Closing day

Well, it's over. Yesterday was closing day; we successfully sold our house. The cat, Sierra, is safely deposited with her new family. The remaining yard equipment has been passed on to the neighbors.

T and I haven't seen the house in a year and didn't sign the closing paperwork, so it doesn't feel entirely real to us. That has made it easier to avoid waxing nostalgic, but I'm not sure whether that avoidance is emotionally healthy.

Closing day on the house is the official closing day for a particular dream and a particular path which our life has turned away from. It may be years before my memory of the house settles into simple fondness. Right now, I feel relief, but also a painful longing, a slight itching of regret, vague apprehension, and a disconcerting feeling of being entirely untethered.

I look forward to the perspective that time and distance from the experience will give me, the perspective that I think Robert Frost writes about in "The Road Not Taken." It's not that I've clearly taken the better path, but I do look forward to the day when I can tell myself that I did.