Tuesday, July 15^th

It could have been in combination with the early evening rain, subtle, discreet, warm. It could have been Daughter’s Youth lyrics, at the exact perfect time that I came out of it and stuck my twisted eagle pose, on the first try, with deep, steady breaths, strong, sturdy one-foot balance, for a full three minutes. She was singing about letting go. I know it was the ocean harbor air, salty, crisp, surrounding me closely on three sides. The deserted dock, an empty pier, just me at the very tip of it, floating on that wooden raft, loosely anchored. The sun had set, the sky was getting darker, the old lights flicker dimly on the lighthouse to my right. It could have been all of that, mixed and swirling through my veins (I swear I felt all of that in my blood). All of that, and the true feeling of coming to peace with this, it had me buzzing even higher than usual when I dismounted from my inversion. Those familiar post-30-seconds as my vision swerves and settles, the blood descends back down into the rest of my limbs, that slight pins/needles numbness, the lightness of my shoulder and arm muscles, the tightness of my core relaxes, and thoughts begin processing normally again as the world returns right-side-up.

I think it was that exact perfect combination of those natural factors with the blood rushing back to my heart that finally brought a clarity to those thoughts: it’s time to be open and to be willing to finally move on. It is time to consider. It is time to notice. It is time to allow myself to realize something with really great potential. I owe myself that. I deserve that. I’m ready for that.

Thursday, July 17^th

I only wear three pieces of jewelry on a daily basis: my Tiffany’s ring from daddy, a simple gold necklace with a thin gold heart, wrapped thrice around my wrist, and a teeny silver hoop earring (or two) on my pinky finger. All on the left side of me, all have become so much apart of me. Whether I’m sleeping or showering or swimming in the ocean or working or lifting or standing on my head, they are apart of me.

My pinky ring has become my biggest habit, thin enough to twirl around with my left thumb, the clasps of the earring part pop open and click closed, addictively. But this current silver ring might be the 10^th or 12^th of it’s kind that has lived on my smallest finger, because those clasps never last long.

I set myself up for this loss, a dependency tracing back over a year now. I remember losing the first ring (originally my very first pair of non-stud earrings when my ears were first pierced at 11 years old). It happened at the cottage, loading up the boat at the marina, the clasp unclicked and the sharp edge of it pinched my pinky finger and I thought it was a dock spider and I squealed and flicked my wrist and it went soaring into the lake. I remember being so mad at myself! So sad to see it slowly sink away. Since then, others have been lost in Spain, at the Kitchener cafe, at Cantell Maths and Computing College, on north beach here that first Australian date night, and a small handful of other places around this planet I’ll never be able to name, simply reaching for it with my thumb one moment, and realizing it was gone.

It sounds silly, I know it does! But it is devastating every new time I notice it is missing. It’s an instinctual panic wondering when it fell off, where it could be, my thumb starts itching to twirl, I feel so naked without the tiny piece of sterling silver. But for how much anxiety those moments bring, it feels exactly equally as good when it is recovered, or when my thumb feels it throughout the day and it is still there. Maybe that even feels better than how sad I get when it's gone. It’s like 9 times out of 10 I reach for it and it’s there, and that makes me smile. Even though I know that 1/10 could hit me at any moment.

And they are stupid expensive! $28 every time I want to replace those things. I lost it again last night, distracted walking home with dinner (so distracted I actually missed my street, my nose buried in yet another all-consuming conversation running aimless circles round and round). It was there and then it wasn’t. I came to Aus with two, and the final one had disappeared. And now I don't even know if they exist here to replace. I guess that’s why this one hit harder, and I feel the familiar panic, knowing my left hand is about to feel so foreign to me for the next long while until I can adjust to it’s absence. And I kick myself for the 12^th time every time I promised to find a suitable replacement, or a jeweler to fuse these things shut.

I am walking back to work this morning, missing it, and of course, I realize how silly all of this is. This small comfort. And I notice just how much time I have spent in the last year of my life retracing my steps, staring at the ground, driving myself mad looking for this tiny piece of me. It is so silly! It is so menial (a word recently introduced to me, one that I can’t seem to shake now…). And so this post was inspired during that walk back to work, as my thumb had already moved in search for it 2 dozen times since waking this morning, and then I finally made a decision: I decided not to replenish the weird addiction. To move on from the loss, maybe even find a new ring... One with less risk, one that doesn't threaten opening and slipping off at any point in the day. Something beautiful and secure and trustworthy and reliable.

That's what I did. That's what I decided. And then 4 hours later, two hours into my work shift... I'm serving a couple out on our patio. And the sun glitters off something that catches my eye. There, just at the front door of the restaurant, caught in our Welcome mat, my teensiest silver ring lay open, bent, waiting to be found.

And the addiction starts all over again. The happiness of finding it triumphs the sorrow of moving on. It controls me.  I literally started this post as a note in my phone on the way to work, with intensions of posting about letting go (a common theme lately), without a single clue that I'd find it again, that it'd survive a whole night without me finding it, being trampled by customers for hours.

I guess I could have left it there… Ignored the glitter... Ignored the fact that it seemed to have found its way back to me this time (I was called into work last minute! This shift wasn’t originally scheduled. And ordering dinner for pick up the previous night could have been from anywhere, but it was from my own restaurant, etcetc.)…

But instead, I ignored the fact that it is still only a temporary comfort; that there is nothing realistic about it’s worth to me. And so here it is, back on my pinky finger. I’m giving it yet another chance to stick around, to be apart of me. I’m giving myself another chance to survive when it inevitably disappears again. I am letting myself enjoy the familiar, the habitual, the instinctual… Until the next scare of a loss presents.