Finding Me
I have been lost a few times in my life.
However, I have been lucky that over a short few months - 6 to be precise, I have been able to find myself.
When my parents and I made the decision that I would leave the school I went to ever since I was in kindergarten, it was probably the first time I suffered for extended periods of time. It would be for the last two years of high school. I cried for months over the loss of my friends, boys I had puppy eyes for, spaces I was familiar with, trees I used to climb and routines that were mine. If were to be honest to myself, that school always made me feel like an extra in the movie of my life, where I should be star. So was it ever mine?
My mother caressed my hair and helped me cope, the way a mother only could with warmth, food and unadulterated love. While my dad helped me study and guided me to confidence. My new classmates and teachers saw a version of me that I still couldn’t see, making me the star of my movie.
The second time was the loss of a the first man I thought I truly loved. All the movies I had watched and books I had read, did not prepare me for when someone broke my heart. I never thought it would happen to me. I wanted to hide in a little hole in the Earth and never meet another sole. How will it all end? Will I ever be happy again?
( Well, you know me and so you know I am fine and excited with life, as never before! )
I managed with the help of some wonderful friends in college, who stayed up with me over buckets of tears… but who, I am ashamed to say, are no longer a part of my life at 40.
Then again, how many people am I to be in touch with, through that break up which was a tiny bump in my story arch.
Most times when I have not recognized who I was, and had turned into one of the worst versions of myself, it has happened over a change of some sort. There is loss of my happy self, followed by months of severe sadness, dare I call it depression?. Then slowly, as always, time works its magic - I start to feel happy again, smiling at the flowers - a delightful version of myself emerges.
So when I stopped being myself and started hiding some time in 2017, I didn’t realize it was occurring again. The loss of self was happening. I didn’t really lose anything and there wasn’t a major change in my life. I wasn't weepy and all, but I wasn't happy. Somewhere during my life in The United States, I was becoming a version of me that I didn’t love. A version I wasn't proud of. Writing, cooking, blogging and photography were all not working for me. I was wondering what my purpose was in my life.
That’s when pottery re-entered my life and saved me.... found me.
