Sometimes I look around me and think that I am so incredibly lucky, that my life has turned out to be something so wildly different to anything I could have ever hoped and dreamt it could be. Even with the splashes and dashes of insanity, I have surpassed even the dreams that I could have ever had for myself on those lonely and indifferent nights I spent dreaming of what the future could hold. Somehow I clawed and fought and dreamt and cried my way to a life that I often stare at in wonder and want to put in a little snowglobe, to shake up from time to time and stare in wonder as the tiny sparkles drift around me.

And then there are times that I feel I am so small and insignificant that I can't even be distinguished from the paneling in the room around me. That even though I have been finding my voice and figuring out what it is that I truly feel inside of me, it doesn't really matter since nothing I say or do really matters anyway. The world has no time for the crazy, even if the crazy do a good job of cleaning up and hiding among the sane. The world has no place for someone like me, someone who finds that quite often every little feeling, thought, and stimuli hurt and sting and cannot be washed away no matter how much bleach you throw on the stain.

In England, they call those twinkly little Christmas lights 'fairy lights', which is a name that I love. I think of them now as little fairies, dancing their way around Christmas trees and store-front windows. We have them in several rooms of the house just because we love looking at them-some of them behind a net curtain, some of them in a net funnel that seems to be a container for tiny fairies, all dancing their way around the shape like lightning bugs in a jar.

Sometimes I wonder if I am a set of fairy lights-I twinkle a bit, but I give off no real warmth, there's nothing behind the sweet façade of light. That if just one bulb is off, the whole set stops working, and if I become a tangled knot that people either scream at to untangle, or else they simply throw me away. That the light doesn't light up the room, but doesn't let you hunt out the dark corners either, and at the end of the day no one remembers how many sets of fairy lights they saw that day.

This life that I am leading now is the only one that I want to lead, and yet I know life doesn't work that way, that someday I will be thrust into another life whether I like it or not. When that day comes I will try to accept it with grace, although the truth of the matter is I have always been good and handling change. It's a perk that you get when you compartmentalize your life into boxes and cartons that get sealed and stored on a shelf and left, lest you cut your finger or your heart ripping open the tape.

Walking back to Waterloo yesterday from the office, I started thinking about it. Maybe in the past I have been good at change because I have had to be. The truth is, I am no stronger or more of a survivor than anyone else-I had to adapt before simply because there was no other choice. I could adapt'¦or I could adapt. The list of options wasn't great.

But now I think I have a problem. I have adapted and grown and survived, but now that I have been in this life, now that I have known what I could have, what I could be allowed to live with, I can't ever go back to just surviving. Before there was adapt or adapt. Now there is adapt and mourn the loss of the greatest life I have ever had. And that's just not something I think I can go through, no matter how well-prepared for boxing up my heart I am.

Someone commented once here that maybe I simply seek out the sorrow because I am not equipped to deal with the good, and I think there has been something to that. In the past, I have put myself through hell and ripped myself apart simply because that's all I thought I deserved. People in my life may try to punish me, but I am the world champion at hurting me and I will never relinquish my title. I have always had this image of myself sitting cold and alone in a tiny dark apartment in New York, hiding myself off from the world and working in a job that gave me minimal comforts and minimal interactions. Angus tells me that I am the most caring person he has ever met, but in this vision I have of myself I have crumbled in on myself and I no longer care about anything.

I walked to Waterloo yesterday since I hadn't done it in ages and I missed the beautiful sight of the bridge over the Thames, of Parliament and the London Eye, of the hopes and dreams of a million people that walk over the bridge, too. I walked to Waterloo despite the fact that I was lugging my backpack full of laptop gear, a projector, and a bag full of Christmas presents I need to mail off. I walked to Waterloo even though it was freezing and dark and walking would mean I'd miss the fast train and be forced to take a slow train that would get me home relatively late.

Tightening my scarf around me, my boots making a firm sound on the pavement, I walked and thought about my life. I work for a company I like and-even more-that I am grateful to for saving me when I needed saving more than any other time in my life.

I live in a village that I love heart and soul and that I don't want to leave-when I leave the office, I take the train home. I get in my car from the station and drive home. I put my key into the antique lock and open the door to the warmth and inviting vanilla smell of home. Our home, a home, for the first time in my life. I can't give it up. I have a man in my life that drives me crazy and that I love beyond all great loves, a man who I stress about when he gets angry or depressed, a man who knows my routines and patterns, a man who I never thought I'd have, a man who makes me freeze when he gets angry (not because he'd hit me). I have my girls, my beautiful lovely girls that I love more and more everyday and can't imagine how I survived 8 months without. And I have Christmas coming, a holiday that I love and adore and want to celebrate within an inch of its life.

The view on the bridge opens up and I am treated to my favorite view of the dark water, the lit up imposing Big Ben. A nearby museum offers a chance to glimpse at a show called "Eyes, Lies and Illusions", and I realize that could very well be the title I have given to my previous lives, to my inability to see the forest for the forest. There are lights everywhere, big bright Christmas lights, illuminating the world and my heart. This life is my life, and maybe the single greatest salute I can give it is to stop worrying that I will lose it. Maybe I will lose it, but I like to hope elements of it will always be with me, twinkling and turning my mind and wrapping me in a blanket of security.

Passing over the bridge, I am overwhelmed by the number of fairy lights I see, and even if I can't remember how many of them I saw, I am reminded of the incredible brightness with which they light up the night, even if they do get boxed up at the end of the month.

-H.

Posted by: Everydaystranger at 10:37 AM | Comments (14) | Add Comment
Post contains 1397 words, total size 7 kb.

1 The world needs the crazy, at least, your kind of crazy. Where do you think all our poets come from? I wouldn't worry overly much about having this life go away. You'll fight way too hard for that to happen. And you have friends who would help you fight.

Posted by: RP at December 07, 2004 12:01 PM (X3Lfs)

2 I give off no real warmth I have to take exception to that. You give off warmth like a 5 foot 9 inch sun. :-)

Posted by: Jim at December 07, 2004 12:25 PM (SBKKb)

3 Poor baby. Sure, nothing lasts, but this life could lead to a better one, not a worse one. Imagine if things work out and you are able to conceive? Certainly, life as you know it would be over, but the new one would be filled with even more joy and love.

Posted by: Marie at December 07, 2004 01:30 PM (dxWfW)

4 I like the idea of taking the long way home from time to time (sounds like a Cheap Trick song . Having time to just think without the radio, tv, or another person blaring at you is invaluable. It's an excellent periodic habit but not something I can do too frequently, otherwise I become obsessed with "what could have been" or "what could be" rather than enjoying what God has given me right now.

Posted by: Solomon at December 07, 2004 01:47 PM (k1sTy)

5 I think that once you've found joys in life you can always find them again, even in the darkest times. And that even when your life does change you will adapt and some things you will miss and others will be so much better.

Posted by: martha at December 07, 2004 02:27 PM (5HJ2h)

6 Miss ya blog visits. Home is where the heart is and it looks as if you have finally found a place that suites you body, mind and soul.

Posted by: drew at December 07, 2004 03:48 PM (CBlhQ)

7 What a lovely post. Now, I'll keep my eyes out for fairy lights. Take Care Michael

Posted by: Michael at December 07, 2004 03:55 PM (OEVsR)

8 Keep posts like this close at hand, so when you need reminding of all you've accomplished you won't have to look far.

Posted by: sarah at December 07, 2004 05:26 PM (h4p3o)

9 I am blinded by the light your soul emits, sometimes. And a world with no place for the likes of you is not a world I'd care to exist in, to be brutally honest. Thank goodness for us that, believe it or not, the world in fact embraces your craziness. It keeps things spinning properly, don't ya know. This piece goes straight into my little box of all time favorite posts, so I can pull it out and read it over and over again, any 'ol time I feel the want to do so.

Posted by: Jennifer at December 07, 2004 06:20 PM (jl9h0)

10 Nice post!

Posted by: Annette at December 07, 2004 07:04 PM (fH7XF)

11 Remember, fairy lights are magical. And so are you, Helen.

Posted by: CarolC at December 07, 2004 09:02 PM (EpzrK)

12 Hooray for you! (cue sparklers) and here's to your continued success and happiness. LD

Posted by: lyn at December 07, 2004 09:20 PM (EUyu0)

13 I have to agree that this is one of the loveliest posts I have read...Life is not about next week or last week.Its about today and now.

Posted by: butterflies at December 08, 2004 12:35 AM (sUcgQ)

14 Now that you've experienced a taste of 'what you want', you'll know what to strive to hang on to - in one way or another - when the next inevitable set of changes comes. Change can mean adding more of what's important, without having to give up what you already value so much. And I honestly believe that what makes that possible is knowing and appreciating what you already have. Seems to me your doing beautifully in that department, and helping the rest of us to do it too. My Christmas wish for you is that the fairies continue to fill your little pocket of the world with joy.

Posted by: Light & Dark at December 08, 2004 04:37 AM (880wB)

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