It
is Sunday and I am up early. Today is my last day home, here, forever. I have a
lot of packing to do; I have to pack up stuff for the weeklong biking trip I am
going on round Denmark with my youngest son, I have to pack up for my 4 month
sailing trip across the ocean, and I have to pack up all my other worldly
belongings. Today I am giving the keys to this house back to my husband. I am
not moving out, per se, I am leaving all my stuff boxed in our unfinished
basement, and my husband has very generously agreed that I can live there when
I get back while I look for somewhere else, but I doubt this house will ever be
home again.
Thursday
I had a last, lovely, cup of tea with a co-worker and friend and Friday I had a
last, lovely, glass of wine with my wonderful walking partner and yesterday I
had a last, lovely, gentle sail out on the river with my newest friend but
today I expect to spend all on my own. As I trek out to the garage to get yet
another pile of empty boxes the early morning mist still sits heavily all
around. It feels like fall and the silence, brought by the mist, adds to my
sense of aloneness.
Back
inside I zip open a large duffel bag to double check what’s inside before
deciding which pile to put it in and the faintest whiff of young-sweaty-body
smell escapes out into the empty room bringing with it a cacophony of happy memories
from all the years my boys played hockey and I am Margaret Lawrence’s Hagar,
startled to find that the years have already passed. Was I not a young girl
myself mere moments ago? How can it be that my own children have grown up and
left?
I
agreed that I would give this house back to my husband. It is, after all, his
childhood home. But it is also my children’s childhood home and packing up,
planning to move out and leave forever the familiar passages, is decidedly
poignant. I remember packing up and moving as a teen, dancing, happy, music
blaring. Today however I am decidedly melancholy and the mist outside,
dampening and isolating, fits my mood perfectly. I don’t even turn on my old friend the CBC; I
patter back and forth in silence, nostalgic, allowing old memories every chance
to echo.
