All I Can Do Is Try…

Today is 30th November 2009.  Today is the day that I leave five years of my life behind.  Today is the day that I leave the place that I’ve called home for the past three years.

In June 2004 I visited this little village for the first time.  I stayed for the weekend with my then Boyfriend.  Five months later we became engaged.  Two and a half years after we met we were married.  Three years later, we’re leaving.  He’s from round here.  I’m not.  He’s giving up more than I am.

I lived in three different places within this one village.  This is the longest that I’ve stayed in any place for the past five years, and now it’s all over.  I don’t know how long we’ll be in our new house.  I don’t know how long we’ll remain at our new ‘institution’.  I hate moving.  It’s not that I’m being wrenched away from a home that’s I’ve grown to love – not at all.  It’s the logistics of moving.  We’ve known we’re going for months, but only 10 days before our move did I really start boxing stuff up.  As a family friend, who is now long dead used to say, houses are only bricks and mortar.

When writing this (before 30th November) I was listening to Ludovico Einaudi, and it made me all reflective.  That’s also where the title for this entry has come from.  Giorni Dispari is from the Echoes Album, and means Odd Days.

I’m glad to be leaving my job.  For a good six months it has been driving me mad.  I don’t think I’ve ever felt so angry yet so cheated out of something as I do about this.  I’ve been forced out of my job by a megalomaniac, who I swear has some form of personality disorder.  Thus, being out of a job means being out a home in this particular business.  Time for both The Boss and I to move on.  But that doesn’t mean that I have to like it.

I know this place.  I know people.  I live here, properly.  It’s not a stop gap to bigger things, I genuinely feel as though I live here.  That feeling only arrived when we moved into this particular house.  I had no plans to move on, I’d say that before six or so months ago neither of us had plans to move on any time soon.  However, we’ve been forced to.  What can we do?

Part of me feels as though I should stop being so cold about it and actually be a little bit human.  Another part of me refuses to do that because it shows weakness, and might give a few people what they want: to see that I don’t really want this.  A hard nosed facade doesn’t give people what they want, it simply leaves them disappointed or wondering.  I am, and will continue to be hard faced about this.  But it still doesn’t mean that I have to like it.

Part of me has grown to hate it here.  That part of me wants to get the hell away from here.  Another part of me simply doesn’t care where I am so long as I am warm, loved, near London and have enough money to survive.  I’ve never felt tied to a place before, and this is no exception.  I’ve never felt as though I didn’t want to leave somewhere that I’ve lived.  This is no exception.  I’m happy to leave here and never come back.  But that doesn’t mean that I have to like it.

It was weird in the final week of my job.  The Boss left early in the week and I left at the end.  We kept getting messages either through cards, e-mail or in person from various people and they all struck this strange chord with me.  It was like I was behind a window and silent.  I was just watching as these people said things to me but I couldn’t really hear them.  It was as though I was in a dream.  Nothing felt entirely real.  I remember thinking previously, when other people have left here, what would it be like if we were to leave?  Well now it’s happening and now I know.  Like everything else I am distanced from it but somewhere inside there’s a stirring of emotion.  It’s still as though it’s not happening to me.

It’s huge life changes like these that make you a little introspective.  Who am I?  What am I here for?  I don’t know the answer to either.  I change my mind so much that I’m not sure there is an answer to either of them.  I sometimes wish that I could go through life not being cognisant of what I am obliged to do, but instead enjoying myself.  Having to change myself so much over the past six months in order to stop myself from being hurt by all of the shit that gets thrown at us on a daily basis at work has made me wonder where and who is the REAL me?

Do I have a calling?  Will I ever find out what it is?  Will I have to try lots of things before finding it?  Will it be discoverable in yet another of the Home Counties?  (This move means I’m onto my third home county – maybe we should stop moving around London and just move into it?!)

I resent the fact that I’m being forced out of my home and my job.  I can see it’s the right thing to do, but I still resent it.  I don’t see why I should feel otherwise.  Perhaps away from all of this crap and I’ll be a better person.  Maybe I’ll do more, maybe I won’t be so lazy?  Maybe I’ll do a load of things that I’ve said for ages that I would?  Maybe I’ll meet some nicer people?  Or maybe, just to keep away from the Mothers I’ll sink further into myself?  Maybe I’ll become a nicer person?

As this day has drawn closer I’ve been more and more unwilling to think about it and how it makes me feel.  I’d rather sit back and let it all pass me by.  I would like to be some kind of bystander in my own life for a while.  Is that really so bad?  Kids, don’t become adults: it only leads to responsibility.

Life has passed by in slow motion for a few years.  Now, it’s rapidly hurtling forward at what feels like light speed and I can do nothing to change that.  Whether I want things to change or not, they won’t.  Nothing will slow down, nothing will take consideration of whether I want it.  It will all just happen.  That’s fine for a while.  What choice do I have but to go on with it?  Wherever life leads you and all those other similar clichés.

Maybe I’ll get a hobby.

I suggested to The Boss recently that we should take up Argentine Tango lessons.  You know what?  He didn’t say no.

The Tango: A Dance to the Death

It’s a passionate dance, and by Christ I’m passionate about The Boss.  Passionate enough to know that if he’s leading me elsewhere, it’s the right thing.

Tags: Giorni Dispari, Introspection, Leaving, Life, Moving House, Moving On, Odd Days, Tango

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