Home for Comfort

Good Morning -

We're back with morning blogging. Yes.

And what a morning it is - we woke up to big, fat fluffy flakes falling from the sky and it is such a sight for sore, bleached, sun-faded, desert-dusted eyes.

The snow was just what I needed after having a bit of a rough night.

I remembered last night that sometimes a bad something is worse than a no something.

Case in point - a bad massage is worse than no massage because it gets you just enough of a taste of the glory that is massage that you realize just how lacking your current rub-down is. That and it gets you all stirred up with no sense of reordering.

With the snow on the brain, the image coming to me is of a snow globe. A good massage shakes up the globe and then sets it down so that things can resettle in a better spot. A bad massage is like setting that snow globe on a perpetually shaking surface so that things stay stirred up and it never settles down.

As I walked home from this bad massage yesterday, I found myself overwhelmingly sad. I was sad about the massage, but by sitting with the sadness, also realized that I'm sad about some other things right now too.

It probably no surprise to anyone but the person who lives in my head that it is harder for me to live closer to family but maintain the same level of (non)relationship as I had when I lived 1,000 miles away. Somehow I had decided that it wouldn't be harder and held some hope that, with proximity, the relationships would have the potential to change.

And they may yet (oh, the eternal optimist blooms anew). I don't know and don't have any control over that.

What I do know is that I felt last night a big sadness that I'm here and getting settled and experiencing a new job and lots of newness with my fantastic partner and my family isn't participating in any of that.

I'm rolling my eyes and gently shaking my head at myself. So much has changed since the Big Split of 2004, so I'm not sure why I'm thinking things would be different with less distance.

Things are complicated and it's not necessarily fair or accurate to generalize. While one family member told me just before moving that she won't be bringing her children to any gatherings where I am, another stopped by on moving day, another is working to find a time to get together, and another yet sent a "hope you're settling in well" email.

So - like I said - it's complicated - and I feel sad.

Which brings us to the Virgen. I got home from my massage and had a good cry and talk with my partner before heading out for some diner dinner of chicken fried steak. Her comfort was such a balm and we were both able to talk about how its been a big transition and we're both experiencing a lot of feelings around it.

I was reminded through the experience that I need a home full of comfort and love. I need the setting and the ambiance and the good people who bring love to this space. I need home as sanctuary and regrouping area and time-out zone and nurturing nest.

It doesn't fix anything, to be sure. I still have sad feelings about the complication that is my familial relations, but I have a place to hold me in that sadness, comfort and support me in the time of tears. And, in time, this too shall pass.

Here's to that. Here's to comfort for the tears. Here's to home as sanctuary. Here's to things passing in time and here's to nurturing nests.

Ah, yes - the snow. This was the view out the front door this morning. Beautiful.