on chapters and home.

I’m big into chapters. Closing one, opening another. Not being able to skip any, as much as I may have liked to over the last few years. I think our lives can be broken up into chapters. Some are longer than others. There are some run on sentences that may carry between them and common themes throughout an entire book but, we all have chapters. They aren’t linear, some run over the tops of others and some never end. 

We sold our South Florida house which is the beginning the closing of a chapter of our story.

This has been one of my most difficult chapters, personally. Any time I have talked about wanting to leave over the last five years it’s difficult for other people to understand. We live in this gorgeous home in paradise. We have a pool and a yard and swing set, great neighbors and a few months out of the year when everyone else is freezing we are still in flip flops. So I get it. I understand why us leaving is weird or hard to understand. Dan’s job is still here, our kids are in good schools. I have friends here, wonderful ones who all bring different light and joy to my life. The status quo is good. But for me, my time here has been tainted. 

I’ve always believed that home is where my people are. Home is where we are when we are together. It’s why we aren’t afraid to move, it’s why my parents never gave it a second thought when I moved to Terre Haute, Indiana out of college for a job and why we have up rooted our lives a handful of times through the years. Home is where you make home. This home, the home in South Florida, never really got a fair shake. 

When we moved here in June of 2016 we had a 1 year old, 5 year old and 7 year old. And almost as soon as school started, as soon as I was ready to put roots down and really get to know people and dive headfirst into the community, my Mom was diagnosed with terminal cancer. I was volunteering at the book fair, actually, when she called me. My first forte into our new elementary school, I was stacking books and laying low, not wanting to add another cook to a very crowded kitchen. 

“Corey, it’s bad. I’ve got cancer.” I remember sinking to my knees in the corner of the library. I knew almost no one. The person who would become my best friend here and will be a lifelong best friend was there, but at that point we’d only had too much wine and sushi together like twice… which isn’t enough to be able to ugly cry into someone’s shoulder in the school library while preparing for a book fair. There are rules to new friendship, after all.

What would evolve over the next few years amounted to a constant roller coaster. My friendships here grew stronger and some people came along for the ride. She’s ok, she’s not ok, she’s better, she’s dying. More treatment, another surgery. She’s going to be ok. She’s not ok. On and on and on. Over and over until the end. 

After that diagnosis, there was not one day I didn’t wake up here, in this house that I love so much, and the first thought in my mind was ‘I wonder how Mom is today’. Every single day until March 2, 2020. I actually had to move my phone into another room so I could sleep because I would wake up several times a night to check it to make sure everything was ok. There wasn’t a day that went by that I didn’t exist with her on my mind, in the back of my mind, on my heart. And Dad too. How will he survive this? Who will he be when he comes out on the other side? She is dying, he is watching it happen. This is not to say I couldn’t function. I functioned just fine, great even. We built a life here and our kids thrived. But there was always a cloud here, over this home. 

When she died, at the very beginning of the pandemic it started a whole new chapter. A chapter where I was grieving with three kids and a husband at home trying to figure out what in the hell was happening in the world. Would they ever go back to school or work? I miss my Mom. I would love to talk to Mom about this shit show right now. And so the cloud continued to hang around. It was different than when she was sick but navigating grief during unprecedented times isn’t for the faint of heart. I was worried about my Dad, my brother, my family, and yes, I worried about myself. I’m good that way. I try not to leave myself off of my list. I found therapy when I needed it and we did our best, just like everyone else. It was new for the whole world. I just had the added bonus of grieving my Mom along with grieving the life we once knew (the one without masks and with concerts and hugging). 

Towards the end of 2020 we found ourselves being pulled. I had navigated what I believe to be the worst of the grief (I laugh more than cry now when I talk about her, I can look back and smile instead of ugly cry most times… who knows what’s ahead and I still desperately want to talk to her but I’m OK) but I felt a lesson sinking in. What did we learn in 2020? What did grief on top of pandemic teach us? It taught us that all we get to control is our own happiness. And my happy, our true happy, is not here. Our happy is with seasons and basements and with family and fRamily (not necessarily in that order). Would this chapter be continuing if there wasn’t the cancer? The grief? The pandemic? I don’t know. Maybe. Maybe it would feel different if my Mom was still around. But I doubt it.

To be clear, we aren’t leaving for a fresh start. We are leaving to go home. I thought home was where you make it, where your people are. But it turns out home also has to be where you feel right. Where your puzzle piece fits right in. And, for me, where the cloud has never hung around.  We are leaving people here who we love deeply. We are leaving connections and friendships that we will take with us for life. That’s how we roll, once you are under our spell, you’re ours for life. 

It’s not easy. In fact, it’s freaking hard. Never in a million years did I imagine we would spend a decade in Florida. I’m leaving people on the other side of the state too. They’re also stuck with me for life, but they know that already. 

Moving is hard, leaving is hard. But there is peace. I have peace. I know that our time here, was supposed to be here no matter how hard. I know that we needed to be here, to be close to my parents when they needed us. To navigate grief and the pandemic and to realize, where home really is.