Thursday, November 25, 2010

Farewell to Security

In a poem I've quoted before, Emily Dickenson wrote:

Parting is all we know of heaven,
And all we need of hell.

Parting is heaven because it means opportunity, change, adventure, and the first day of the rest of my life, etc. It's chance to pursue dreams delayed, forgotten, or eclipsed. It's a purposeful striding into the unknown, casting about for a course, unshackled by bonds of any kind.

Parting is hell because it means change, danger, and farewell to all that is safe. It's losing the anchors and mores that have kept you in one place long enough to put down roots and enjoy life. It's stepping into darkness from light, cutting the ties you lovingly wove and tended, and then watching the edges bleed as you stumble into the darkness, casting about for a course, no safety line of any kind.

For a year and a half I have been together, and now I am parted. For 18 months I have been found, and now I am lost. It doesn't matter whether I stepped away of my own free choice or not. I've lost something precious and now there is a hole where it was that I have to fall into before I can climb out. As I fall I rotate quickly through fear, excitement, daring courage, longing for what is behind, and panic over my choice to step forward when I was so happy where I was. So, I'm not ready, but here I am: it's time to fall, crawl, grope, grow, and change. Good luck me.

103495861, loridambrosio /Flickr

3 comments:

Unknown said...

You can do brave things. I wish I could be there with you.

fm7 said...

Lot's of friends and family have thoughts have feelings going with you.

Mountainlark said...

You took a leap of faith, which is always exhilarating and frightening in equal measure. When it hurts too much, and you start to wonder if you made a mistake, remember clearly what led you to the decision. Those reasons won't change, even when you start to doubt them, and you have to have them locked firmly in your mind. I'm in the falling stage of my own leap of faith, and I have to keep chanting to myself "I knew it was right when I did it, so it's still right now, even if I can't feel it anymore."