The Book of the City of Ghost Cats

We are – as of this moment – something like a month or two away from me sitting on a plane and flying to Heathrow in London and then taking all the various trains up to York. It’s hard to say the exact timeline as I await details from work, but applications have been submitted to essentially transfer my job in the U.S. to a remote one in the U.K. I don’t know if I have any specific insight into how to do this beyond the fact that I asked if it was possible and, eventually, after many discussions, it was approved for me to do my role from York. And that’s the plan I’m preparing for.

There’ll be more details to share about why York and why now and all the driving factors along with how I’m figuring out how to make it all happen, but ultimately, the purpose of this blog will help me wrap my head around the fact it is, in fact, happening.

Because I am a quiet person. I am not a world traveler, or would never consider myself one despite the fact that I have had my feet touch down on the various streets of China, Ireland, and the U.K. Strangely enough, never Canada or Mexico. Such has it just happened to be. I’m a quiet person and it is layers of fate and grief and loss and love and serendipity and therapy and self-belief being cobbled together into this change.

My parents passed away this year – within 3 months of one another – and this made my tether to the place I was born stretch. Stretch and grow until it was as long enough to run through the heavens and connect to anything and anyone I love. That psychic barrier of needing access to my parents, the security of the Rocky Mountains always sitting to the west, of being a creature of the Foothills, of knowing with some certainty who I was…it all melted away when they were gone.

It’s even more terrifying, of course, for this particular introvert to imagine taking her hard-won stability into a cocktail shaker and shaking it to foam with all her might.

But I’d regret it forever if I didn’t find a way to experience my quiet alongside his quiet in England. I will love Colorado forever and perhaps we’ll be back here together someday. The possibility is always open, but, for now, I have the flexibility to give this a go.

So right now, I’m starting to cull my clothing down to things I actually wear enough to pay to send around the world. Not exactly Marie Kondo’s “Does this Spark Joy?”, but it is the question that is getting a fair amount of t-shirts and pants I’ve held onto for decades out of the apartment. I’m going to sell my car, my desktop computer. I’m selling my bed. Some fairly significant personal stuff is going to be donated. It’s a bittersweet feeling. However, I think upgrading said stuff and moving away from hand-me-down furniture is a nice enough trade-off.

The ability to have a real fresh start sparks joy, I’ll tell you that much.

What’s next? There’s certainly going to be more to come.