Becoming More

I'm moving.

Not any time soon, mind you, but as it's graduation season and my friends are finishing school and moving on, I've been thinking about it a lot.  I'm 80% certain I'll head off to the University of Edinburgh the minute I graduate from UVU.  On study abroad 4 years ago, I fell in love with the city, the people, the purple-grey beaches, the lifestyle, the way the castle looks like it grew out of the mountain, and the U of E's MS Creative Writing program.  I'm going to a grad school open house in November to make sure, but if I can have my way, Auld Reekie it will be.

So in a couple of years, when all is said and done, I'll pack up everything I own, sort my belongings into the musttakewithmes and the putitinstorageuntilIsettledowns, and I'll set off across the ocean.

And I'll likely be alone.

The thought of spending a year entirely on my own, on a different continent, away from friends and family and familiar streets scares the crap out of me.  It seems so lonely and frustrating and a little bit empty.  But last night I was staring at my ring, the ring my mother gave me on her last Christmas, the ring I hope to someday wear on my left hand, and I saw, reflected in that hope, a potential for significance I had never realized.

I took this picture with my left hand!

This ring has meant so much to me in the last 5 years.  It is its own language of sentiment, rich with expressions of monumental loss and the good that can surface in its wake.  And when it changes hands, when it is slipped gently from right to left by a man who means everything to me, this ring will become more.  It will speak of two great significances, of before and after, of memories cherished and memories yet to be made, of a girl who sits writing in the park alone and a girl who sits writing in a park knowing there is someone to go home to.

And if a ring can take on  new meaning, more power with such a simple shift, what can a Thanksgiving alone do?  Birthdays and holidays and Sunday nights are just days imbued with the sense of belonging granted by a loving and generous family.  They speak of many years of difficulty and the perfect exultation of bringing new life into this world and the desperate sadness of watching it go.  But the transcendent and transformative power of new experience means that spending these days alone will give them new significance.  It means I can create or discover my own language of family and love and religion and self-confidence and home.  It's an exhilarating prospect.

I know it's going to be hard.  I'm not blind to the fact that starting from scratch is tedious and difficult.  But armed with this knowledge, I'm a little less intimidated and a little more prepared.  And I am absolutely ready to become more.


Watch out, Scotland.  Ready or not, here I come.

I did not take this picture. In fact, I didn't take any pictures while I was in Edinburgh.

~~~

Recorded 5/7/13



P.S. I'm now accepting donations.  Make checks payable to the Aubrey's Sooner Rather Than Later Fund.