Lately, I realized that I will never stop writing about longing and loss.
I see everything from a transient perspective.
I am in love with the moment, because it is so fleeting.
I see everything from the end.
When I witness people in the later stage of life, I see the goodbyes they had to say.
The many selves they had to abandon. The many people they lost.
The jobs. The hobbies. Their favorite chairs. Tables.
A room they loved in a house they lived in.
It is almost as if I see the life that is not there, but was.
This week I am saying goodbye to a big chapter of my life.
A self I have occupied for many years.
My youngest daughter left for college.
And now, I have to say goodbye to the woman who raised two daughters without their dad.
Goodbye to all the choices she made through that identity.
To the woman she had to become so she could be both mother and father.
I have to tend to every invisible loss she is experiencing.
All of the many parts she had accumulated during the last 20 years, are being disassembled. They are on their way out the door.
I have names for all the pieces that are leaving her.
The biggest piece is called reliable.
Another, fathering.
I will miss the everyday togetherness I had with my daughters.
Their daily presence, and laughter.
Our daily drives to school.
The movie nights, the kitchen hang outs.
Who I was at home with them.
Every time we end a chapter we mourn many invisible parts of ourselves.
We have to see them all, name them, and acknowledge their role in our lives.
It will take me weeks, maybe even a whole year to see all the parts of me that will be forever lost. So many pieces won’t make the next chapter.
Maybe I will be completely gone.
As I am writing this I realize what a big part of me was about raising the girls.
Bigger than I ever thought.
And as the pieces are flying out of the door, it feels quiet now.
Empty of the toughness I had mastered to be a strong mother.
The old life is fading away and with it, a new life is crawling in.
I don’t know what it will be like.
I have never been here before.
What I do know is that I love being a beginner.
Finding my way to a life for myself.
It’s been a long time coming. (Click to tweet!)
With beginner’s luck,
Christina
P.S. During the last two weeks I had two extraordinary podcast guests that know about beginnings and endings very well. Best selling novelist Jane Green will make you fall in love with her and her many books. And Tracey Harris, my favorite artist of all time. You can find both their interviews here.
