Tag Archives: goodbye

Saying Goodby To Your Childhood

“Growing apart doesn’t change the fact that for a long time we grew side by side; our roots will always be tangled. I’m glad for that.” –Ally Condie, Matched 

“My hometown… was always there, at all times, unchanging. What I think… is not that we go back to our hometowns, but that someday our hometowns come back into each of our hearts.” –Jirō Taniguchi, A Journal Of My Father

Hello friend,

My old man turned 80 years old a few weeks ago.  Eighty!  How the heck did that happen???  Anyway, since it was a big one, my four siblings and I agreed that we would all make the haul back to our hometown to celebrate the guy who made us.  With the exception of last year—the Year Of All Exceptions—I have always gone back for Christmas.  Other than that one annual trip, though, my visits to the place I grew up have been few and far between.  Because I only go at Christmas, when the outside air hurts anything it touches, I really just hang out in my house for the few days I am there, usually taking a couple of walks around my neighborhood to remind myself of who lived in which house all those eons ago when I had the run of the place from sun-up to sun-down.

I am a sucker for nostalgia.  I love pouring back over childhood memories in my mind.  I had a truly enjoyable youth, so I am all smiles when I let my mind swim back through that sea of images.  Getting a texted photo from a sibling or old friend from some long-forgotten event is always a delight for me.  So, walking through my old neighborhood at Christmastime each year, even with my nostrils frozen shut, gives me all the good feelings.

I have been semi-consciously attempting, these last few years, to put a bow on my feelings about the two places that have always felt like childhood home to me.  One is the lake cabin we have been going to since I was a kid, and one is my actual childhood home.  I want to say goodbye to them while they are still in my life, not from a distance when they are suddenly taken away from me by my parents either selling them or dying.  I wouldn’t have a lasting peace about it unless I can fully soak them in and say goodbye (even if I might be back again next year).  As much as I have felt them as an essential part of me and my foundation, I want to let them go gracefully.  Now that I think about it, I guess I am doing that with the people in my life who might be leaving soon, too (but that is a letter for a different day).

To be clear, I am not trying to cut these places (or people) out of my life; I am just trying to be at peace with them and the inevitability of their loss.  I hope this will help me feel less empty when they go, whether that is tomorrow or ten years from now.

I feel like I have done pretty well with this project on my most recent visits home (and to the lake cabin).  I have really felt each of the rooms in the house and taken in their memories and the positive energy they have filled my soul with over the nearly-half-century I have spent there.  I have let myself simultaneously celebrate the memories and mourn the eventual loss of the place from my life.  I have made Peace and truly given each space, including the yard and my neighborhood, a soulful salute, a great big “Namaste.”  I hope to visit again many times, but if I don’t get the chance, I have some measure of closure already in the bank.

However, until this most recent trip back, I sensed that I was missing a key element of the goodbye.  I could feel deep down that I wasn’t satisfied that it was complete, that I hadn’t let it all go.  I hadn’t covered all my bases yet.

You see, on all of those Christmas trips home over the years, when I didn’t leave the house but for the occasional sledding run with the family, I always told myself that I wasn’t missing anything.  I swore that the only place I wanted to hangout in my hometown was in my house (I really do love my house).  I had no desire to go to the local mall to find after-Christmas sales or to the local bars to meet up with old school mates.  I was content to just be home with my family.  In my home.

Going back this time in the Autumn, though, when everything wasn’t so frozen solid, snow-covered, and dark for most of the day, gave me a chance to think about home in a new way.  It let me think about the actual town where all of my memories were made, a town that I once loved very much but haven’t thought much about in recent years.  When everything is frozen over, I sneak in, hunker down in my house, and then sneak back out.  The town goes untouched, unnoticed.  This time, though, coming in off the highway, it felt like a real place, like it had a soul.  I felt the stirrings in my own soul and understood just what had been left undone.  I needed a personal reckoning with my hometown.  I needed to take it all in one more time, to make Peace with it so I could bid it a fond farewell.

So, one afternoon when the kids were busy with their cousins, my wife—who was also raised there but has a very different history and relationship with the place—and I got in the car with the stated intent to “tour the town.”  The only two certain stops on the trip were the old Scandinavian church in a park where we were married and the cemetery where her father is buried.  The rest of the itinerary was left to my whimsy, which is exactly how I like the world to be.

We started off heading to the other end of town, going past a couple of the houses she grew up in (unlike me, she bounced around town a bit), laughing about how small her elementary school looks now and how that walk that felt to her like a mile was really only a couple of blocks.  We pointed out the stores we frequented for candy, and every treasured Dairy Queen.  We kept going past friends’ houses and places we had been to parties or taken late-night drives until we arrived at what used to be the very end of town but is now a bustling neighborhood and huge new school.  I asked for a special favor to go into the tennis club where I used to play as a kid (and later worked).  The lady at the desk indulged me in a quick look around and even gave me an old black-and-white photo that had been left there from the era when I learned tennis, of my first coach, my high school coach, and my former boss, all as young adults in their short-shorts.  The memories came flooding in, and so many emotions rolled over me.  I am so glad we stopped.

Next, we started the long, circuitous journey from the farthest North end of town to the farthest South, weaving our way in a scattered zig-zag from East to West and back whenever a new idea struck me.  We laughed about the old hotels where birthday parties and Homecoming nights took place.  There was the bowling alley where we had gone together before we were officially dating a few decades ago.  It was a sad discovery to drive by the town roller rink I used to go to on Friday nights and see that it was no longer a roller rink; I loved that place.  I had to go by all of my favorite tennis courts where I spent countless hours with friends and foes, every court holding a memory of what was once an all-important match.

We visited all of our schools, including ones that are no longer even there, lost in a flood a decade ago.  Those school memories had no end for me.  There was my elementary school—now with an addition—every teacher and friend so crystal clear to me still.  We went by the football fields outside my middle school where we once shot off the rockets we made in Science class.  Around the back side of my first high school, I thought of the school dances in the pitch-black basement cafeteria.  We drove around on the course where our Driver’s Ed class happened, laughing about “The Serpentine” and parallel parking nightmares.

We stopped at the hill above the high school football field and tennis courts and looked out across the valley of the city.  There was so much of my life in that view: my friends’ houses, my Dad’s workplace, the place I spoke at my high school graduation, the streets I biked and later drove, everything.  In the distance I spotted the college football field in whose parking lot I had my first kiss.  Just down the street from that view, we stopped at that Scandinavian church where I “kissed the bride” on my wedding day.  Everywhere I looked that afternoon, there was some memory to smile about.  This was the town of my childhood.  My childhood was a happy one.  It was worth remembering.

As the years have gone by and I have matured and embraced my Truth, the rose-colored lenses I once viewed the town with have evolved.  As with everything else in my little corner of the world, I have taken a deeper and more critical look at the place.  I have realized some things about being raised there that I wish were not the case, things I was vaguely aware of then but can now put a finer point on.  It was an extremely homogeneous town.  It felt like everyone was White, straight, and Christian, and I am quite sure it was pretty horrible for anyone who did not appear to fit into those strict categories (my wife being one of them).  It was heavily conservative and narrow-minded.  None of the institutions—schools, churches, etc.–did anything to nurture the compassion and progressive values that I hope my current community is modeling for my own kids.  You were treated well if and only if you fit the right description.  At the time, I was quite clueless about how privilege works—which is part of the definition of privilege—and thus no doubt contributed to the culture.

Looking back, all of that makes me sad.  The town could have done a lot more for me than it did.  I am a little bit amazed at how I turned out morally (and, by extension, politically), which makes me feel there is a lot more Nature than Nurture going on.  But there is something I have been working on in my heart and mind in recent months, especially in these times where political (i.e. moral) differences are tearing families and friendships apart, sometimes in one dramatic moment and other times through silence and slow distancing (my people prefer the latter).  Old friends, parents, and siblings, the people whom you have loved and been loved by forever, are not going to survive a measuring by your evolved and refined standards.  They just aren’t.  Your Dad is going to be a racist or misogynist (or both), your sibling is going to be a homophobe, or—clutch the pearls—your childhood bestie is going to be a Democrat (or whatever horrific thing you want to fill in the blank with).  They are going to disappoint you in ways that pain your heart and make you question the wisdom and sanity of every future visit.   My new goal in these interpersonal relationships with people whom I genuinely love but still struggle with their beliefs and actions is to appreciate them for all the things they ARE and HAVE BEEN for me and let go of all the things they ARE NOT and HAVE NEVER BEEN.

This long, circuitous drive let me do the same thing for my hometown.  I got to forgive it for all the things it was not and set that aside so I could fully appreciate it for all the things that it was to me for so long, for what it has helped me to still be all these years later.  There were so many great things about it, so many places all over the town that gave me happy thoughts.  I saw the place through the rose-colored glasses of my youth—I guess I always will–and I loved it all over again for one beautiful afternoon.  Not only did I love it, though; I appreciated it.  Through my nostalgic grins and chuckles and “I-remember-whens,” I got to give the place that made me one final, grateful salute.  An honest, heartfelt Thanks for everything.  And with it, a Goodbye.

I needed that Goodbye.

How about you?  What is your connection to your hometown?  Open up your journal and take a deep dive into the sea of your childhood memories.  What was your town like when you were a kid?  Do you have memories from around the entire town or mostly just your neighborhood and schools?  Where did your friends live?  How close was your house to school?  How big was your range for “going out to play”?  Were you on your bike a lot?  What was your relationship to school?  Did you like your teachers?  How many friends did you have?  Where did you go to buy candy or other treats?  Where did you usually play?  Whose houses were you comfortable in?  What were your favorite things to do?  As you got into your teens and high school, how did your friend group change?  How did your feelings about school change?  How much more of the town did you cover once cars entered the scene?  What activities were you involved in?  Did your activities connect you with different parts of the town and new friends from a broader area?  How much of your town were you familiar with?  Could you always find your way home?  What about the town itself?  Did it have any unique features?  What were the main hangouts when you were in high school?  At the time, would you have said you liked the town?  Do you remember your time there fondly?  Were you dying to get out when you finished school?  How big of a role did the town’s places—its parks, schools, movie theaters, malls, etc.—play in your enjoyment of it?  How would you, as a kid, have described your town’s population and culture?  How has that view changed as you have aged?  Do you have a clearer sense now of the town’s general attitudes and cultural leanings then?  Does this evolution make you view your childhood and feelings for the town differently?  What is your relationship with your hometown now?  Do you visit?  Do you have friends and family there?  Would you go back if they weren’t still there?  If you still live there or have moved back, what is the draw?  What makes the place special?  Is it the same things that were special to you when you were a kid?  If you don’t still live there, what is your attitude toward the people who do?  Are you more like, “That is so cool!” or “What is wrong with you?”  Wherever you live, are you able to see the shortcomings of your hometown or ways you wish it had better treated you or prepared you for the world?  Do you feel like the town provided you with your values or that you either brought them to the scene or developed them in spite of the town?  What things about your hometown are you appalled by?  Given where you are in your life right now and who you are, would it be a good fit for you?  Would you choose to raise kids there or recommend it to others?  Do you wish you were raised elsewhere?  Have you forgiven it for all that it wasn’t for you?  Even if you dislike some or much of it, are you still able to think fondly of the places and people that you liked when you were a kid?  Are you able to be grateful you lived there?  If you no longer live there, have you taken the time and effort to make peace with the place?  Have you done a stroll down Memory Lane—either in your memory or an actual drive like I did—to say a true goodbye to all the spots in town that live in your heart?  If you never saw the place again, would that sit alright with you?  If not, what can you do to rectify that feeling and get some closure, if anything?  Will you?  Leave me a reply and let me know: Have you said a real goodbye to your hometown and your childhood?

I wish you Peace,

William

P.S. If this resonated with you today, I hope you will share it.  Sometimes people need a nudge along their path to Peace.

P.P.S. If this way of self-reflection appeals to you, consider buying my book, Journal of YOU: Uncovering The Beauty That Is Your Truth, at your favorite online retailers.  Namaste.

What Always Brings Tears To Your Eyes?

“Those who do not weep, do not see.” –Victor Hugo, Les Misérables

“Tears are words that need to be written.” –Paulo Coelho

Hello friend,

Last weekend I attended my first virtual funeral.  I don’t ever go to real funerals.  It is just not my jam, for many reasons.  However, this one had me especially intrigued, and since it was over Zoom, I figured that I could escape whenever I wanted.  My commitment was minimal.  I was drawn to this particular memorial not because I was so close with the deceased—indeed, we didn’t know each other well at all and hadn’t seen each other in years—but because of my sense of who he was (perhaps a kindred spirit) and the wide variety of lives I imagined that he had touched in his too-brief stay on this Earth.   I knew that he was special, and I wanted to see how that presented itself in this final farewell.  And honestly, I wanted a little more of him.  I am sure we all did.

Throughout the service, which was designed to pack in as many different voices and testimonials as possible from the lives he touched along the way, I discovered a pattern in my emotional state: when the speaker was dry-eyed, I was dry-eyed; when the speaker cried, I cried.  It never failed.  Oh sure, I cried at a few other times, too, like when they showed a picture of him and my daughter when she was a baby or a picture of him and my wife smiling together.  Those got me.  But otherwise, it was a pretty safe bet that when I witnessed weeping, I wept.

I have come to know that pattern about myself over the years.  When raw emotion is in front of me—especially crying but beyond that as well, even in Joy—I am an instant puddle.  After studying myself through my journals for this long, I have come to chalk this characteristic up to the same Empathy that has shaped so much of my worldview, including my politics and spirituality.  When I witness someone deep in feeling, it just seems to channel directly into my heart.  I am powerfully moved in an instant.  It can be a problem, but I mostly appreciate it.  I like to be reminded occasionally that I have not hardened myself too much against this world that is so full of slings and arrows.  I am still raw and affected.  That is alright with me, especially the part of me that wants to remain an artist and a warrior for justice until the day I die.  As long as I keep having authentic interactions with people and absorbing their genuine emotions, I am going to be a weeper.

But when else?  Other than diving headlong into others’ drama, what are the other moments that get my tears going?

If you have been with Journal of You for a while—whether through these regular letters or just the book—you know that I spend a fair amount of time obsessing about Death and Legacy, the importance of my impact and what I will leave behind.  I am so grateful that I have not yet had to face many deaths of those closest to me; I have always been lucky in that department.  But it doesn’t stop my active imagination from running wild with images of that loss.  I don’t mean scenes of graphic violence or horrific accidents; my mind does not go there.  It does, however, go often to thoughts of learning of their loss or having the difficult conversations about life without them.  I picture things like hearing about my child’s (or sister’s or mother’s) death or explaining my wife’s death to my children.  Vivid scenes that sweep me away and leave me tear-stained.

Those daydreams, however, are nothing compared to the ones in which I am the one dying  (usually of cancer) and have to communicate that with my wife and, even more often, my kids.  Somehow, I seem to fall into this awful habit when I am driving alone.  I think about making videos for them to watch when I am gone, on occasions like birthdays, graduations, or weddings, messages from their father who would be so proud of them and wish he were there.  I make big speeches, often out loud in my car, by the end of which I am full-on sobbing, hardly able to see the road through my gushing eyes.  By the time I realize what I am doing, I am practically panting in despair.  It is embarrassing.  It is that idea of leaving my family, though, that I simply cannot abide.  That is a guaranteed tear-jerker.

Speaking of leaving my family, I am pretty quick to get weepy in saying goodbye to my parents and siblings after our too-infrequent visits.  I try to fight it by rushing through the process, but by the time I hit the gas pedal to drive away, I am mush.  Even though we all get frustrated with my Dad for doing it, sometimes I envy him for his habit of just sneaking off before the goodbye part of the visits.  If we have gone to his house to stay for a holiday, he always manages to be “at work” when it comes time for us to leave town.  If we meet up with him at the cabin and we are all planning to leave the same day, he gets up early and gets on the road before anyone realizes it is time to go.  It’s pretty weasel-y, but at least he doesn’t have to face the emotion of goodbye.  He leaves that for the rest of us, most of whom are pretty teary about it.  I don’t really get that way with goodbyes with other people outside the family, but that is why family is family.  It’s just deeper.  I know I will be awful about it when my kids are grown.

I have a terrible time reading out loud, too, without crying.  This happens with sad stories, of course.  I still read to my daughter every night before bed, and it is highlight of my day, but I occasionally struggle to keep it together.  I can laugh now at my attempts a few years ago to get through Where The Red Fern Grows with her, but it was a choking, teary mess at the time.  Any sentimental message read aloud can get me, though, like a card or a Facebook post that I am sharing with my wife.  It happens with my own writing, too, especially things about my feelings for loved ones.  I sometimes read my work aloud to myself before publishing it, just to see if it flows, and I have definitely found myself in a puddle of tears on more than one occasion.

Likewise, I can envision wanting to say something at my parents’ funerals but just not being able to.  I am one of those criers who simply cannot speak through the process.  The emotion stabs me like a knife, and it’s like my air is just gone.  I tried to say a few words about my grandfather during the visitation the night before his funeral, and it was a sobby, chokey, mostly silent mess.

Strangely, I have occasionally fancied the idea of being a television news reporter or anchor, probably a poor fit for a guy who cries when sharing almost any impactful story.  It was more acceptable when I was studying to be an actor, which, now that I think of it, is probably how I fell into the habit of imagining all of those dramatic scenes I mentioned above that so regularly slay me in the car.  I guess I am drawn to sharing the Truth of any situation—whether my own or of those whose stories need hearing—even if that sharing brings me to tears.

As I come to recognize that realization, I am reminded of my tendency to tear up—not sob, but just get “watery eyes”—in just about any direct, intimate conversation (typically one-on-one).  I can recall so many conversations, especially ones concerning my loved ones or my own work—things like parent-teacher conferences and job interviews—when the eye-to-eye and the intimacy itself seems to draw the water involuntarily up to my eyes, even when seemingly inappropriate.  As I said, it is not weeping in the usual sense—I am not breaking down emotionally in these otherwise-normal moments, just tearing up a bit (which can cause the normal to become slightly awkward, though people typically pretend not to notice).  I chalk it up to sensitivity.  I am a bit of a raw nerve, prone to really feel everything.  It is just one of my idiosyncrasies.  I roll with it.

I am not sure what it says about me, the things that bring me to tears and the regularity of them in my life.  I tend to not judge it, not seeing it as either a particular strength or weakness.  But is it?  I kind of appreciate the cleansing nature of crying, but I don’t seek out opportunities for it (like I said, the dramatic driving scenes are not planned or even fully conscious, but rather just the result of getting swept up by my overactive imagination).  I don’t have a strong desire to cry any more than I do now, though I would prefer not to have so much of the “watery eyes” in mundane, everyday conversations.  I tend to see the source of my tears as an understanding of Love and the value of connection.

I also understand that I come at this topic as someone who is unusually blessed in my life circumstances and psychological make-up.  I have been lucky all my life, with a healthy upbringing, a pleasant nuclear and extended family, always enough food on the table, with things I enjoy doing and people I enjoy spending time with (and, as I mentioned, I haven’t dealt with much death yet).  My worldview is naturally optimistic, and I don’t struggle with anxiety or depression.  I am resilient and self-confident, and I understand, thanks to my daily journaling, the minute details of what makes me tick.  My mental health is in good shape.  For all of these things, I am extremely lucky.  I understand that if any one of them went the other way, my outlook on this topic of crying would likely be entirely different.  I am grateful that most of my tears to this point have been healthy ones and from situations I could choose.  I don’t ever cry because the world all seems too much for me, because I am stressed out or just can’t take one more thing working against me.  I don’t cry because I hate my life or feel trapped or overburdened.  I imagine those kinds of tears are pretty common in the world, and I know that Life still has many challenges remaining for me.  A run of good luck doesn’t last forever.

This is part of why this topic is fascinating to me, and why I want to know your answer.  It illustrates yet another way in which our stories are all different and thus why we need Empathy and Grace.  Our tears, whether of Joy or Sadness or anything in between, reveal something special about us.  No, reveal is the wrong word.  Maybe indicate.  The tears don’t tell the story.  They merely indicate that there is something special worth digging into.  Something deeper.  Something worth the effort to understand and appreciate, because it is soul-level stuff, the kind that makes us who we are.  For me, that means there is magic in those tears.   The magic of our Truth.  And I always, always, want to be a part of the Truth.

How about you?  What always makes you cry?  Open up your journal and your heart to explore the source and significance of those tears.  What predictably makes you cry?  Are your things specific events (e.g. a funeral, a break-up, a goodbye) or mental health-triggered issues (e.g. anxiety, depression, or the accumulation of Life just becoming too much sometimes)?  What are the events that trigger you?  Are they obviously heavy hitters, like death, or are they more subtle things?  Who are the people usually associated with your tears?  Has it been the same people all your life?  How often are the these “people tears” due to how much you love them, and how often are they due to these people wronging you?  Is that a healthy ratio?  How do you do with goodbyes?  What about books and movies (I’m a big movie crier)?  Do you have any memories that always bring tears with them?  Are those good memories or bad ones?  How often do you cry tears of Joy?  What other emotions make you cry?  How often do ordinary, everyday life situations bring tears to your eyes?  What kinds of conversations do it?  Do you cry at the sight of others crying or suffering?  How empathetic are you?  Do you think your Empathy rating dictates how much you cry in response to others’ pain?  Do you ever wonder about the source of your tears, their true trigger?  What do your tears actually say about what is going on deep down inside you?  Are they revealing of something you haven’t yet addressed and need to dig into?  Do you need help with that?  Do you believe your crying to be mostly a healthy sign, or a sign of problems?  Do you usually feel better afterward?  Do you wish you cried more often or less often?  Which topics give you your best cries?  Leave me a reply and let me know: What always brings tears to your eyes?

Be free,

William

P.S. If today’s topic resonated with you, please share it.  We could all use a release from time to time.

P.P.S. If this way of introspection appeals to you, consider buying my book, Journal of YOU: Uncovering The Beauty That Is Your Truth, at your favorite online retailers.

Growing Pains: Saying Goodbye to the Place You Grew Up

“There comes a time in your life when you have to choose to turn the page, write another book or simply close it.” –Shannon L. Alder

Hello friend,

Last week, my kids and I had our annual “Favorite Week of the Year” trip to the lake to hang out with my wonderful family. It was fantastic, as always, but this time I definitely felt traces of sadness and loss coloring my usual lake-week serenity and happiness. These uninvited feelings came from a prospect that I have been denying for years and years: that we may have finally reached the end of our days at the family cabin.

When I was a kid, two of my great-uncles and aunts had cabins on the clearest, most magnificent lake I knew. It was a lake big enough to get lost on, but small enough to be found again. I would visit them every Summer and have a blast: swimming, waterskiing, fishing for “sunnies,” tubing, and riding a little motorbike in the forest land across the road. It was heavenly. Then, one year in elementary school, in a move that would come to shape my family’s history in so many happy ways, my Grandma and Grandpa bought an empty lot on the same lake, uniting my sweet Grandma with her two sisters.

My Grandpa, a carpenter by trade, did the most amazing thing that Summer: he had all of his grandkids help him build the little garage/cabin that would forever be the home base of the place, remaining an essential structure even as a bigger “real house” was added some years later. We all had hammers and nails and followed my Grandpa’s designs, building walls and rafters where there had been nothing. We slept in tents and campers until we got the roof done, and we used the neighbor’s outhouse until we got plumbing. When it got too hot, we dove off the little dock and had a swim, then got back to work.

What made this such a cool thing that my Grandpa did was not his ingenious use of child labor at the mere cost of a few cans of Mello Yello, but rather that we all grew up to believe that we had a stake in the place. It was ours. We built it.

There is no better way to build a sense of ownership in a place than to build it yourself. I feel it these days with my vegetable garden: I till the soil, plant the seeds, water, and weed, so that when it is time to harvest, I feel a genuine pride in it. It’s my space.

I remember the first place I ever felt belonged to me: it was my house that I grew up in.

We moved to town the Summer before I turned four and rented a place while ours was being built. I didn’t get to hammer any nails in the original building, but I remember being in it before the carpet and paint and fixtures were installed, when it was just bare wood and concrete. I remember riding on the back of our three-wheeler dragging a grate all around the property to remove the rocks from the dirt so we could plant grass. I remember planting the gardens, mowing the grass when it came up, and building a fort under the tree-house my Dad made for us. Inside, I remember owning every nook and cranny of that place when it was finished. That sense of HOME has never left me there, even after 41 years. Every visit rekindles it.

So it is with the family lake cabin, the second place that felt like home to me. Those nails and boards that I pounded made it so, and each Summer affirms it. Home is where the heart is, and mine is certainly there. Looking back at my journal entries there—both from this past week and from all of the other weeks I have spent there over the years—it is plain how much peace and contentment I feel there. How truly home I feel.

This is exactly why it was so unusual to have my normal flow of serene gratitude tinged with a sense of sadness and loss during last week’s visit.

As I was unpacking my bags from the car and loading up the refrigerator for the week, my Mom started talking about how her brother and his wife were interested in selling their share of the cabin (my Grandpa died a few years ago, moving ownership down a generation to my Mom and her brother). She mentioned how none of the “kids” in my generation—my siblings and cousins—were likely to ever be able or willing to own the cabin outright and that now might be the best time to sell it and buy a place of her own with my Dad.

As if my mind wasn’t reeling enough from this news, she even floated the idea that my Dad could even consider selling my childhood home and moving out of my hometown. Nothing definitive, but just the possibility of these developments suddenly loosed the ideas out into the world and sent them rampaging through my heart and mind. It was A LOT to process.

I have told you before that I am deeply nostalgic. While my mind normally is present-focused and also tends to be get quite excited about all of the wonderful things that are upcoming for me, there is also something I just love about memories. Looking at old photos, reading old journals, chatting with friends or siblings about the old days—these things are truly delightful to me. I have never been hung up in the past and or one to hold onto a lot of regret, but I dearly love to reminisce.

My past means a lot to me. That is why I love the old photos and journals. It is also why I so cherish my visits to the lake cabin and the home that I grew up in. So, while I was basking in the peaceful beauty and family fun of the lake last week, in my quiet moments, I couldn’t help but mull the prospect of it being the last time. Maybe I wouldn’t be back to the cabin next Summer. Maybe I wouldn’t be going back to my childhood home at Christmas. Or ever.

It is hard to imagine, actually. These places have always been with me, always been a part of me. They are central characters in my life story. It is hard to see how the story goes without them in it. It makes me sad to try.

What I realize, though, is that this is simply How Life Goes. It isn’t easy. It doesn’t always seem fair. It’s messier than you want it to be. It breaks your heart sometimes. That is all part of the deal. The longer I live, the more I understand that. I am still working on accepting it, but I am at least starting to understand it. It’s called “growing up”, I suppose.

And though the kid in me wants these safe havens to remain frozen in time and available to me for visits forever and ever—just like it wants my parents to be around and healthy forever and ever—the grown-up in me knows that it cannot be so. He even knows that it should not be so. The grown-up knows that it is time for my parents to get a cabin that suits them—not one that suited my Grandpa—if they want a cabin, and to sell my childhood home when they decide they don’t want to be there anymore, regardless of how many memories they (or I) have there. The grown-up knows how to do what is necessary, even when it isn’t easy.

I suppose what I am learning in this little attempt to be an adult is that the better your life has been and the fonder the memories, the tougher it is going to be to let it all go as the years require. The people, the places, the hobbies, the adventures, the passions. The best that I can hope is that whenever I am forced to say goodbye to one, there is a good alternative waiting for me.

It makes me cry a little bit now, though, thinking of all those difficult decisions and moments of surrender ahead of me. Growing up is hard! Necessary, I suppose, but hard. I think the way to go, though, is to live a rich, love-filled life so that every last one of these necessary goodbyes is a tough one, even when you are moving onto something that will in time become amazing.   That is how I plan to do my growing up.

How about you? What things have been most difficult for you to let go of as you have aged? Open up your journal and take a mental walk through your transitions away from things that have always been there for you. How do you handle letting go and moving on? Which things have you definitely said goodbye to so far, whether by force or by choice? Who are the people you have intentionally moved on from? How difficult was that? Who are the people who have been taken from you along the way? How accepting have you been with that? Do you still hold onto bitterness about the unfairness of any of those losses? Do you have passions or enjoyments that you have had to let go of? How about the places that always felt like home to you? Do you have some, like my cabin and childhood home, that you have counted on since you were a kid? Which homes have you had to let go of? Did you get to choose, or was it forced upon you by circumstance? How have you handled it? Did you ever go back to see it, even though it wasn’t “yours” anymore? If my parents ever sell their house—my childhood home—I don’t foresee a reason that I would ever return to my hometown, even though I would miss the house terribly. Would you? What is the one place in your life right now that you will most struggle with letting go of when the time comes? What is so special about it? What are your favorite memories from that place? Are you good at holding them in your heart? Is that enough? I hope you will tell me that it is, because I know I will struggle with the losses that are in my future. Leave me a reply and let me know: Which losses make growing up the hardest?

Maximize the Love,

William

P.S. If today’s letter resonated with you, please take the time to share it. I think more people need to be reminded to cherish their little corners of the world.

So Long, Farewell

DSC_0819“How lucky I am to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard.” –A.A. Milne, Winnie the Pooh 

Hello friend,

Whenever I think of goodbyes, I think of my parents. My Mom is all-in when it comes time to part ways. I think so fondly of the mornings at her house—the home of my childhood–after a long holiday stay, when I am packing the car with a million pieces of luggage. She makes sure to get up early to make a big breakfast. She finds a way to engage in a good conversation one last time, gently reminding me that I still feel so very much at home there. She comes by with lots of motherly love and rubs on the back. She tells me how glad she is that we came. She hugs. She kisses. There are lots of “I love you’s,” and even more heartfelt tears. She puts it all out there. It feels good to have a goodbye morning with her. I always drive away full of love and gratitude—and yes, a few heartfelt tears of my own. My Mom is the world champion of goodbyes.

And then there is my Dad. The man who occupies the same house on those sweet, sentimental goodbye mornings is nowhere to be found. Perhaps the dog needed to go out for an extra-long walk, or that darn post office box was in desperate need of a checking, or maybe something was left at the office. In any case, he will not be sharing in the farewell breakfast, the “I love you’s,” or the teary-eyed hugs. My Dad is the world champion of avoiding sentimental moments, especially goodbyes.

As the child of this wonderful good-cop/bad-cop duo, you might suspect that I am some kooky hybrid of the two. I suppose that is true. When it comes to that kind of goodbye with those nearest and dearest to me, I love the lingering, sentimental goodbye like my mother. I am hopelessly nostalgic, so I like to soak in those last moments of a visit like they are a warm bath, thoroughly enjoying both the moment and the grateful afterglow of the wonderful time we have shared (which makes leaving so difficult). I love the peaceful gratitude that comes from spending time with the right people. When it comes to anyone else, though, I would rather take my old man’s route and avoid it altogether. Just get me out of there!

I have been full of goodbyes lately. A few days ago, I left a job and career of many years, in the process bidding farewell to many people who hold all sorts of different places in (and out of) my heart. In the week leading up to the final departure, as I saw folks for possibly the final time, I noticed my heart and mind run through the full extremes of responses, both in the goodbye itself and even in the mere anticipation of the goodbye.

On the one hand, I really appreciated the opportunity to say farewell to some of the players, mostly because I wanted to thank them for all of the their time and effort and commitment over the years. We had been through a lot together, and a player-coach relationship can go pretty deep. I definitely felt that in my inclination to touch base with my long-time players. The more I had invested in them—and vice versa—the more I wanted to connect with them one last time and thank them for the ride. It is a great gift to get the chance to coach someone who is invested in their own improvement, and I wanted to linger in that gratitude a bit in my final moments with those special people.

Otherwise, though, I mostly wanted to avoid people all week. If I wasn’t close with someone personally, didn’t care for them, or never made that great connection that comes when someone really lets you join in their fight for their own advancement and self-confidence, I absolutely did not want a farewell. I was actually even a bit repulsed by the idea. It was the complete opposite of my reaction with the other players.

I seem to fall on the “Give me the genuine and heartfelt, or let’s not waste our time” when it comes to goodbyes. But as I write that, I see that that is exactly how I am at my core and why I mostly keep to myself. If I am going to interact, I prefer it to be deep and meaningful. I don’t suffer the shallow stuff very well. So, I don’t avoid most goodbyes the way my old man does—to hide from the emotions that might come up—but rather because they won’t bring any emotions up. That is why I had no inclination to say goodbye to coworkers; I was not close to any of them. If no one knew I was leaving, I could have easily walked out the door just like any other day and never looked back. I suppose that sounds cold or simply weird, but that is a pretty normal feeling for me. I have had enough big transitions—moves or job changes—to know my patterns. I tend toward the deep and lasting OR a complete severing of ties (mostly the latter). I am not sure if that is a good or a bad trait, but it is certainly me.

Next week I will say goodbye to one of the best friends I have ever had. He is moving far away, and who ever knows what happens then? For the most part, I just want to have one of my Mom’s goodbye mornings with him and linger in the gratitude and fond memories. In some ways, though, I want to be my Dad and make his goodbye a little easier for him—it is already tough enough to move away from a life you have built, no doubt—by disappearing until he gets out of town and avoiding all the sentimental stuff. But this is a guy who tends to go dark, so what if this is the end? What if I don’t get the chance again to tell him that he’s the best and that I love him and that I thank him so, so much for all that he has been to me and my family?

This is when I know how much I am my mother’s son. The Truth in my soul demands a proper farewell, no matter how many tears must be shed or hugs must be hugged. It would be false to my Truth to go out to walk the dog for this one. I will stay. After all that we have been through, I must say my goodbye.

How about you? How do you do with goodbyes? Open up your journal and your heart, and share your Truth. Do you have a typical pattern for your big goodbyes? Are you the world champion of them, or are you the one who avoids them like the plague? Does your response change wildly, like mine, depending on the bond you have made? How have you handled your biggest goodbyes (e.g., moving away, leaving a job, even the death of a loved one)? I love the Dr. Seuss quote that goes “Don’t cry because it’s over, smile because it happened.” Do you tend to be the one smiling or crying, or both? It can be a complicated matter, so dig deep on this one. Maybe allow the feelings to come out that you didn’t when you said (or avoided) some important goodbyes. It is a good release. In any case, tell your Truth. That is always the most important thing. Tell your Truth. Leave me a reply and let me know, How do you do goodbye? 

The real you is amazing,

William