In one of those Proustian moments, I read the word windmill in a poem and was lost to the past. I drifted back to my first trip to Clarksdale, Mississippi. I had gone there with a woman I was dating, and where we stayed, a place with shacks and small grain silos converted into rooms and cabins had, standing near the commissary and abandoned truck in tall weeds, a small metal windmill with rusty blades that would slowly squeak with that metal on metal screech when the windmill turned. It didn’t turn often – mostly seized up from years of weather and neglect and a windless southern heat. My mind then jumped to a different trip we had taken and the green jeep she had rented so that we could drive to the beach along the Georgia coast. The summer swelter of Savannah, the cafes where we lazed and drank our morning coffee before the sun’s midday blaze.
I’m missing travel and have had the urge to plan something. Nearly every night on my evening walk, I pass a Comfort Inn. Sometimes I look in the lobby and I miss the act of checking in somewhere new – the symbolism of hotels and lobbies and the exciting strangeness of a new town or city. It wasn’t too long ago when every few days over the course of a two month long road trip that I was checking in somewhere new. Despite this itch to go somewhere, I feel as though I’ve lost the ability to plan. My last big trip had a rough outline and no firm end-date. And now, I neither know where I want to go nor what I want to do. Sometimes, I would like help with this.
In a separate semi-Proustian moment, I was thinking about how I used to be the type of person who planned things, mundane things. It was Sunday, and I was trying to envision my week ahead. I recalled how I used to plan my meals… how on Saturday or Sunday, I knew what the week had in store, what nights I’d be home and how much time I’d have to cook. Back when I was doing the family thing, married and a kid and living in the suburbs, that type of planning was necessary. It was helpful for the family unit to be in sync. Later, when I was single and dating and still living in the suburbs, that type of planning, especially if I was dating people who lived in the city, sometimes got in the way, which, in turn, made me seem and feel both stuffy and inflexible. Life, I’ve learned is different when the grocery store is within walking distance. Life is different when there are a dozen restaurants three blocks down the street. Life is different when you’re a little more free to make it up as you go. Ironically, that freedom (having too many options) can lead to turbidity, because it becomes easier to do the routine things you know than to make a different choice.
In these moments of remembrance (concerts, travel, how I used to live and plan), I find myself making comparisons, and when finding significant differences, asking myself if I could be that person again, if I could live that life again. The question isn’t one of desire or will or rejection, but it’s more of an observation on where and how my priorities/affinities have shifted. Seven or eight years ago when all I had known was life in the suburbs of Philadelphia, I couldn’t imagine living in the city – I didn’t even want to date people who lived in the city. Now, the situation is reversed. I can’t imagine moving out of the city. I’m hesitant to date people who live outside of the city. I like the freedom of not having to plan – and when I encounter someone who lives differently than I do, I’m often wondering what I’d be willing to compromise.
Ever since getting divorced and being forced to really consider what I want from both life and my relationships, I’ve come to appreciate moments of growth. I’ve come to appreciate relationships in which we see and learn new ways of being in this world. The good ones entice us with, and allow us to consider, other ways of living. The good ones challenge our sense of self – they spark our curiosity. In the absence of that enticed growth, I have tried to be my own catalyst. But I’ve also come to recognize the limits of my own imagination – and by limits, I probably mean fears. Both in and out of relationships, it’s easy to grow complacent… and outside of a relationship, when one is own their own, it’s easy to harden and shrink into one’s own certainties. This is what I know. This is what I like. This is what I’m comfortable with. Why would I change?
Despite trying to chart my own journey for growth, I don’t think I’d have grown half as much as I have were it not for some of the people I’ve met along the way. I don’t think I’d have embraced city life had I not experienced city life with people who were living it. I don’t think I’d have questioned my need to plan (and control) had other people not challenged me to give up control or had loss not taught me about the folly of believing we have control. This is another instance in which I need to remind myself to practice and thinking. We can achieve growth on our own and we can achieve different growth when inspired by others.
The image I have of this interplay is of two people running and laughing, one usually in the lead by a few steps and occasionally pausing, turning, hand outstretched, and playfully urging the other one to hurry up. There’s a song by Glass Animals, “Pork Soda,” that has a similar image:
You took my hand and you made me run
up past the prison to the seafront
you climbed the cliff edge and took the plunge
and later, “let’s climb the cliff and jump again.” And later still:
5,000 footsteps in your wet dress
back to the house with your arms ’round my neck
we drank pork soda with tangled legs
I won’t forget how you looked at me then.
What I like about the lyrics, aside from the water imagery, is the idea of one person bravely coaxing the other to take the plunge. This is what I think two people, when there’s trust and a growth mindset between them, can do for each other. There’s an excitement about the destination – and usually, any destination will do. Of course, when trust, safety, and honesty are not centered properly, playful coaxing can look a lot like force or coercion. When one party is along for the ride in an effort to please the other party, resentment can take root and suddenly one person is excitedly pointing out the window and saying “look, Big Ben, Parliament!” while the other rolls their eyes and resumes looking at their phone.
For me, one thing I’ve learned is that it’s not always the big things, it’s not always the jumping off a cliff moments. When I look around my apartment or examine the way I live now, I see dozens of small influences left behind by others: slowing down in the grocery store, letting go of being efficient, the furniture and decor I’ve kept, the poets I read, the bistro glasses I use when I drink wine, they way I travel, the experiences I seek out. These are both part of who I am at my core and what I’ve adopted. These things and habits are the mosaic of my current moment.
I think the recent reveries, the recent Proustian moments when I’m lost in some not so distant version of a past self, are small tests of my willingness to shake things up. Small tests against my own certainties. Maybe it’s the arrival of spring. Maybe it’s the increasingly long arc of the late day sun. Maybe it’s the anticipation of June or summer – a time of year that, for me, has often led to growth and connections deeply felt. Whatever the case, I’m sensing an openness to outside influences, an openness to inspiration. Maybe it’s just gas.