All week, I’ve had a sense of foreboding. Logically, you’d expect me to be looking forward to going away, to be happy and excited. But instead I feel worse than ever. I often get this before I go somewhere, but it feels worse than usual this time, maybe because I know this could be the last time, there is nothing further planned. I still haven’t started packing, I haven’t even decided what I’m going to take. I know it’s not really ‘the last time’, there will be other things, I’ll be in Oxford in a month, but that is different, a different group of people. What might come from all of this? Still life is in this state of flux? Do the old patterns always have to repeat themselves? Can I break the bonds and go soaring?
I have been talking about my state of mind when we moved into this house.. What else is there to say? It was supposed to be a new beginning. It is a beautiful house, though it requires so much work, it takes so much time, it’s not always comfortable. Could I walk away from it? It holds me here, perhaps I am safe here, like with my safe marriage, nothing outside of this, to be here, held tight by life.
It’s raining. I can hear it outside the window, and I remember I forgot to bring the hammock in. I will have to put it somewhere to dry out.
It will probably rain in Brussels. I’ve never been there in the summer before, but I expect it will still rain. So I need to think about what to pack. Check to see if there’s a metro map in the guide book – I’m sure there is. I was planning a lot of walking, but I might have to rely on the metro.
What now? I think I’ve done most of the big things that needed doing. Just the packing and sorting out what else needs to be done – oh, articles for the parish magazine, I have to write two reports about the two PCs. Circulate the minutes for comment. Any other action items? I won’t run out of things to do, because there’s the minutes from last night’s meeting to start on.
I keep thinking it’s Friday, I guess because I’m going away tomorrow, although I usually go on Thursday, so that doesn’t really make sense, it’s more a case of, looking at this as a week, this is the last day.
And when I come back, will I be feeling better, or worse because that is the end? I have been in such a state of flux over the last year, it has been a weird year, a very weird year, another one. I think that life settles down into patterns, that it repeats itself, but the things that repeat are the big things, the loneliness, discontent and frustration, the details change constantly. How will it be if life settles back into dullness again? Into this-is-how-it-is-and-it’s-never-going-to-change? Will it be a relief? Maybe, for a time…I come back to the same place, the place that pulls me back, like this house and this marriage.
I set myself up for disappointment, always. Because how could it be that life could work out the way I want it to?
I just re-read this. Actually, EVERY time it 'feels worse than usual this time'.