If Animals Were Messengers

I moved all of my possessions out of my home on Saturday. A home I never wanted to leave. A home that all of the members of my former family remain in. I moved all of my possessions out of my home, into storage at my aunt’s house. Because I have no home to move those boxes to.

This is a scenario that would never unfold in a traditional marriage. The courts would decide who would leave, or who would stay if either spouse wished to remain in the family home.

My cousin and my brother helped me schlep a pick up truck and cargo van full of my belongings. I fed them pizza and beer, and my eternal gratitude. I didn’t cry, or get emotional. I just wanted to get out. Get it done. I’d packed everything a couple of days before. I’d purged mountains of my possessions. My ex helped me. That felt like a bad dream I couldn’t wake up from. The only thing I couldn’t handle was dividing up the Christmas decorations. I can’t begin to think about Christmas yet.

The enormity of the morning’s activities didn’t sink in until I was showered and made up and on my way to officiate one of two weddings I had on deck that evening. Then, it was another one of those drop kick moments. When my legs feel like they’ll buckle beneath me. When no matter how hard I try, I can’t believe this is my life. This is cataclysmic. Seismic. A catastrophe of epic proportion. Don’t cry, you’ll ruin your makeup.

Then, as I was stopped at a traffic light, a blue heron flew over my car. Blue heron brings messages of self-determination and self reliance. Progress, evolution. The ability to stand on one’s own.

My mind drifts to thoughts of her. How she’s in my home more than I am now. How she’s sliding so seamlessly into my place. Like a light bulb that gets screwed in when its predecessor sputters out. I can’t stop thinking of her, but everything I read tells me that’s normal. Given these kinds of breakups.

A monarch butterfly flutters maniacally over my windshield, in a frenzied effort to get the hell off the highway. Butterfly means that massive changes are afoot. She’s in your path to ask you to embrace those changes in your environment and your emotional body. Release any expectations regarding the outcome of the change around you and don’t try to control it. Allow it to flow through you and around you. Accept change with grace and eloquence.

I think of how little I am left with, and how much my former life meant to me. How much of my identity is rooted in the people I called home. How I never, ever imagined my life without him in it. To share the stories of my day, to hold and taste and adore. How I never would have wished to lose my son half of the time. Or see my daughters only every other weekend.

Two ravens squawk at each other before leaving behind a carcass on the side of the highway and flying up and over my car. Noisy raven urges you to speak up for yourself and heed the messages you are receiving. Raven is the keeper of synchronicity. You are in the right place at the right time. All things are falling into place for you. The people around you are reflecting to you the things you most need to learn about yourself.

I arrive at the wedding. The venue is a marina in Port Colborne. The weather is perfect, and everyone is in good spirits. I allow my own struggles to slide somewhere else inside of me, and surrender to the bubble gum pink beauty and the possibility of love. I unite lovers. I unite families. As I’m completing the paperwork, a blue dragonfly lands on my knee.

Dragonfly says pay attention to your deepest desires. Think your dreams into reality. Live your life to the fullest, change habits that need changing. A dragonfly landing on you indicates extremely good luck.

All of these messengers in one short afternoon. The most significant afternoon of my life, it seems. I think of days earlier. I was on a hike with a new friend, who seemed to know exactly what I needed and took me to see the fireflies. As dusk settled in, I watched a beaver slide into the old canal. I had no idea beavers lived this far south.

Beaver represents hard work and collaboration with others to turn your dreams into reality.

Then as we walked along the path, the trees looming over us like shadowy sentinels, the entire forest lit up with a thousand sparkling lights. Fist fulls of diamonds in the moonlight.

It’s this glow within me that will save me. This blazing heart that will fill me with love and illuminate the way ahead. It’s my own firefly light that will shine on all that is good and beautiful in this world, and no matter what I’ve lost, I will always see that there is so much yet to be gained.

I had lots of fun looking up the symbolism behind these creatures on this site.

The Process

Thanks for your patience. I’ve been wading through this complicated new reality, not always keeping my head up, and not always feeling like I wanted to share.  The grieving process is like that sometimes.

The other morning I woke up at 8:00 am, took my canine companion for a walk in the rain, still wearing my pjs, unloaded boxes from the trunk of my car, fried some bacon, scrambled some eggs in the bacon fat, made coffee, sat down at the table near the window overlooking the garden and I felt good.

A few nights ago, I cooked dinner for myself, poured a glass of wine, settled into the cabana in the backyard (I’m house sitting again) and binge watched the new season of Queer Eye on Netflix. That show has literally injected pure joy into my heart on numerous occasions through the last several months.

I feel good.

Not all the time. Certainly not the day I spent sorting through bins of stuff while my ex helped me purge garbage bags full of old clothes and fabric I forgot I even had. Certainly not when I found out the apartment I thought I was moving into wasn’t going to work out. Certainly not when I went to see the first couple of alternative apartments available in my budget and was terrified of both the filth and the neighbours. That was a double-whammy of a day when there was also a full moon and I was in the throes of PMS, but these moments of bad feeling are quickly replaced with a sense of hope, and a sense of peace. There’s a voice somewhere just beyond me that keeps insisting that it’s going to be okay, and that voice feels very true.

There isn’t a single part of this separation that has gone the way that I want. It doesn’t matter. I’m not in control. I’ll work with what I get, and keep trusting that voice. Maybe I wasn’t meant to spend this year of healing in a basement. Maybe my moments with my daughters, though far less frequent, will be of greater connection and quality. Maybe constant trips to the home we made together when we were a family would have made it too hard to really let go. Maybe living with my parents for the summer was always going to be a safer place to land as I start this new life. Maybe lawyers are painfully slow because there are more conversations that need to be had, and greater understanding to be achieved.

I’m spending more time thinking about what I want than crying over what I’ve lost. So, on this bright and sunny morning, a moon into my single-hood, here’s what I want for the summer:

Quiet Saturday mornings for writing and eating home-cooked breakfasts

The feeling of liberation that comes with getting rid of mountains of stuff I don’t need (both physical and emotional)

Continued work opportunities to create this new life for myself

The fun of dreaming of a new living space

Dinners with great conversation and people who I feel good around

A camping adventure or two, and one that includes the kids

Someone to teach me how to become an expert paddler

Weekly hikes

Time for reading, just for fun

The courage to embrace the lonely and overwhelming moments, sit with them, and know that they aren’t forever

Great moments of bonding with all of my kids

Continued acceptance of change, even if I don’t understand other people’s choices

A safe, clean home of my own in a place that feels good

The momentum to create a routine of ongoing physical activity

I think this is a great list, but I’m always open to suggestions. For example, a dear friend challenged me to get a massage. I never do things like that for myself, so I’m going to schedule an appointment. So, can you be a pal and throw some of your own suggestions below for the #summerofme?

A Letter to Present Me from Future Me

Dear Catherine,

(I’m sorry, I just can’t call you Cat. It’s absurd.)

You don’t think you’ll make it through this, but you will. You’re right about one thing, however. You won’t be the same. Nobody is ever the same after grief like this. It’s okay though. Remember how the other grief you experienced made you really learn to appreciate the fragile beauty of life? This will make you appreciate the fragile beauty of holding someone else’s heart. Most importantly, it will help you appreciate the fragile beauty of becoming the keeper of your own heart.

All of those things you’re doing that make you feel better? Keep doing those. Also, be prepared because you’re going to start having to do other things too. Those things you’ve been scared of. You know they’re going to help you get better as well, and if you take a long hard look at the present, you’ll see the time has come. Trust deeply in your ability to survive through this. It’s not going to kill you, and I’m not going to spout any more cliches than I already have.

Your children love you, deeply. If you keep on loving them the way you always have, this love will continue to thrive and flourish. Don’t pull away because it’s complicated. It was always complicated, and now it’s actually simpler in ways that matter more than you can know right now. You may not have the paperwork to prove you are ‘mother’ to all of them, but those two young women have the fiercest, most passionate fairy godmother in the history of guardians. You’re going to rock that role, and they will always be grateful for your persistence.

Stop trying to understand why. You can see how crazy-making that is, and you know as well as I do that it doesn’t matter. Remember that sweet, handsome soul who told you that you’ll feel normal ‘when you can let go of the story of wrong/right as an identity piece’? That particular little nugget will be a game-changer for you. Let go of the wrong/right narrative. It just was. And it was totally different for each of you. Nobody was completely right, nobody was completely wrong, everyone did their best, and everyone lost something that cannot be replaced. See? There really are no winners. Just people, trying to heal and be whole. Stepping away from the story is stepping towards your wholeness.

Start writing a new story. The story of you, taking care of your finances, your children, your heart, your body and mind. Of you finishing books and putting them out in the world because you aren’t paralyzed by anxiety and sorrow. Of you connecting deeply with old friends who know each line on your face. Of road trips to visit new friends. Of adventures with your three munchkins. Of meals that you cook, to thank all of these beautiful people in your life for their kindness and compassion. Plan a trip for the fall when wedding season winds down. Somewhere that connects you to nature. Where your loneliness will feel more inspiring than crushing. Where you might kiss a stranger and learn something new about yourself.

Only you can make this better. Stop asking for the pain to go away. It doesn’t work like that and you know it. Hold that pain like an angry child until it settles and shifts into something else. Hold it while you reach for a different sensation. Send all the feelings on their way and wait for the next ones to arrive. Repeat, over and over until the feelings fall into a new pattern.

Write it all down. Share what you can without making things harder for yourself. Choose only that which truly serves you. Accept this hug and feel it across the miles and the years whenever you may need it.

I’ll see you sooner than you think.

xo

A Handful of Things

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