Summer rain

The rain falls straight down from the sky here, in grey, pattering drops. We’re in the middle of a southern summer storm, after having the rolling thunder threaten for the last 18 hours or so. The sandy soil will pull in the rain, the red clay will bleed it off, and we will have some relief from the heavy hot air which has been pregnant with this possibility since we arrived in Augusta on Saturday night.

If it has been a long time since I’ve written here, it’s because my mind is so full the words won’t unfurl themselves from the others swirling around—and sometimes my mind is so empty there are no words to find. This trip home, to DC and then to Augusta, has been alternately fast and furious and slow and spacious. I have slept in many beds, seen many (but not enough) friends and family, and now am in the slow and gracious south (what Keith rejects as the south and calls the “upper-middle” believing that Kiwis know something about being in the real south).

In each of these places, we are not simply reconnecting with family and old friends, but we are finding bits of ourselves—real and imagined. Here in Augusta there are many people who were at our wedding 18 years ago, who have been in my life since I was Naomi’s age. Hearing our story come out of their mouths sounds absurd. When someone drawls slowly, “So are y’all still living in New Zealand?” I want to laugh at the absurdity of it. “Are y’all still living on Saturn?” would sound just as unlikely.

My father is discovering a new life. Whenever Jamie or Michael or I have that kind of sharp intake of breath that comes with an unexpected email or a forgotten to-do item, he smiles serenely. “That feeling you’re having right now, with the tight belly?” he says, “I don’t have that anymore.” On this, his official twelfth day of retirement, he is loving his new spaciousness and thinking only vaguely of the future.

I am discovering, uncovering, imagining a new life too, although mine comes with a tension in the belly. I hear stories of vague acquaintances from long ago and hear their stories tangentially. My friend from high school is moving to Central America for a year to give her kids an international experience. Someone has cancer. There are divorces, adopted children, little kids who are suddenly teenagers and driving. If you stay in a place for a long time, it weaves through you and becomes a part of who you are—and you become a part of who it is. Dad, who has lived in this house for almost 30 years now, is so woven into the fabric of this place that we can’t drive out of the grocery store parking lot without hearing, “Congratulations!” or “We’ll miss you so much, Dr. Garvey!” People look at me earnestly when he’s out of earshot and say in hushed tones, “Well, I probably don’t need to tell you how deeply sad we are that your dad is going. This place won’t be the same without him.” And it won’t, couldn’t be.

So the tightness in my belly comes from having an exciting and beautiful life that I love and wondering about what we’ve lost by not staying in our house on McDowell Street, two blocks from here, and having babies and teaching at Davidson for the last 20 years. The tightness comes from wondering about whether I’ve been woven enough into the fabric of anything or whether I’m a patchwork, leaving behind patchy memories in a mostly-unbroken pattern of life before and after me.

And none of this is the tight belly of real regret. I have a life so good that it makes me want to weep, and a kaleidoscope of experiences and delights which I couldn’t possibly regret. I know, though, watching these old friends now, a little greyer, a little heavier, watching my vibrant and wonderful father pack his office, pull his awards down from his wall, and give away his books—this life is all we’ve got. This one time is time enough only to stay planted for a life time OR to wander around and end up in paradise. There is time only to live a lifetime in Georgia, a lifetime in Maryland OR a lifetime finding your joy at the end of an airplane ride. I admire the choices my father has made and the choices I have made. But I cannot make them all.

And so this week I celebrate my Dad and his stability, his deep, woven contribution to the community and the college. And at the end of that celebration, I’ll get on a plane and soar home to my house on the sea in another season, another hemisphere, another south. I can feel good about my choices and regret them at the same time, just as I feel good about this rain and wish we could be out picking peaches. Life is overflowing with beauty and joy and sadness. The one moment we can be sure about is this one, the murmuring of my kids in the next room, the sound of my father’s clock ticking, the sound of rain on the roof. All of our choices arise and fall away, sinking into the sandy soil or running off the red clay, leaving rivers like blood over time.