Day 98: The Next Step

We're in contract.  After months of looking, we've made an offer, then accepted a counteroffer and now we're in contract.  I should be excited.  Instead, I say "Rich, can we just sit in the quiet for a minute."  But he wants to vacumn and clean and move around our little rental on the beach.  Says he can't sit still.  The vacumn slides swiftly under my feet, followed by Micky; barking and snarling all kinds of unmentionable things.  Without a word I get up and walk out the door. I walk toward the water, where there's space to think about why I feel so dissapointed.

The house is perfect.  A small cape with over six acres of beautiful land, just down from a lake.  Cathedral ceilings and a tiny garden house with Robins that come back every year.   And on June 1st, it will be ours.  We'll settle in.

But Rich and I were never the settling type.  Our entire relationship has been defined by these crazy impulsive moments.   A marriage proposal ten days after our first campfire.   An elopement two months later.  Resigning from meaningful (and good-paying) jobs to travel across the country and live in a pickup, ending up in Southern Oregon.  Resigning again to move back east just ten months later.  We fit together because we're the same soul.  Wanderers.  Seekers.  And now we're going to buy a house.  And when we buy this house, we're going to have to stay.   And I'm afraid that we'll lose that same soul.  I'm afraid we'll settle.

 And so I'm marching across the beach trying to understand this sadness.  Like a woman on her wedding day.  I know I'm  blessed and lucky and surrounded by love.  But there's a little less to dream about.  And I'm a little bit closer to being the person I never thought I would be.  The one who stays.  I turn in the wind and see my husband chasing after me.  He grabs me and we stand there, still in our work clothes, holding onto each other.  His wheezing breath is louder than the waves and I'm overwhelmed with my reality.  A man who loves me.  A home of our own.  And then it doesn't feel like settling anymore.  It feels like the next step.