It’s a gray day here after days of warm, brilliant sunshine and a perfect day to sit back and think about how life has changed since the pandemic. There is good and bad in my world. On the bad side, we have friends who have lost loved ones, friends who got Covid, friends who lost their jobs, and friends who have lost their marriages during the pandemic. On the good side, as a family we have been blissfully spared just a year after three cancer diagnoses rocked our world. We instead got an engagement, a new kitty and some major renovations done at our houses.
But when I talk of what is different now, I’m not talking about the physical. While I never want to be cavalier about the losses experienced by others, I am also turning inward to what is different about me. Somehow, it feels like the lessons will be lost if I don’t take a few moments and at least try to learn them.
First lesson is that I am partially vaccinated. Next week, I become fully vaccinated against Covid, but I will remain partially vaccinated. Why is this a big deal? To most people it wouldn’t be. To me, I spent a lifetime unvaccinated and scared to death of, well, death if I ever got vaccinated. A severe anaphylactic reaction to my first DPT meant that I have spent a lifetime navigating around what unvaccinated people can’t do and relying on the kindness of others to be vaccinated. I’m outrageously proud that I am vaccinated today. I’ve never known this sense of comfort. Moving forward, I want to get the pneumococcal vaccine as me and my asthmatic lungs probably can’t handle viral pneumonia. I’ve also got dreams of other vaccines. The mere thought that I could live life a little more risk-free is highly appealing.
Yet, to get vaccinated, I had to face my fear and my mother’s voice ringing in my ears. How many times had she told me “Be careful. A tetanus shot could kill you.” Or “You can’t get a tetanus shot. Get out of there.” Hey Mom, I felt your concern as I walked into my vaccine appointment. I knew the risks but I had to take the chance. I hope you’re not disappointed but I’m so glad I did.
The other things that are different is that I felt the whole world around me slow down. As I had slowed down three years ago, I felt the world join me. I’ll be candid. At first, I was just overjoyed to have the whole world slow down, too, and have others experience what I had experience. Then, a little annoyed that my slower pace of life was no longer special. Then, even more annoyed when my pace of life had to accelerate up in order to preserve the future of my slowed down life. Now? I’ve come to terms. It was petty to feel any loss of “specialness” – if that’s even a word. It was hard to gear up again and I resented it. It’s calming and rewarding to see it slowing back down again. So, what have I learned?
Mostly, that I’m still me. I’m prone to overreacting and internalizing environmental changes too wholeheartedly. That I still struggle with gaining perspective and stepping outside of “now” to take the long view. And that I need a daily walk to keep myself grounded and the weight off. It seems like there is some magic that happens on a walk that brings me back to the true reality of my situation – and not my perception – and settles my soul in a way that I focus on appreciation and joy, not stress and complication.
And that gets to the real lesson of this pandemic. Life is and must be different now. My husband’s business has taken off. My sisters and their families are doing well. Everyone is healthy. Adventures are starting. Me? I have to get back to the business of writing my next chapter.
Unlike everyone else, I took three-and-a-half years off. When I left my job, I was so exhausted that I struggled for the simple peace that I so dearly needed in my life. When I achieved it, my grateful soul rested there like one of my kitties climbing into the preferred brown and white faux-fir trimmed kitty bed. I just sunk in, covered up and woke up only to the essentials of my life: a little work, a little play and a lot of rest. Don’t get me wrong. I immensely enjoyed the past nearly four years. There are parts of my soul that are also healed in ways I didn’t realize could be healed. I am rested and I have experienced true contentment.
But, it’s time for the next chapter. I don’t mean professionally. I don’t have those urges anymore. I want to do good and be good at what I do, but I want that to only be a part of my life. And it’s not my house or renovations. Those, thankfully, are coming to an end and while they have consumed my life for the past five years, I know that the end result will be the calm, warm and welcoming place to call home that I’ve always envisioned. Most of all, it will be good enough. It no longer has to be the focus of my creative energies or the passion of my soul. Creating a home was an amazing, soul-satisfying project but it’s time to let it go and dream elsewhere.
And that leads me here. Outside of my husband and my family – the true focus of my life – I’ve had two additional passions, my work and my home. If the two passions of my life are not destined to be the focus of my next twenty to thirty years, than what is? I confess that I don’t know. More importantly, I have come to the realization that I don’t think I’m supposed to know yet. I feel like this summer and this year, when I’ve arranged for so much time and so much opportunity to just experience joy and contentment will set me up for gradual exploration of what that new pleasure will become. Genuinely, I don’t want to force it. I want it to come naturally and organically. There are interests I know I have: gardening, photography, painting, writing, hiking, exploring, cooking… the list could go on. But what is that thing that my soul knows I should do? It may sound incredibly weird, but I have the feeling that if I just give my soul time without rushing into the silence, I’ll eventually know. A part of me feels like maybe I already know and a part of me feels like I’ll be surprised beyond words when I finally figure it out. It genuinely doesn’t matter. I am content to open the door, step into the sunshine and listen.
It is time to move forward. Time to throw off the fuzzy blanket, to leave the cushy place on the couch and reenter my life. I am ready to do this now as a person and not a professional or homemaker or fledgling homesteader. But as me. I’ll get there and I have all of the time remaining in my life to realize it.
Welcome to my next life… .
The Yuppie Homesteader 