Nesting and story telling

It has happened again. I am here supposedly working and I am writing instead. This is the perils of being your own boss and being able to justify the fact that your not on the clock.

I have had a easy week with everyone else getting caught up from their own holiday week so it feels good to cruise for a couple of hours. I will be here as long as it takes to get my to do list complete.

I got a call last night from a couple I met at one of my meetings. I was just wrapping up here and deciding what to do about eating when they called to see if I wanted to go to dinner. I was surprised because this hasn't happened before.

We met at a local bar and grill and had a long interesting meal. They are going through a really tough time and losing a lot of things in their life that is important to them. Really just important to her and he is not attached to what they are losing, because it is mostly her stuff.

People say material things are not important and in the grand scheme of things they are not but for someone who has lost their family the remnants of the past is all they have left. I struggled with this in the past myself after I lost my family. I had and still have many things that were my grandmothers or even things that were a part of past relationships that are gone.

I see the stuff as a kind of substitute for the loss. A nest of sorts to comfort when the what has really been lost cannot not be replaced. It supports you when the unthinkable happens, when you lose some large chunk of your life and can't cope with the idea of losing anything else. Grasping for a something familiar to remember the joy or pain of that person or time in your life.

I can be sadly sentimental I have my ex husbands sweater that I taken on every trip I have ever been on except last week. It has been over for 20 years. Sounds crazy but I am not ashamed he never really liked that sweater anyway. I loved him and thought we would spend the rest of our lives together.

I think that not taking the sweater on this trip was yet another sign of putting the past in its place. This trip was about getting my family back or what is left of it. The timing is finally right for me to let go of the past and start fresh. I can do that now. I can change my sad story to something with a happier ending. I can let go of my pain and blame and live with what is instead of what could have been.

I am exchanging people for the memories that I have kept alive for so many years. I was lost in them for so long and didn't know it. Letting go doesn't mean I will forget it just means I don't have to make today's choices by holding them up against something that happened in the past. I can make them without baggage and as the person I am today.

I can see the past like an old cherished book to be kept on the shelf. I can take it down from time to time and let the emotions of the story wash over me if I want. I know for me by book contains some fiction and some facts but it was all real to me because it is my story.