Transitions

Transitions are hard. At least they are for me. I know they’re not that way for everyone. My husband, for example, will run blindly smack into the future without any qualms or reservations.  Not me. For a while I worked at a small private school. I ran their dining room, made healthy lunches and special treats for elementary and middle schoolers, did some faculty catering. It was a job, nothing more. I didn’t love it, but I needed it and the hours were great. I had one daughter when I started, two when I left, and a husband who traveled for work, so hours were top priority – above job satisfaction or career advancement. Yet, it was those very hours that caused me such difficulty. The school year is a morass of transitions. I worked 4 days, so after three days home with my daughter, leaving at 7AM Monday morning was wrenching. Worse still – Holidays. Long weekends. There was always one coming up. I was always leaving work for a school break or long weekend, then steeling myself to head back. The single thing I needed from the job was the single thing with which I had the most difficulty: transitions. Always being in flux. Always moving from one head space to another. Would it have been better if I liked the job? That’s a character development study I haven’t done a deep dive into, but my guess is…maybe.

I still don’t love transitions, even if they are necessary, even as I realize I have difficulty with them. Case in point:  I am packing up, getting ready to head to Vermont for the summer through early Fall. I love our house in Vermont. It was a refuge during Covid. We were there for 9 months. The house and I, we bonded during that time, in a way we hadn’t before. It became a home. March in Vermont is impossible -to -walk- the- dog mud, and black flies, which I get a pretty nasty reaction to. So, we packed up and came back to CT. It was time. It was hard. And now, after only three months, making ourselves at home, seeing friends we haven’t seen in well over a year, we’re heading back up North. And it is hard. It’s a gift, having two homes each with good friends around. I don’t take that for granted for one millisecond. That doesn’t make the leavings less difficult. Why is that?

Simple. Because every transition involves some degree of loss. Even positive transitions: ones that are planned, desired, or anticipated, involve a loss of some kind. At some point I realized I don’t handle transitions well because I handle loss worse. Does this help me with transitions? Not so much. But it does help me with my writing. Our characters must transition. They must grow and change, or your story will be as flat as the paper it’s written on (aging myself, yeah?) The awareness of the transition /loss connection brings depth to these situations, adds emotion and motivation, and It can be written for or affect every character, main or secondary.

I know I’ll miss walking with my friends, hashing out life with people I love and trust. Superficial, yes, but I’ll miss wearing nice shoes. In VT, I ‘ll smell like bug spray and sunblock until September. I’ll walk with friends I haven’t known long, but with whom friendships are growing. We’ll have weekend company, do a lot of cooking, drink Dry Rieslings. I’ll spend time gardening, hiking, reading on the lake. I’ll write poetry, send in some submissions, work on a verse novel and a perhaps a picture book as well. Maybe do another revision of my novel in verse for my agent? Hopefully not as extensive a revision as I just finished. Then, come September when it’s time to return to CT, I will pack up, grit my teeth, and transition once again.