in-between

Writing a blog is an interesting exploration of vulnerability for me. It is part journal and part media—a meeting of the public and private that I am always curious about in my daily interactions. There is always a question in my mind, well-trained to be on guard for how my actions might impact others, of what is appropriate to share, what is right to share—and since my intention is to share honestly for myself more than for you dear reader—what is the shifting boundary line around what that is. This is a question that I expect to shift over the course of this blog, many times, the creek that wanders to find how to flow further towards the ocean, the way with the most ease, even if it takes a little longer.

3 weeks from now, I will pack my car, say goodbye for now to Andy, 2 older cats, and the ancient-but-new-to-us land we now reside within. Land (and sky) that has gifted me with so much solace since moving onto it, and that I long to be less of a stranger to. The cedar trees pull themselves off over the bluff, holding expertly onto the fossilized rocks that are the main earth of the place. Bluebirds have come to visit in their winter roundness, to visit and eat in the pile of fresh cedar limbs that came down during a fall storm. They join the waxwings who seek the sun and eat the juniper berries, as Juniper the cat makes her enchanted-by-prey noises from behind the glass. She prefers this window shopping at this moment, for which I am deeply grateful. Why am I going? Something in me knows.

I am making my to-do and to-go lists and beginning to stage the packing in our extra bedroom. One of two heart-shaped rocks from this place to carry with me to the rocky red desert of Eastern Utah. One stone to another. I am still very much learning and wanting to learn this place named Saddle Bluff, but there is this detour that begs to be taken, to shift perspectives, to bring in wholeness, and to bring something back with me, to this land that begs to be loved in a way that is not yet clear to me.

In this moment, I sit at my dear friend’s kitchen table, her daughter sleeping in the next room, my ears taking in the white noises of this place. I hear the mister dripping, which remind me of the dripping icicles I saw earlier today when I wondered how long they will be suspended in this frozen state of resisting gravity. I am also suspended in some in-between place. In-between these second nature, well-practiced identities and this new place where little is known and less is practiced for me.

Suspended, I feel the sweetness of my friend’s home, of this nurturing connection that is already part of me. My winter-dry body soaks in the sweetness like a thirsty sponge to carry within me my new home-place in Utah. This is a strange sweetness of being, resting in the space between grief and excitement, relief and longing.