I Move On

Sitting down and talking to your youngest daughter about her options, post many earthquakes and aftershocks, the divisions between the two descriptive nouns is debatable, as is the difference between a recession and a full blown depression mainly dependent upon which activity is happening to you personally and which activity you are hearing about on the news, the internet or the radio stations. If it’s happening to you it is an earthquake and a full blown depression, if it is happening to another it is an aftershock and a recession, the dynamics are always strongest when in one’s home port.

We are all fxxxed who live in Christchurch in one sense of the word, but in another, we are the most privileged on earth. We get to decide whether to go or stay, and what that looks like solely dependent upon our attitude and not necessarily the environment or immediate opportunities. This is when the spiritual side of a person takes over, there is no external certainty, but internally, we all get to choose, am I happy or sad...do I believe there is more to life than what meets the eye or not?

Well, I do and always have. I have played around with trying to decide upon an absolute version for this and I gave it up for Lent without ever becoming a specific religious affiliation permanently, because there is nothing but impermanence in this world, it is the one major truth, just look at Christchurch, or Sendai, Hiroshima and Nagasaki. KA-BOOM, it all falls down or disintegrates whether it be a natural disaster or a human designed one.

I have to maintain my dignity and integrity if nothing else. What does that look like, and how do I convince those others surrounding me, depending upon me, that now is the time to strike out and start a life somewhere else? I cannot. I can only allow them to make choices of their own and I, myself, must make choices that others may not want to hear, but I shall do, no matter what, because I enjoy living, I really do.

I will not go down with the ship. That is not why I came here, I came here to live.

My options are two. I can go back to the USA where I was born, in the state of Oklahoma where I have many friends and family, or, I can stay somewhere else in New Zealand beside’s Christchurch where I might be able to make a simple living and continue to see the many friends and family I have here. Both options hold family and friend ties, none of which are any more important than any other, they all count. I do not need to be living close to anyone to call them my family and friends; they just are and always will be. I feel no over-riding pressure to move or not move based on family.

Safety is first. And, I definitely do not feel safe in Christchurch, some do, and they have their reasons for such, but me, I feel vulnerable every minute of every day now, not just when the earthquakes and aftershocks happen, but always. I have had enough and I know it, so it is time for me to move on. America or New Zealand?

To move back to America would cost us a lot of money, and, with no guarantee of jobs for either my 64 year old husband, or my 55 year old ‘feminine’ self. Perhaps you think it matters not if I am ‘feminine’, but according to many people all over the world, it counts as another strike against me. I am simply being realistic. I can no longer bat my eyes and wiggle my hips at the same time, I must pick separate days to do either and even then, there is always the possibility my hips have been loaned out to taking care of a grandchild, or two, there are parents gone missing all over this world. It is a reality, too. It definitely feels like a 7.4 when that happens, oh, and with an enormous ‘g’ force that has nothing to do with eroticism, in fact, that doesn’t exist post-traumatic events like earthquakes and full blown depressions, except in the movies.

My youngest daughter cannot think of leaving New Zealand, I honour that choice and I understand it. And, I know that this too may change.

I don’t go to movie theatres anymore, for nine months now, I avoid all contact with large building spaces wherein I might be flattened instantaneously, a thought I have every right to consider post earthquakes, but maybe not pre aftershocks. In other words, those of us here in Christchurch have a whole new way of thinking about everything, and we do, have every right to, just like everyone else all over the world dealing with their own unique collective problems that doesn’t seem to miss anyone. So, what is the trouble?

Nothing is new; it is just part of the process. But, we try to make it seem unprecedented, in order to make a statement. What might that statement be? Perhaps it is something like this:

Look here, I am having an earthquake and a full blown depression, I have to figure out what matters in my life and what doesn’t and consider my options and make decisions and write lists to see what it looks like on paper, in the air, on the sideboard, while I’m taking a bath, when I am relieving myself and when I am driving. Whew, I have to think about this everywhere and all the time as earthquakes and depressions demand that you do something providing you survive them, and I did, so what now? What do I do?

I move on...