the river of life

this isn't the first time i've been struck by the unstoppable, unrelenting, ever-changing nature of life. but it's the first time i'm writing about it. my mom got a new dog yesterday. if you're a regular reader of these pages, you know that our family dog, sadie, died on 10 may 2001. yesterday mom adopted ciara (pronounced /kira/) from the spca. she's a 4 year old black lab. cute. friendly. smart.

i still miss sadie. of course, ciara isn't meant to take her place. mom lives alone, and i think that house is awfully big for her, by herself. and dogs are great company. on the way down there (virginia) yesterday, i cried, remembering the last moments of sadie's life. once we had ciara at home, though, and she was busily exploring the house and yard, happy to not be locked up in a kennel, i thought that sadie's death made room in our lives to give another homeless, needy dog a good place to live. ciara is different from sadie--she's not so insistant on being petted as sadie was, she's more active (even when young, i don't think sadie *ran* around the backyard as much as ciara is), and she's stronger. but ciara sighs the same way sadie did when she flops down onto the floor. she stretches the same way. she holds her ears the same way when she's walking.

dad is having the most trouble, i think, letting sadie go. don't know why. but he said yesterday that he's not ready for a new dog ('course, ciara isn't his dog. she's mom's dog. his own damn fault that he doesn't live there anymore.) for all his professed attempts to take life less seriously, and not let things get to him, he is being particularly dense when it comes to seeing that ciara isn't sadie, will never be, and isn't intended to be, and that that's okay. that we can all keep and love another dog without diminishing sadie's importance in our lives. life flows on, like a river, continuously; it doesn't stop for anyone or anything. we all get on and off at different places, the current bringing us into and out of contact with each other. we can row and steer our way to places we want to go and people we want to be, but chance plays a role too.

lately, with this flurry of dating, and of friends moving away and returning, i've been having similar thoughts about relationships. at work, people are leaving for new jobs (academia: the year begins and ends in august). erica, who i've known since elementary school and been friends with since high school, just got back from 1+ years in kosovo. i can't keep track of all men i've dated this summer. people come, and they go. most of the people who slip through my life (coworkers), i get to know, become friends with even, then leave and never think about again. it's hard, to continually make new friendships all the while knowing that when it comes down to it, most of life is more important to you, and to them, than the friendship. the friendship is a convenience. some friends, though, like erica (and the rest of that "old friends" foursome, jan and ingrid) are there for the whole ride. even though there are times measured in months and years that we don't see each other, we're important to each other, and we always come back.

dating can go either way. most people, myself included, are looking for someone who will make them (me) the most important thing in their lives. the person for whom you give up a job, house, city, whatever for because home is with *them.* then again, the prospect of being part of a relationship where i couldn't just, say, up and go to humboldt county, california to live if i wanted, is a little scary. at 26, i'm getting used to being an adult, with no one's blessing or opinion to seek before i set off on an adventure. i like it. i'm stricken by wanderlust, and like the freedom of being able to move to [fill in destination of your choice] and make my living doing [fill in unexpected career]. i don't even know if i'll ever take full advantage of that freedom, but it's nice knowing i have it. i suppose that i always will have it, even if i end up married with children. no one can stop me from disappearing. but there's a huge, cavernous difference between a disappearing single person and a disappearing parent and spouse.

being a spouse would be comforting. long-term, committed relationships are comforting. like i said before, there's that person who has decided to sacrifice some freedom to share life with you. made a committment to be there for you when you need it, in exchange for same. however, the world calls. the desire to experience as much of what the world has to offer as i can, in the one lifetime i've been given. and i could do more of that if i weren't beholden to any one person. not saying that i don't need or want companionship and love. but i look around and note that companionship and love is available on a short/semilong-term basis for anyone. relationships come and go, and there's *always* someone out there to fill the role of lover. so i could go through life jumping from one lover to the next (some people do that anyway, with repeated marriages and divorces), always free to jump ship and swim for a while. am i brave enough to choose that path? brave enough to live life with only my own two feet to stand on? of course, that's a rhetorical question--everyone has to be. no matter what, you can't predict when you're going to be left with only yourself to rely on. so the question is, am i brave enough to *seek* a life powered by only my own two feet? don't know. i suppose this is one of those questions that only gets answered at the end of life, as one looks back. perhaps i'll fall in love and never get up again. perhaps i won't. life is a surprise.