And just like that, a decade
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| Strike 10. xtfer/Flickr/CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 |
But none of this was true. I, aged 34, was getting off at Ballston so my husband could pick me up in our car and we could head to our church in South Arlington for a Mardi Gras pancake dinner. After that we'd return to our single family home one metro stop farther (with a stop at the grocery store first), where we'd complete a couple chores, have tea, and settle into bed.
Ballston doesn't look the same anymore, and neither do I. The gas station behind the old townhome is gone, replaced by a huge apartment complex that obscures the familiar bricks that used to greet me every evening. Three new people inhabit the space where I poured my heart into many festivities, tears, and routines. The surrounding area has morphed too; the mall is ravaged, buildings are new or emptied, restaurants have come and gone, and with them all my sense of place, the halo of my wide-eyed youth.
Don't get me wrong, Ballston's general 1980s-era architectural aesthetic remains intact, but I view it with different, older eyes. I now live in the settled 'burbs by comparison, where houses are homes grown organically across the decades. My neighborhood has lawns and shrubbery, a host of tasteful additions. I can no longer walk to the grocery store. We have not only a driveway, but a car. We have not only a yard, but a garden. And all this with a spouse.
Yes, circumstances certainly have changed since February 3, 2008, when I first moved to Arlington. As I wrote at my one-year DC anniversary:
I'm overwhelmed by excitement. And loss. And a profound sense of growing stronger, growing smarter, growing up.
At my second I wrote:
I mark milestones mainly because they're a socially sanctioned form of navel-gazing, much like blogging or karaoke. They compress all your major victories, minor frustrations, and regular chores into one convenient timeframe, and push all the trends you missed (or chose to ignore) to the surface.
At my third:
At this rate, I'll be published in 2052. If I'm lucky. But who cares?? I'm having a ball and loving that I'm a writer who's actually writing. Finally.
And at my fourth:
... this time around I'm older and wiser. I know that peripheral vision doesn't deliver the full picture. I also know I'm made of tough enough stuff that I can look the oncoming year straight in the eye and say, "I have scant idea what you're bringing, but bring it anyway." And I know that I'll mean it.
I didn't write any more DC anniversary posts after that. A shame, because boy, did a lot change in the intervening years. I broke off a long-term relationship, I lost two grandparents, I dated, I earned a graduate degree, I fell in love with Nature Boy, I progressed in my career, I traveled to many new places, I changed parishes, I moved, I married Nature Boy, I got published, I witnessed a change in administration (a very DC thing to say, I know), I got published some more, I became more involved in social justice, I kept writing and blogging ...
Through it all, I dreamed. I hoped and cried and wondered. Set new goals, reached them, set some more. Checked out heaps of books from the library. Learned new board games. Acquired a few cookbooks. And acknowledged on February 3, 2018 that I am legitimately an adult in her mid-thirties, a citizen who has called a place home for ten years, a person who has put down deep roots as the river swirls around her.
I am still me, though. The words that marked my milestones from 2009-2012 resonate with me today. I recognize her, this growing girl-to-woman who wrote with increasing steeliness. In her voice I hear the frequencies of curiosity and confidence, worry and optimism, stubbornness and laughter that carried her to where she sits today, and that will carry her for decades to come (which is good, because her back is starting to hurt more).
Best of all, I have hung pictures at our new house in less than two years. If that's not a sign of maturity and wisdom, I don't know what is.
Prayer #321: Count to 10
1, 2, 3, ... I tick the numbers off my fingers, off my toes, off the Rosary beads and Commandments, this magical, mystical, whole number that ends one cycle and starts another.
4, 5, 6, ... I read you are the number of heaven, the number of "the world and universal creation." You require two numbers to complete you; all other fundamental numbers roll up to you.
7, 8, 9, ... Strike, dime, after, pole, hang, top, lords a-leaping. Your ordinary invocations belie your significance. You are complete and perfect, just as you are. Transitions are chaotic (and indeed, what is life but one endless transition), but you are the anchoring hinge.
10 ... On you I rest. On you I turn. On you I begin again.
Amen.