I’ve been quiet the last couple of months but there has been a lot going on, last time I wrote about change and everything has changed again.  I don’t even really know where to start so this will probably be kind of a mess, you’ve been warned.  Since last Dec I had been in a fairly unconventional relationship, but it had been something I had wanted to explore since my marriage had ended.  For the most part, it was an interesting and positive experience until it wasn’t.  That story is for another time though, I’m not at all ready to go there.  It ended badly and it dredged up a lot of trauma I thought I had processed which turns out that I hadn’t.  So in the wake of that, I’ve been seeing a therapist regularly because I have no idea what I am doing.  

I try to see my therapist as regularly as I can, if not weekly then every other week (at best).  I think we get along pretty well, I am comfortable talking to her which feels important cause this is shit I don’t even really like talking with myself about let alone other people.  There is a lot of trauma for us to root through and I don’t think I’ll ever be “fixed” but maybe I’ll learn to understand myself better.  A couple of the big themes we’ve been talking about are rumination, cause I’m a compulsive overthinker and lack of a home.  We moved around a lot when I was a kid, and I don’t fault my parents for it, they did what they had to do.  Its something I’ve thought about a lot (see rumination) but I never really delved into how it made me feel. 

As a young adult, I continued moving around.  It had become habitual, don’t get settled somewhere for too long cause it’ll be time to move again.  I even dragged my poor ex-wife on a tour all over British Columbia while we were together.  I’ve landed myself in Toronto, it’s been nearly 3 years with one foot firmly stuck in BC, I now reluctantly call Toronto home.  For years I told myself it’s temporary, I’ll go home to my friends and everything I know eventually, but time kept moving and I was trying to stubbornly block it.  Then it happened, the chance to move home and at first, I was elated and couldn’t wait to go back, but as I started to look into the logistics and my needs and wants it dawned on me.  Toronto is Home. 

I haven’t really had home in a long time, honestly, the place where I feel most at ease is in transit.   My work has required me to travel quite frequently for several years so home has been somewhere between Air Canada, Starwood/Bonvoy properties, Rental Cars, Airports and whatever in between.  Mastered living for over a week out of a roller bag and a backpack, and that was my steady state.  When I moved to Toronto I didn’t have to travel as much for work and in one way it was nice to be in one place, on the other hand, it felt weird to not always be gone somewhere.   I do still travel frequently for personal reasons so I guess that satisfies my need to roam, for personal trips I tend to prefer driving.  There is something calming about be out on the road, there’s a freedom that I’ve felt since the day I got my license in 1998 that I still feel over 20 years later whenever I hit the road.  

Between November and December, I finally let go of my last ties to BC identity and became a full-on Ontarian.  It’s been 3 years, I can’t kid myself and call it temporary.  It felt kind of fucked up and bittersweet to let go of something that had become part of me.  I’m excited and scared of what is next I want to go home, but this is home, for now.