Reflections Upon Returning Home

So nice to be home!

I had a wonderful welcome from the family – flowers,hugs and kisses and passionate declarations of love from Five

“I missed you and I love you more than infinity to the power of infinity!”

One clung to my hand and quietly said “Mummy, mummy” over and over again and Husband tucked my head under his chin since the rest of me had been annexed by the children and said several times that it was nice to have me back again.

Clearly I need to go away more often.

My presents were met with great approval (well really, who doesn’t like a giant tin of sweets?) and the hastily snatched up toy London bus and taxi  – £6 the pair – proved a huge hit with One who has spent many happy hours pushing them around under the table muttering “Obo, fe,peezh”  (All aboard: Fares, please) just as I have taught him. Sadly for him he will never realise his ambition to be a bus conductor but this is perhaps just as well as although I have forsworn not to interfere too much in my childrens’ life choices, I do have slightly higher ambitions for him than that. Besides, by the time he is grownup it is very unlikely any of my beloved Routemasters will have survived and he would have to become a robot. Thinking about that, though, I’m pretty sure that’s also on his list of career choices..

So, here I am, back in bed the office with Bagpurrito after my great adventure contemplating what the trip has meant to me and what I will do from this point forward.

One thing is certain: Nothing can be the same because I am not the same.

I think I had become a rather diminished, shrivelled version of myself prior to this trip: Motherhood, wifedom, Stepford had all taken their toll, but taking this time and space to reconnect with who I am has put many things into perspective for me.

I am a little reminded of those capsules which contain sponge shapes for children to play with. Five calls them “breaky things”. They look like time-release headache pills or somesuch.  You place them in warm water, the gel capsule melts and lo! A magical shape emerges of a butterfly or a safari animal or a spaceship. 

This time in London has released me from my capsule and I am the shape I ought to be, that I really am, once more. 
The trick will be to retain this sense of self now that I have found it.

One very definite part of this is that I will no longer pay attention to the smaller things – and smaller-minded people – in my surroundings. It is amusing to me now how easily affected I could become by issues and dramas not of my own making. I used to be very good at not being affected by other peoples’ shitstorms. I would note who was heavily damaged and who was not, and I would avoid the former.
Simple.
I would not get suckered in by feeling sorry for them, I would not engage in psychodrama, I would set my boundaries, and that would be that. If one does not give energy to this kind of thing, it generally diminishes.

This is only half of the solution, though. The other half is to pay attention to what I love, what I need, what I believe to be important for my own happiness and then ask the Universe to supply more.
This is what really works. That is what propelled me to London and what made my trip home so magical and full of messages from the most unexpected sources:

I went to see my old house while I was there. I steeled myself for a painful afternoon of watching strangers abusing my former home. I rattled around that vast Victorian pile for 13 years and practically grew roots into the walls which Husband had to rip out, bleeding and trailing as he packed me into the taxi for Heathrow when we left for America. I hadn’t been back since. My very good friend, D, manages the property and the tenants and she recently had it redecorated and my next door neighbor, a kindly old buffer, does the odd repair for us. We had informed the tenants, all 6 of them, that we were coming in to get some things out the loft and would be inspecting the property.  

It looked pretty shoddy. Despite the new paint and carpet (already burned by cigarettes in a couple of places; bye-bye deposit, tenants) it seemed smaller and dingier than I remembered and the garden, once my pride and joy, was dark, overgrown and full of weeds. They had also been having campfires back there which D will put an immediate stop to. It was very dirty throughout. I felt a little annoyed with the occupants, but I realised that I didn’t feel violated or outraged, as I thought I would.
Mainly, surprisingly, I felt nothing.
We got some things out the loft to be shipped to me – some prints I had stored there and some old costumes from the band for Five to put in the dressing up box- and then we went next door to have a cup of tea with Sid, repairman extraordinaire. He has acquired a new girlfriend since I left, a lovely, sixtyish lady who is a former teacher, now a watercolourist, and we sat in their conservatory and chatted. We were talking about my house, and how I felt about it and she said 

“You can return, can’t you, but you can never go back. You don’t know that you’re ready to let go until the very moment that you do. And it’s only then that you are at peace.” 

Tears started suddenly in my eyes. This total stranger had articulated it precisely. I had let go of something that I didn’t even know I was holding on to.

And yes, I had found a kind of peace.

I doubt I will have to go this far to receive wisdom every time I need to hear something important (although I’m not averse to travel – quite the contrary ) but I do think there is something essential in being open to hearing and receiving messages from unexpected sources, which is harder when one is in an everyday routine, and even more so, in a rut. That has a tendency to shut us all down.

Remaining open, this is the thing.

To stay wide-eyed, open-hearted and ready for life to take us on a flight of fancy.

This is where I want to be, and what I want to teach my children.

Keep your passport handy.