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Saturday: Dreaming Big — My ‘Wild and Precious Life’
A Week of Little Thoughts About Life
When I got divorced, I became a single person after 16 years (and more if you count dating) of being coupled. Being paired was an essential part of my identity and it was a promise of an identity that moved into the future. I never considered that it wouldn’t be for the rest of my life.
In general, when we get married, we sort of know our future and so does our whole community. (Though I think of that moment in the wedding ceremony when the officiant says, “If there is some reason these two should not be joined, speak now or forever hold your peace.” I wonder how many times someone is sitting in witness thinking, “Good luck! These two shouldn’t be doing this but I’m not saying anything.”)
In getting divorced, I went from seeing my own life in terms of ‘we’ — what is best for us? What is the future that we collectively envision and work toward? To…what?
I remember the last time I visited my in-laws house in the Green Mountains of Vermont — a place I’d visited and absorbed year after year — a place of great beauty, peace and nostalgia. A place of important visions of my own future, the place I’d planned to retire — I considered — ‘this is the last time I may ever be here.’ It was surreal.
