Movement in 2023

I’ve been thinking about my future. I don’t like thinking about my future because we had our future planned … but that’s gone now. Sometimes … always … that’s a hard pill to swallow.

Part of me wants to carry on with our future, the one we had planned out together … but I can’t without you. I just can’t. There isn’t a part of our dreams that I could do singularly … it was for us, as a team.

So now, I have to completely change everything. Unexpectedly. No warning. No going back.

I think I’m going to stay in Ontario for the next year, until Dee finishes school. I was so worried about him finding his place and thriving after the move but … he did.

Every single thing in Ontario is Chris. Every.single.thing. That is very difficult for me. But I will make it work, and stay, for Dee to finish school and not experience any more upheaval in his short 17 years.

I know Chris’s parents will help me financially for the next year, to make ends meet. I don’t have to ask, his father offered, which stabs my heart further because .. it shouldn’t be this way. It should never have been this way.

Next year, next summer, I will likely be moving to Saskatchewan. Who the fuck wants to live in Saskatchewan, you ask? Well … I guess I do.

There’s no chance in the seven realms of hell that I can afford to live in my beloved Okanagan again, not on my own. I mean fuck, Emily & Evan are paying $2000/mo for a 1.5 bedroom basement suite. It would have been a breeze had we brought the company out here like we’d planned, bought a little piece of property, etc. But now … it’s just not possible anymore.

Alberta is off the table, hasn’t been on the table in decades, and will never be on the table again. End of discussion.

My best friend Mara lives in SK. I can buy a whole house in her town for $40k … wtf … you can’t buy a car for that here. I can rent a whole house there, with a fenced yard for my dogs, for $600/mo … wtf … Plus, SK is almost exactly halfway closer to the Okanagan than I am in Ontario so … shorter flights for visits.

I feel sick in my stomach thinking about it all.

I’m not supposed to be here.

It isn’t supposed to be like this.

This is wrong, Babes, come back and make it right.

So … basically … for the next year, I’m going to exist in his childhood neighborhood, in the apartment I joined him in 2 years ago, with his truck parked in his space, every shop we went to together, every person we knew together, every place you took me to, every landmark you pointed out to me, every time I catch the CN Tower winking at me I’ll know it’s you. Every time it rains I’ll run outside and catch the drops on my face and pretend they’re your kisses. I’ll walk the dogs to Tim’s for our coffees, and let Sadie pretend she’s finally going to catch that squirrel by the park.

This will be my year of mourning. My year of living for you. In our home .. our space .. I’m not ready to leave yet, even if I could. I’m not ready.

And next year … maybe next year around this time, it’ll ache a little less … maybe I’ll cry a little less .. maybe I’ll smile a little more and laugh again …

Maybe then I’ll be ready to put on my big girl shoes .... again .... and start over.