Life moves fast! I didn’t really understand how fast until change struck like a thunderbolt from the sky and I found myself on the road–and homeless. Oh, I had places to go and people with whom I could stay, but it’s a ghastly feeling when reality hits and you realize that everything you own is in the back of the UHaul truck barreling down the highway in front of you and a tie that has kept you bound and whole is severed for good. Or for ill, as the case may be. It is possible to go from secure to floundering in less time than it takes to catch your breath. It’s one of those moments when “just breathe” is out of the question because there’s no more oxygen left in the room, or in your body; when anger and pain are the fuel that ignites motion and breath is simply gone.
I’ve been looking for the silver lining to that dark cloud of disappointment. There isn’t one, or at least not one that I can see. The heaviness of loss is slowly leaving my body but the buoyancy of lightness and happiness is still hovering. I can feel it out there, waiting for me to lighten up. And I will. For now, I am content to explore the limits of yet another venue, to change what I can change, to carve out another comfy cave from which to think and write and ponder the meaning of life. It’ll come. I just have to remember how to breathe.
Cave Dweller: Alone in a Social World 