On (Relative) Stability

Feist – Get It Wrong, Get It Right by Interscope Records

 This has been the first full year that I have lived in the same space since 2004. I spent college moving from building to building, sometimes for as little as six weeks before moving again. I took very few of my things to Spain for five to six months. After graduating, I moved back in with my parents for a short time, then moved into the fortunate (in some ways) unfortunate (in most ways) basement cave when Chadoh and I got married. Then we moved out, into his parents’ house. Two months later, he moved to West Chester, and I moved back in with my parents. I drove six hours roundtrip every weekend for two and half months.

This realization has evoked some unexpected reactions in me. For example, simultaneously wanting to move to San Francisco and wanting desperately, to the point of tantrum, to move back to Central PA. Wanting to run from the work of building a life. Wanting to run back to a place where I’ve already done it so effortlessly.

We are building a life here. We’ve been here long enough for me to say that and not doubt it. We’ve been here long enough for me to say it and not resent the effort it’s taken. It takes.

Because it hasn’t been easy. For years, I thought that I wanted to move around to so many different places. Different coasts, different continents. I thought it would be easy for me, I would enjoy it. But here, I haven’t. It comes as a shock, still.

It might just be West Chester. Chadoh and I aren’t suburb people. We have learned this. I have learned this. Though, I’m also learning that maybe it’s ok to change. That if maybe I want something different than I thought I did, we can still revise. We can always revise. We can revise, and it will all be ok.