The Shadow Recedes

Blearily, I stumbled out of bed--washed my face, brushed my teeth, ironed my hair, donned my outfit, painted my face, took my pills, fed my cats, grabbed my things, locked the door. Outside my home, it wasn't QUITE daytime yet--the sun was shining, and casting a golden-pinkish-orange light over Mt. San Jacinto. The shadow of the mountain had not yet crept over the land. It was 50 degrees out that morning, and no doubt all over the desert, people were sitting on their patios, sipping their coffee, and marveling at the magic of living life in Southern California in January.

Not me.

This was just two days ago. As I drove to work at an ungodly hour--the Goon Festival required brutal work this week--Mt. San Jacinto glowing rosily at me for a good part of the time--I thought of bleak winter mornings back home, in Indiana. It was about 3 degrees that morning, back home.

I thought of how days and weeks and months and years slipped by, as I sat at the reference desk and watched patrons browse the new books, and helped them find their information, and watched ten years of my life slip past, as the Library (my true home in California) changed subtly while I passively sat by. Sure, I changed too, took on new tasks and cheerfully evolved--although my position and salary didn't, past a certain point. But there's no denying the fact that a lot of years chugged along while I sat in the same spot, both literally and metaphorically. Time was still chugging along, actually. How many more days am I going to have to watch the sun rise here? I pondered, more than a little grumpily. How many more Goon Festivals will I have to staff?

I thought of the countless dreams I have had, through the years, of returning home. Of course, Dream Home is weirdly different and surreal--sometimes an amalgamation of Real Home and many other life memories--and sometimes just plain NOT real, but still, hauntingly, mournfully familiar.

And then I thought, randomly, about how suddenly things can change. How you can chug along, quietly, trying to make the changes happen. And they won't happen, perhaps--until, unexpectedly, they DO, and then everything changes. And it happens that suddenly, and swiftly, and subtlely.

All of these thoughts, I had as I drove to work on Tuesday morning. And realizing that the change would happen, sometime, somehow, some way, brought me a little bit of peace, finally.

Later that morning, I got a phone call from a potential employer.