This Painting Is One of the Few “Things” that Matter to Me.

A Rebel’s Prompt: A Painting, Paints the Words.

At 65 years old I believed I was living the dream. I had everything I wanted or needed, friends, a lover, a large, beautiful home with a hot tub, and plenty of room to entertain. I was part of a vibrant local community. My family and I were living far apart but still managing to be close by visiting often and using technology in between.

Then one day, at 66, I left it all and moved across the ocean; bringing three bags packed with clothes and things that were so precious to me that I needed to carry them on the plane with me in case I never made it back.

The painting that inspired this piece was in that bag.

What happened?

A pandemic. A deadly disease that shut down travel, closed businesses and schools. It made me re-examine everything in my life. Also, the political climate made me fear for the safety of some of the people in my family — people who had already left and paved the way for my arrival in the NL.

A values clarification exercise:

For many years of my life, I used to buy lottery tickets and say that doing so was a values clarification exercise. I would ask myself, “What things would I change about my life if funds were suddenly no object?” Doing that exercise opened my eyes to the things that really mattered. It also helped identify the things I wanted to remove from my life, and often I could make those changes, with or without a windfall of millions of dollars.

I changed jobs and bought a house based on those thought exercises, and cleaned out many a closet, realizing the things in them were not serving me.

Have you ever wondered what you would take with you if you found yourself leaving home with only what you could carry?

It’s a very different exercise when we look at the question differently; rather than focusing on what one would change, asking what we want to hold onto tightly, regardless of, and perhaps even at the expense of, all else.

Have you ever wondered what you would take with you if you found yourself leaving home with only what you could carry? When I was a teenager I used to imagine grabbing my clothes from the closet if we had a house fire. I would carefully place the hangers all facing the same way so that I could grab a handful and run.

Fortunately, that never happened.

What did happen was, one day, after air travel had shut down, and the borders had been closed between the US and most of Europe for half a year; a way opened for me to fly to London, quarantine for two weeks and a few days, and then take a train to the Netherlands.

As soon as I confirmed that it was a legal route, I bought a ticket and started selling my furniture. I had less than two weeks to pack and it was very unclear at that point whether I would ever be back. I still believe that had the election gone differently, or had the coup attempt succeeded, there would have been no reason, and perhaps no way, to ever return. It was also unclear back then (in September) when we might ever get a vaccine for the virus that had closed the borders, separating me from my family for the better part of a year.

I had to make choices. I would leave my dog and cat with my partner. I had put my house on the market a few weeks earlier, now I arranged for it to be sold with me abroad. Old papers and files that could be tossed were burned.

Leaving friends was difficult, and people started showing up at my house, even during the pandemic, to say goodbye. A lot of tears were shed, as I faced the possibility of never seeing any of these people, all of whom I love, again.

The election did turn out ok. The coup failed. A vaccine has been approved and has begun rolling out. I will probably see those people again, if only for a visit now and then, but at the time it wasn’t clear and it was painful.

Then I began to pack.

The things I brought with me surprised the girlfriends who helped me pack. Far fewer shoes came than I would like, for example, and none of them were high heels.

An antique silver mirror that belonged to my mom was carefully placed in my carry-on. My great grandmother’s cast iron pot was too heavy for the carry-on, so it went into checked baggage, along with the tray my father painted while he was hospitalized, for much of my childhood, with tuberculosis.

The mirror was one of the things that caused my luggage to be searched. They thought it was a weapon when looking at it on the X-ray machine and had to confer amongst themselves to determine if it was going to be allowed while I tearfully asked them to be careful taking it out of the bag because it was an heirloom. I’m still not convinced I would have gotten onto the plane without it. The cast-iron pot got my bag searched every step of the way. I’m sure it looked like a bomb.

The tray is hanging on my wall now. It makes me feel like I am home, and also represents the difficult travel that was involved in getting here. The pot is safely ensconced in my kitchen and the mirror is in my bedroom. My dog will get here eventually, we are still working out the details.

For the first few months, I felt like I was camping and I still don’t have everything I want.

That’s ok, because, from the moment I got off that train in Amsterdam, carrying the luggage with the tray my father painted over fifty years ago, and my family rushed into my arms, I’ve had everything I need.