I’ve blown up my life twice. The first time when I asked my (now ex) husband for a divorce1 the second time when I moved clear across the country with my boyfriend (who is now my husband.) Just to be clear: these are unrelated events that happened nearly ten years apart. Neither was a mistake.
I’m not really going to talk about my divorce right now because even though I had a lot of frustration and anger around the whole thing my ex is a nice person and I’m hoping he is happier without me.
Now, let’s talk about blowing up one’s life by moving clear across the country after only ever living in one city for 49 years. First, I don’t know that it would’ve happened if it hadn’t been for the pandemic. I lost a lot of things in 2020: my father, my workplace, vacation trips, my amateur bike racing team, my sense of being grounded in a place as part of my personality. 2020 was a hard year for everyone, I know, but man, it really cleared the decks for me in ways I could not have fathomed.
I’m still mourning some of it. Obviously I’m mourning my father who I miss so much, but this is not about that, though his passing made leaving feel more possible. He’d been sick for quite a few years and I didn’t want to be somewhere else when his time was so limited.
To back up a bit, I met my husband Fred in 2017 and we moved in together in 2018. He started talking about moving and I didn’t really take it seriously. I AM Richmond Virginia. Who would I even be someplace else?
To still be living as an adult in the place where you grew up is to have multiple layers of memory around places that are still current to you. Like, Fred and I would go for a walk in his neighborhood which was also the neighborhood where my middle school and high school was, and mere blocks from the neighborhood where I grew up. I’d point to a house and say, “I got stung by a bee there when I was six.” Or, “My high school friend Jolene lived there but then she moved back to Chicago” or, “That store used to be a Blockbuster Video and before that it was a Big Star grocery store.” Ghosts everywhere but I was used to having them around. They were my ghosts.
The first time we had a real conversation about moving was in December of 2018 when Fred was telling me about a job he was interested in that was in Ohio or somewhere like that. He was so serious about it that I started to panic-cry because what are you even talking about? I just hired a cycling coach! I am committed to racing next season! Also, my job! Also, my dad! My dad is sick. No, absolutely not.
In 2019 I trained for the upcoming cyclocross season. I’d never trained with a coach before and woo boy, I hated it. But this was going to be my year!2 I was very invested in my team - my dedicated cohort of cycling friends who’d gotten me through so much. By the end of the year I’d raced my sixth full season of cyclocross and was burned out. The team was also starting to show cracks.
And then, pandemic. In March of 2020 my job went fully remote for “two weeks, maybe three.” I never went back and I never saw my boss in person again. We were two weeks from a trip to Scotland. Canceled. All bike events were canceled. All everything was canceled. I worked from home and rode my bike alone and missed my life.
Fred started talking about moving again. He’s from California and never meant to be in Virginia for 20 years. He’d been thinking about taking a job in Boston right before he met me. (Instead, he bought a house and I moved in. Oops.) In early 2020 we had the following conversation:
Him: How about Reno?
Me: Absolutely not.
Him: How about Connecticut?
Me: No, too cold.
Him: How about the Pacific North West?
Me: … …Maybe.
Him: I’ll take that as a yes.
We’d intended to take a trip out to the PNW so I could see it before deciding but the pandemic happened, so canceled. But the idea was in my head. I played with it. I put it away. I took it out again. Maybe. Maybe.
By early 2021 I was. fucking. over. it. Fred was making sourdough and building a path in the back yard. I was taking dumb little morning walks, listening to podcasts, and shopping online. It was a sad and boring time. Moving somewhere else began to feel exciting. Like, I could be anyone! I could do anything! I could exist in a world that wasn’t full of ex-boyfriends and frienemies and obligations. I could have a reason to quit racing. Live in a place with no ghosts. I could stop coasting in a job that was safe. I could make new friends. I could I could I could. I could cry.
Then, a job transfer option opened up in Portland, OR and Fred texted me from work to ask if should apply.
Yes, do it, I replied.
Part II coming soon!
Or, as my mother would say, the time I “gave away a house.”
Spoiler: It was absolutely not my year.
My husband I and I moved away from my hometown to Savannah before we had kids. We had our first grown up jobs there, bought our first house there. I feel like that’s where we “grew up” in a way. Our oldest child was born that and we moved back to my home region so that our kids could be close to their grandparents. I feel like we were different people there and I sometimes wonder who we might have been if we’d stayed there.
I live in my college town and you’ve perfectly captured the “ghosts” that can live in a place like that.
I vaguely knew about some of these events from just blog-following, but now I'm invested! "Yes, do it" sounds amazing!