, damned spot," there was no guilt. No blood on my hands. It is more like I want this dark spot in my history gone. I know I will never be unconnected from him...the girls will always connect us...although he seems to continue doing an excellent job of making sure that connection will be tenuous, at best. Regardless of how badly I want that spot of history gone...it won't be.

But I also reflected on the dark shadow he cast on me...that cancerous spot on my soul...the one that was leeching the life out of me. It feels better. I am healing. So as I washed out that blood, it wasn't just getting rid of a damned spot...it was also a bit of ...

I'm going to wash that man right out of my hair.

Except I already have. So I might need to rewrite the lyrics.

The fact is...life is turning in a way that is darn good right now. Despite lots of difficulties, I'm happy. I love my new place. I love this life. A spot is really nothing but a drop. A small mess. And I cleaned up that mess. I've cleaned up earlier ones and I'm sure I'll

clean up future messes. But I can do that. It's not going to bog me down in regret or even anger. I'm just going to do what I need to do and keep moving in the direction of where I want to be.

I give you a South Pacific house. (Any musical theater geeks out there? Huh, Kell?)

spring cleaning

There. Phantom fingers
in the spaces between mine
cold from last winter

one of the great and wondrous things

As I've gone through this amazingly tumultuous time in life, I have been blessed with the friendship of so many people. From old friends coming out the woodwork to offer their support and hugs, to my co-workers and partners who are cutting me so much slack...and I really do need it. I've discovered this divorce-network of sorts...as one friend put it...it's a divorce club. She said, "It's not that we keep others out...it's just that we're the only ones who really get it." This isn't some real club with meetings, I'm talking about a union of experience. But it's also very real. When someone has been through it; you can see it in their eyes. Elizabeth Gilbert described the experience as having a bad car wreck everyday, for two years. And while I wouldn't say it's THAT bad, it is about a car wreck a week in my experience.

It was two of these divorced friends who gathered me up, a few days after the great split, and got me totally shit-faced. Then they drove me home in my own car and deposited me in kitchen... knowing my parents were at my house and would make sure all was ok with the chickadees. And you know what? They were right...just once...I needed to get totally shit-faced over this thing.

Or acquaintances who are now good friends after they appeared at my house to help me pack and came on their free Saturday and Sunday mornings with food and to help move. Or my one darling bloggy friend who came and brought her husband and loaned him to me to do all those husband things that I wasn't sure I could do on my own (like put together all the damn furniture from Target...I'd still be putting that stuff together if it weren't for Mr. Tonks).

And then there was tonight. Younger was playing in a school concert. I doubted her father was going to make it (although I made sure he had the schedule of events). I had not uttered this fear to anyone because I keep hoping...seemingly against all odds...that he'll figure out how to parent on his own. Apparently, Younger's best-friend's mother had a similar doubt. So do you know what she did? She came to watch Younger's concert, along with Younger's best friend. Best friend's college age sister came too. And when I said to her that it looked like he had not come, she leaned over and nudged me with her shoulder and said, "That's ok, because the rest of her family is here," motioning to herself and her girls. And then she invited me over for post-concert tiramisu. We ALL need friends who offer post-concert tiramisu, right?

You know, when you need it and you're open to it, life really steps up, puts it's arms around you and let's you know that you'll make it through.

leaping

I spent months...even years thinking about it...and then I leaped.  Leaped right out of my marriage.  If there is one thing I do well, it is leap.  It is always a studied leap.  I never take one unless I know how I will land.  And I rarely take a leap I regret.  I do not regret the leap from my marriage.  Not even for one millisecond.

But in the 23 years I spent in that relationship, I forgot about a part of me.  I forgot the impetuous emotional soul.  The person who can, so easily, fall in love.

So, at the same time I took that studied leap, I did something else.  I fell.  I fell in love.  Hard.  And now, I have to recover.

I did not fall into some tumultuous affair.  I have only seen this man once since my leap.  He lives almost 900 miles from me.  And on that one visit we did not ...um...take things to extremes.  Oh hell...I'm an adult, talk like one...we did not have sex.  But we have talked almost every single day for over four months...and shared...and it was good for me.  But now...now it is not so good...and I feel broken.

You know... I expected that after I ended the marriage there would be some great emotional moment where I would feel rotten about the end of 23 years.  There never was.  At this stage, I'm not sure there ever will be.  By the time I left, it was irrevocably over for me.  Is that because I fell somewhere else?  Possibly.  My therapist talks about the purposes of relationships.  What was the purpose of this love?  To get me through this time?  Perhaps.  I'm still too close to it to know.  But, boy-o-boy, there is definitely a great emotional moment...or a thousand of them...getting over this fall.

There is a lot about the divorce process that I need to talk about.  But as this new thing has ended, something someone said to me recently has really struck home.  In a relationship, the time to leave is when the pain of staying exceeds the pain of leaving.  I agree.  It is true of my leap and it is true of getting up from the fall.

But I can feel the need to write returning.  So, of all the maybes in the my life right now...maybe I'll be returning here.  We shall see.