Six months ago, I moved to a retreat center.
Well, actually, nine months ago, I started a “job” and pretended I could change everything while not leaving anything behind.
Twelve months ago, I took a leap by sending in a resume - challenged what I thought was possible.
It was last May I cried on the kitchen floor for two days, over my 37th birthday, knowing things would never be the same.
(I put “job” in quotations because I vehemently argue that I don’t want a job, I want a life and keep trying to blur the edges between them, to great success and great frustration, both).
The last time I wrote to you was in March. I didn’t quite know what to say except I was changing and now I am changed
and then I changed some more.
The cycles of time and fate haven’t stopped, in case you were wondering. Whether or not it’s a whirlwind or a wishing well, the universe is still at work, turning us toward whatever happens next.
I am adjusting to the newness and the ancientness of being a human orienting toward heart led trust and I continue to discover that we can’t really know much of anything. I pause writing to keep getting curious about who I am/who I am now. What I want to share, you to know. I want to invite you along. I want to tell you about all the change, not just the big sky of “everything is changing” but the close looking of the life/death/life pattern of
realizing that in the process of changing myself, I look around and I have changed everything.
I wonder what might happen next?
My echoing question for the past ____ years.
Five months ago, I left a 16 year relationship, a tender reimagining - fate not failure I tell him on a walk as we try to understand together.
Five months ago, I fell in love with a woman. It’s us we realize, a year into friendship. We get snowed in on a mountain, try to go slowly, but bless us, we didn’t.
One month ago, I eloped in Santa Barbara.
She reads me this poem while I stand barefoot on the grass.
I’m not sure how to describe such a feeling, to be so practiced at not knowing much of anything and then decide with such swift certainty that I know this. After a decade of designing events (mainly weddings), and almost 12 years engaged, I was pretty sure I didn’t care about getting married and certainly had no interest in state sanctioned love. And still, when L & I drove through the Olympic Peninsula in February, only weeks into partnering, there were few things - all life defining, undeniable moments - that ever felt as true.
Taking this “job”.
Changing trajectory in 2017 - leaving the design studio and deciding to build a body of offerings.
When my mom died in 2012, and my sister came to live with me.
The next few months we ask a lot of questions, cover a lot of ground. Decide that we’re willing to be wrong but more importantly, willing to be right, and lean in.
These months are full - full of movement, upheaval, travel.
These months are full - full of love, full of grief, full of opening and opening and opening possibility.
In the flurry of new work opportunities and new co-habitation I have to learn to rest again. I ride the waves of disruption in service of love (a phrase Prentis Hemphill says on their podcast during a recent interview with adrienne marie brown). I recall a list I made last summer, on it I write that I am willing:
Yes: Hard work.
No: Busy work.
I try to note the difference when occasionally a full plate becomes less of a feast and more of a feat. I practice practice practice getting free. I practice practice practice leaning in to break through. Keep finding myself held. What if surrender meant letting go but not being let go of.
May comes and Spring Retreat arrives and it, too, is so full - so much green and so much grief - a deep ache in our hearts and in our communities. Our third year, and I just keep thinking of the Japanese saying, ichi-go ichi-e, one chance, one encounter. Nothing will ever be the same. It can’t. We make our offerings - song, fire, salty tears - and keep walking in the dark, reaching for ourselves and each other. It’s beautiful and so so different.
And then,
I fly to California.
And two days before my 38th birthday between the Santa Ynez mountains and the sea, L & I stand outside of the Santa Barbara Courthouse and laugh-cry our way through some vows, witnessed by two loved ones and the late morning sun. Ten minutes later I’m a wife and I tell almost no one.
Change is hard and beautiful I wrote late last year, still standing in the threshold.
Something something about a prayer for radical risk.
I find myself in the changing landscape, the waves of the after. I cry. A lot. For everything that’s different now, I say. So much is different and I don’t want to rush this feeling, even and especially as I tend it living between my lungs and heart - the same place as the greatest joy, greatest liberation I’ve ever felt. Liberated by the yes. Liberated by this love. Something in the sacred commitment, something in the promise, leading me/us toward ___________.
I find myself wanting to both celebrate in community and to be held in this precious “for us” a little longer. It’s not a big deal. I want to say, so sure it just makes sense. We tell people one at a time, and then in small groups. Sometimes I don’t know what to say and say nothing at all. If you’re finding out now, hi, thank you for receiving my joy, in just the way I’m able to share it. The familiar startles a little at my entry.
I was imaginal cells
I grew wings
I had no choice but to use them.
And also, it is a really big deal. Hi, my name is Gwendolyn and I just changed everything. And I think about belonging and I think about trust and I think about who we are and who we are together and whatever expectations I co-signed / never signed to stay the same.
Last week, after several weeks moving from place to place - a week teaching at Penland, a week telling family and friends in person in Cleveland and Milwaukee, after several months of moving back and forth across a map, a year, dancing in the spaces in between, we land back at Hope Springs. My first weekend without the buzz-hum of a group to tend or the miles and miles of going somewhere, I settle into one month in one place, something that hasn’t happened since August of last year (and even then, a rarity!).
And here I am, writing again.
Here I am, watching the leaves on the tree outside the window, watching the fireflies in the yard, eating black caps from the vine. The air smells like honeysuckle. I remember how to pray - it’s something the wind does, it’s something the water does, it’s smoke rising, it’s the earth, still soft beneath our feet.
Fruit ripens. I leave my heart on the vine.
As for Cleveland, which has been my home for nearly 28 years, I expand but don’t depart. These woods, these gathering spaces, these front porches, this mama erie, and you and you and you. I am finding a new rhythm, a new balance. New ways to tend friendships, sisterhood, and connections.
And back on top of Peach Mountain, is an invitation to visit.
personal retreat weekend
july 18-21 at hope springs
Hi, this is where I live and work!
Hope Springs in Appalachian Ohio, has held sacred space for transformative experiences for 29 years. Home to 30 acres of biodiverse woodlands, meadows and ponds, and surrounded by protected forest, the land calls us to slow down, listen deeply, and build connection.
It’s so special here.
July 18-21 I’m hosting a Personal Retreat Weekend. An invitation for respite, rest, and reflection, a few days of nurturing care and space for whatever needs space. Daily (optional) community practice and gatherings with offerings from Stacey & Libby.
Whew.
Thank you.
Thank you for being (here).
Hoping you are riding the waves, cradling grief and hope in open palms, finding yourself supported and taking good care. I’m sending such a big love in your direction.
How has this year been? Who and where are you now?
Drop me a note if you’d like, I’d love to hear from you.
Until soon,
Gwendolyn