We’re moving next week. This has been in the works for a while now, but we’re officially at the hire the movers, pack up the house, make almost-daily trips to Lowe’s part of the move.
I’m no stranger to moving. In fact, I’ve done it every two years or less (usually less) since I graduated high school in 2008. The longest I’ve lived in any one place was five years and that was from ages six to eleven. Though I abhor the actual process of packing, loading, unloading, and unpacking, I do enjoy a new beginning. Or maybe I just hate standing still, who knows.
I like the endless possibility that comes with starting over. A clean slate, untouched and untarnished by mistakes and bad memories. What experiences will I have in this new place? Who will I be?
I love New Years time for the same reason. There’s an energy in the air, a promise to do better — be better — than you were before. I love an opportunity to start over, to make a new space a home, to find new local businesses to love and new neighborhoods to walk through.
In other words, I love a new start.
I haven’t ever found a place I wanted to settle down in, at least not long term. I’ve mostly lived in apartments, which are temporary by design (outside of large cities anyway), and I’ve always felt kind of in flux. I have goals and ambitions of course, but I don’t have a grand plan for my life. I don’t have one particular place that feels like home to me, and if I’m being totally honest, I haven’t felt at home almost anywhere I’ve lived.
There’s always been somewhere new to go, something new to try, someone else to be. I don’t think this feeling has ever been described better than by Sylvia Plath in The Bell Jar with the fig tree metaphor.
“I saw my life branching out before me like the green fig tree in the story. From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig, a wonderful future beckoned and winked. One fig was a husband and a happy home and children, and another fig was a famous poet and another fig was a brilliant professor, and another fig was Ee Gee, the amazing editor, and another fig was Europe and Africa and South America, and another fig was Constantin and Socrates and Attila and a pack of other lovers with queer names and offbeat professions, and another fig was an Olympic lady crew champion, and beyond and above these figs were many more figs I couldn't quite make out. I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig tree, starving to death, just because I couldn't make up my mind which of the figs I would choose. I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to wrinkle and go black, and, one by one, they plopped to the ground at my feet.”
I love this quote so much, I got a fig tree branch tattooed on my back.
And so, as I embark on a new journey, I wonder if this will be the place that sticks, if this will be the house, the neighborhood, the city, that feels like home or if it’s just another stop on my journey.
Like all the others, eventually the newness of this place will fade. Dust will collect on the window sills, weeds will grow in the yard, and what was once a beacon of hope will become old hat. I’ll get bored of walking the same streets on my nightly walks, going to the same grocery store, cleaning the same kitchen. And, eventually, something new will beckon.
What I’m reading:
Beautiful Ugly by Alice Feeney: An author’s wife disappeared a year ago and he hasn’t been able to write anything since. When his agent offers him the use of her cabin on a remote island off the coast of Scotland, he goes in the hopes that he’ll finally be able to write his next novel, but the island and the people on it aren’t what they seem. This was fine. I was into it while I was reading, but when I finished I was left unsatisfied.
The Three Lives of Cate Kay by Kate Fagan: A bestselling author chooses to remain anonymous as she reckons with her past mistakes. I’m only halfway through this one, but I’m enjoying it so far!
Conversation Starter:
Would you rather be hot or cold? I made a TikTok about this question this week that went a bit viral and the answers are very mixed. And no, you can’t answer “cold because you can always add more layers.” You can watch the video to find out why that’s not a valid answer (imo)!
Starting over is a nice feeling but packing and moving ugh