Three Years Gone - Where I've been, PART 3

The decision to leave my home and my job wasn't an easy one, but something that felt necessary at the time. The stagnation in my life had moved well beyond those things, and I was in desperate need of something new.

New doesn't even cover it. Transformative. Explosive.

It was time to blow it all up and dig deeper into who I was and how I'd become that person. I'd lost myself in the daily grind and the ways I was coping with that grind. It wasn't healthy, I wasn't happy, and aside from some new forms of therapy and coaching, I wasn't really changing. There were too many of the old coping mechanisms within arm's reach.

I found myself with a unique opportunity that no one else I knew had available to them. The option to pick up and leave. The ability to start over anywhere I wanted. And so, I did.

I didn't really know how long I'd be gone or how it would go, or even what I was getting myself into, but I liked the idea of the challenge. I liked the idea of taking a chance on myself and knowing that if things went sideways, I'd be able to figure it out. I never worried about that too much. The idea of getting up and writing every day surrounded by nature was enough to push through any fears or doubts.

So, I spent a year in the desert on a working cattle ranch, with all the noises and smells that come along with that. (It actually wasn't bad at all.) There was the howling freight train wind and bad well water, but also, open valleys covered with rocks and bones, a clear running river, and wildlife everywhere I looked. I rarely saw anyone else when I was out hiking or kayaking and that's the way I wanted it.

With the passing of my uncle, however, a new opportunity came my way. I was just beginning the process of deciding where I would be going next, and there was sense that it was meant to be.

My uncle had struggled his entire life with diabetes (same as me), and been disabled for a few years at that point, living in my grandparents house -- a home that had been a part of my life since I was born. Summers spent there. Holidays. Birthdays. If I was in town to see family, that was almost always where I stayed, and honestly, it was tough visiting there as I got older and watching the place become more and more rundown.

He wasn't just a pack rat and a collector of anything and everything, but a hoarder. Rooms were piled with boxes. A basement/garage that you could barely walk through, stacked with old coffee makers and stereo equipment from the 1970's. The smell of cigarettes permeated everything from the carpet to the ceiling.

I love my uncle with all of my heart. He was one of the funniest, sweetest men I've ever known and he had a tough life, but he simply couldn't get around well enough to take care of that house. He could barely take care of himself.

And so, I thought -- here is another incredible opportunity before me to not only continue my own journey of discovering who I am, uncovering and healing my own past (and to some extent that generational trauma that was never healed by my family) and restore a home that had, in some ways, been the anchor of my family throughout my entire life.

So, back I went, across the country again, to West Virginia.

Clearing out the house to make it livable was the first challenge. Getting most of the furniture and garbage out. Going through almost all of it to see what was salvageable and what wasn't, donating and selling what I could. This took months and had to be done systematically. I lived in the back bedroom like it was my own little apartment.

The next challenge was determining the state of the hardwood floors beneath the carpet my grandparents had installed in the 80's -- which were thankfully in great shape, but the project became the bane of my existence.

Not only were there tens of thousands of carpet staples that needed to be pulled out of the floors by hand, but they were old and many of them broke, meaning each side would then have to be plucked from the wood. This was neck-breaking, back-breaking, wrist-breaking work that went on for months. The floors needed many of those staple holes filled and smoothed, and the padding beneath the carpet had also broken down over the last 40 years, leaving sticky spots dotted all over the house, again requiring careful removal, one at a time, on my hands and knees with a soup spoon and a special chemical cleaner.

I had to scrub the walls before priming and painting the entire house with special paint to cover the nicotine. That included the ceilings. Then there was the detailed work -- replacing floors, back splashes, light fixtures and fans. Repairing and painting the shutters outside the house. It was a never-ending barrage of work.

I did take some time off though, hiking the gorge, kayaking and exploring the mountains. I travelled up to Maine and back, seeing as much as I could of the east coast and New England in the early days of fall. Looking for a new place to land and just seeing how everything felt -- how I felt. I went down through the Carolinas, too, but none of it was really calling to me. Not like the desert had.

As my time of labor and stress came to an end, I had a big decision to make -- where would I be going next? What was I doing with my life?

Thank you SO MUCH for reading this today and for everyone's support over the last three years. This story continues and goes much more in depth in my new book, EVERYTHING IS BRIGHTER NOW, coming out NOV 4th! --AND-- Any order over $24 ships FREE!

This book is 3 YEARS of work, featuring a collection of short stories and poems that reflect my drive to find balance in the chaos of my life. I hope you'll check it out and help to support my work. ❤️ It truly means the world to me.

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