I just returned from Seattle to Nashville.
To be honest, I am relieved to be home.
And not home in the sense, that this is where I belong forever- home as in the distinct, yet foggy feeling that something just isn't quite right with the person I am underneath the hood of the forever overcast.
I have some evolving still to do.
I have built a life here in Nashville.
Despite renouncing my musical dreams and trading them in for a dozen pairs of cat-hair covered slacks and the endless possibilities of excel spread sheet combinations, I love the person I have become and am becoming. It was my hope that I would go home, and people would take stock- that they would notice that I've changed.
I am no longer so insecure. No longer so headstrong and selfish, no longer the weak girl who would waver to please anyone who showed interest.
Nobody noticed a single shred of difference in me.
But I don't blame them.
Instead of being the new me, I quickly fell into patterns of the old me.
It was a strange observation, since I was mostly watching myself outside of myself, but I was feeling oppressed by the ghost of the former me.
It sounds spookier than it actually was.
The reason for the trip was to go to my husband's 10 year high school reunion. I was not much into high school myself and actually decided to graduate from a small sect of online-learners as opposed to the whole to-do of public education matriculation.
He, on the other hand, was very involved and was very much looking forward to the whole she-bang.
I was a nervous wreck. I spent hours getting ready, hated the way I looked, couldn't find my lucky earrings, downed a couple glasses of wine and tried to hold it together.
The reason is that more than anything in the world, I hate being judged. As the former homecoming king and class president's wife I felt this strange pressure to live up to expectation, and vainly I wanted to exceed them.
The truth is, that as someone who preaches that we should find our worth in God, this last weekend I was tested and failed.
I put my worth in how I looked.
I put my worth in the compliments I did or didn't get.
I put my worth in drinking wine, and later found myself howling at the moon.
The truth is, I was humbled.
I have a long way to go before I become who I want. I have a long way to travel before I make the final trek home.
1 comment:
It's easy to be a new person in a new place. It's harder to take that same person home with you when you've lived a certain way with those people for so long. I understand. But if you're away long enough, you become more solidified with yourself. Then it gets easier.
And I miss you, that person who always encourages me to go for my dreams. Remember to look in the mirror each day and give yourself the same advice. <3
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