I managed to physically get out of my rut. I shrugged everything off my back, shook the dust from my feet and breathed deeply.
In the past when I moved on I never went back. However, friends and houses and dogs handle abandonment better than my children and the Mum inside.
Up to a few years ago I still considered my life to be a series of vignettes. Now it has exploded to epic proportions.
After a year I found I was having to retrace the road less travelled…unheard of for me.
I could not get away with going away for good!
Geographically I had escaped for an approved period of time. When the ticking stopped I had to confront my psychological reference points, and turn back to face the past and do something I had never done before.
Return to what I’d left behind…without going back.
A surmountable oxymoron.
I wanted to drown myself in denial.
Yet here I am despite myself.
I have met with a couple of friends, reluctantly. Once so far is enough.
I went back to the church where I had read, was a Lay Eucharistic Minister and a sub deacon, washed and ironed linens, laundered cassocks and surplices and maintained the Stephen Ministry board. Well, my body returned, my spirit didn’t.
Without thinking about it too much I trotted off to Jazzercise and found it to be everything I remembered; only my at home routine suits my lifestyle better now so…oops, there goes another door!
This was in my devotional today,
“Wherever you go, there you are.”
To which I say,
“Welcome You!” for I was not running away from anything, just moving on. I learned with children I can’t move on. They do that!
My parents bred a wanderlust in me that had kept me on my toes, except for the last two decades when my feet became en-mired in the mud of the rut.
It’s not my house, or my friends, or my activities or even the bigger than life State of Texas that has brought me back. It is my children and the Mum inside…and my dirty toes.
For that reason youngest daughts and I went off for pedicures yesterday, my first!
I was metaphysically skipping blithely over ruts.
I’ve returned without completely coming back.
And it feels all right most of the time.
How did I ever go this long without a pedicure?
Well hello there! My name is Vivienne McNeny.
I am an empty nester exploring life as a Boomer…you could say I'm happily Boomering along!
As a homeschooling Mum I have finally quit the job of role model and mentor to my four children. I do what I want to do, eat when I feel like it, enjoy life with my blue eyed cowboy and clean my house once a month or so whether it needs it or not!
In true English form I write about the emergence of my true identity now that I can no longer hide behind my children as their Mum.
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