Oh boy.
I’ve taken a 3 1/2 train journey and a hundred steps backwards.
I felt I’d really made a leap in my adjustment to
Lancaster. Much of the time I felt positive and happy that I lived there. Two
weeks ago I even wrote an email to my sister saying that I thought I loved Lancaster.
Yes, I actually used the L word.
Now I'm back in Witney for a few days.
I had deliberately left this as long as possible – three
months – to give myself more of a footing in Lancaster and therefore more
resilience to be able to deal with any emotions that hit me when I went back.
Three years would have been more like it!
When I walked through the front door of my house
initially I felt nothing. The house looked dishevelled and unloved after
three months of Fred and just the occasional visit and once-over from Jim.
Good, I thought, I’ve lost my attachment.
But the next day I spent seven hours cleaning and my fondness
for my house was re-kindled with each swish of the duster, each swoosh of the
mop. The plants perked up. The sofa smiled. The toilet gave me a wink. Ah,
thank goodness SHE’s back, the house seemed to say.
Then I saw friends. Loads of friends. Pubs, coffee shops,
parties. Hugs and easy, pleasurable, connecting conversation with people who
know my history and my character, good and bad. I didn’t need to be all Jazz Hands
and try to make a good impression. Even people I
bumped into in the street, people I used to be on strictly Hello only terms with,
hugged me and asked me if I had time for a cup of tea.
In fact, even the streets gave me comfort. So familiar, so tranquil, so tidy, so FLAT. The
sky looked huge without the tall buildings in the way. I could see the light. And
I could walk on auto-pilot.
I sat down on my corner sofa and cried and thought, I
don’t ever want to move again. I woke up in my bed in the morning and felt ‘right’.
It would just be so easy and comfortable to stay here and never go back. To tap
back into the benefits and love and comfort and ease of the home and world I
have created.
Of course, I went from summer in Witney to Autumn and
Winter in Lancaster. I went from my home to a rented house. It’s not a fair
comparison. And this is hibernation time of year, a time when you naturally
crave nesting on the sofa with a fire crackling and a roast dinner in the oven,
not a time to go out and meet zillions of new people and do zillions of new things.
I just don’t know if I have it in me.
I am doubting I have done the right thing.
I am re-evaluating yet again what is important in life.
Oh boy.
Update:
When I got back to Lancaster, I felt as flat as a pancake. But the next day, I got up and got on with it and actually felt.....well.....fine. Lancaster felt a little more like home. A hundred steps backwards, a hundred and one steps forward?
