So - this week I left. Finally - after what feels like the longest build-up - I left IBM. It feels good; strange but good. I will always feel a little odd, especially given that my husband worked there for 21 years and I for 15. An awfully long time in these modern, no-longer-a-job-for-life times. I was so touched by the way my colleagues marked my departure and whilst as each hour passes I think: this is a good thing, I was still surprised by how much it moved me. Embrace the change is my mantra.
I acknowledge that I am a nostalgic soul and this surely contributes to why I stick at things so long. My husband and I were mooching today, reading the local paper, when we saw that his childhood home was for sale. Given that he and I were neighbours (the original girl next door?) this has poignancy for me too. I got that familiar hit of heartache that I get when something from my past come to light. The same applies when I hear any song by Fleetwood Mac (...'Stop Dragging My Heart Around' circa 1981). I get sentimental about the times I spent in America as a child and long to return to Florida. It holds some sort of mystical charm. Nevertheless, next year when I turn 40, I have asked for one thing - to go back to the States. I don't mind which state - we have spent time in Boston and San Francisco, New York and Hawaii, and in my childhood Florida so many times that I can't recount. I just want to go back. I know that it might not the the same - things will for sure have moved on - but the lure is there.
I often have to remind myself that this corner of England that I inhabit is someone else's perfect destination and the place that someone, somewhere longs for. The cloudy days and the fields and cities that make up England. And I am sure that if I left this place - the beautiful country walks, the pubs, the beach huts, the endless cups of tea...I would get the same, if not stronger, longings to return.
The same applies, I have noticed, to shopping decisions. Haunted by those clothes of the past - perfect Hawaiian print Bermuda shorts when I was nine, that Fame-inspired sweatshirt when I was eleven, those patent penny loafers when I was fifteen. I have decided I am always trying to recapture that same feeling now, years later! Or even when choosing things vicariously for Boo, I have to stop myself picking up similar clothes that I had when I was her age. Taking the best from the past, but it's just the way I am.
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