Upgrades

As much as I loved our vacation, re-entry has knocked me for a loop! For many reasons, I feel like returning home was not really returning to the same place. When we left, it was deep summer; now it's definitely fall. The garden has progressed accordingly, and the hummingbirds have gone. And most remarkably of all, when we left, my bathroom--frowsy, outdated, and moldy as it was, was the same tiny, private haven I have loved since we bought the house 8 years ago, but when we returned, a new, pristine, fabulous, glamorous--and unfamiliar--bathroom was waiting for me. I had no idea how odd that would feel! (I am planning to share before and after photos of the new bath soon!)

Like I said a couple of entries back, having the upgraded bathroom feels more like a new me than just a new room--kind of like it's a symptom of some inner upgrade I have made and not yet fully integrated. When we first got home Sunday night and I saw it, it felt a bit alien, even in its splendor. Now, I love it--I mean I really LOVE it, and spend time in it just marveling over the transformation and delighting that I was able to allow it to happen so miraculously--truly, one of my most amazing Easy World experiences! Ironically, after almost a week of adjusting, I am now eager to transform everything in the house.

This experience makes me wonder how in the world those families on Extreme Makeover: Home Edition handle leaving their old falling-down pathetic house and returning in only a week to a completely different, totally renovated glamorous house in the same setting that doesn't even resemble the original, all tricked out with the latest in design and convenience features. It must be what I experienced, but on steriods! And talk about needing to integrate your old image of yourself with the new!

Bathroom aside, I have felt a little like we landed on the moon when we returned. In more than one way, I am not in the same place I was before I left. Even without a home renovation, we may think we're returning to the same place when we come back after an absence, but everything moves on, both internally and externally, whether it's very noticeable or not. To cope, I have been experiencing an overwhelming need for rest, for stillness, to calibrate the various levels of myself. Some of that is just from the stress of travel and all that entails, and some of it feels like a necessary part of a new birth.

I don't really know what I'm moving toward, but I will just keep going forward and trusting it's exactly right and, though perhaps, unfamiliar, that it will be wonderful as I grow into it and it becomes familiar--just like my new bathroom. In the process, I give myself permission to take lots of naps. And, if you feel you need permission to do the same, I grant you permission to nap, too! I believe we're all discarding old identities and upgrading to new ones, and sleep is beneficial in that process.