Monday, October 31, 2016

Dazed and Confused Part II


In January of 2013, we arranged to spend a week in southern Oregon at the Klamath wildlife refuges.  Originally, we planned to witness the great eagle fly-out that is supposed to be one of the must-see events of the area in winter.  We never did see that...but we were just hooked on the beauty of the frost-laden landscape and the other winter wildlife--raptors, owls, coyotes, swans, geese and ducks--that populated the seemingly deserted refuges.  We had such a great time that we returned the following January, and the second trip cemented my love of the place.    

Ever since, I've been longing to go back, but finances and other issues kept us from returning in 2015 and 2016.  As this past summer came to a close, I knew I couldn't stay away any longer.  But in light of the husband's revelations about his lack of attachment to another of my beloved get-away venues, I asked him if he wanted to go, instead of just going ahead and making the reservations, as I normally would have done.  And though I wasn't shocked, I was hugely disappointed when he said, "Nah.  I've seen it."

This defection tore at my heart even more than the beach revelation.  The ocean is just 90 minutes away.  I can, have and will go there by myself.  It's lonely, but it's possible...familiar.  It's my second home, and I'm comfortable there. 

But Klamath is a trek--four hours by train, rent a car, arrange for lodging, consider inclement weather (snow, ice, zero-degree temperatures).  It was not only a place that I came to love; it was a little challenge that we faced together and conquered.  We would strike out in the mornings, just the two of us alone together wandering around these huge expanses of beautiful country, then we'd straggle back into town as the sky darkened and pick some funky little place to have dinner.  It was a really good time, a really special time.  Or at least, that would have been my synopsis of the experience.  Apparently, it was something entirely different for the husband; something that he had no burning desire to repeat...so he told me.

I was beyond sad.  For a time, I just didn't think about it, because every time I did, I would literally start to cry.  Then, I decided I had to hitch up my big girl panties and go anyway, if that was what I really wanted to do.  I approached my sister about coming along with me.  She got on board, but I could tell the prospect didn't excite her much.  I resolved not to worry about that...at least I had procured a companion so that I wouldn't have to be timid, lonely and half-fearful (my usual condition when I sally forth on these odysseys alone.)  This was back in the end of August.  The way now was clear for me to make the arrangements, firm up the reservations...plan the trip. 

But for some reason, I haven't done it.  Hard to figure, right?  I was SO adamant that I had to go, with or without the husband; happy that I had lined up an escort.  Yet I couldn't pull the trigger on the trip.  WTF?

Lately, I've come to understand that when my determination to do something peters out  in this kind of hesitant funk, it means the Universe is telling me something is not right.  "Don't go for it.  Not yet."  This has happened to me a lot in the past several years, since I've been making a greater effort to tune in to the nudging of the Spirit.  And when I slog forward and do the thing anyway, I usually find out pretty quickly why the Universe was trying to put a warning hand in front of my face.  If it doesn't turn into a disaster, it falls apart, or at the very least fails miserably to meet expectations.  So it's best to pay attention when I inexplicably lose my zeal for a project.

Certainly I would not nag the husband into going with me anyway.  If he didn't want to go, what was the point of dragging him along?  The essence of my sadness and confusion about the whole thing was that I had completely misread his feelings about the experience. It was like a knife in my heart to find that something for which I took for granted we had a shared love, was in fact just me dragging him along in my wake; and him coming along because....well, whatever the reason was, it wasn't because he loved it.  There was no setting that aside and charging ahead anyway.  I couldn't bear for him to come along if he didn't love it, too. 
And yet, it ate at me. 

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