It’s under one of the bedroom windows; it would be a great place to sit and read a book if there weren’t so many random objects on it. It would also be a great place to store things if there weren’t so many random objects in it: my wedding dress, fabric scraps left over from various projects, unpaired top and bottom sheets whose mates are long since gone.

Yesterday, I spent an hour reclaiming the hope chest’s inner and upper spaces. Two bags of linens for recycling later, and the deed was done. Blankets and seasonal items in current use and good condition are now inside the hope chest; a comfortable pillow is on top, providing a place for cats and humans alike to enjoy the view out the window.

Traditionally, young women would fill a hope with things they might want when they married – bed and table linens, even dishes. It has me wondering what the culture thought was the hope: a comfortable and well appointed home? A husband? A recognized and honored place in a society that didn’t value single women? In this time and place, what is the content of my hope?

A society that values life in all its many forms. Safe spaces for everyone to live and move and have their being. Hearts full of compassion for self and neighbor. The courage and chance to be our God-created and God-related selves.

The cats are looking for their food bowls to be in the same place they were three years ago, not the current location. They scratch at the door to the attic and the one to the back yard, just as they did before we moved. On some level, they remember this house, this place they called home for ten years.

I’m still working on getting the kitchen in order, and I don’t remember where the rolling pins and cake pans used to be. Unless I don’t think about it. Half asleep or distracted by something else, I’ll return things to their former spots – my somatic memory knows things beyond what comes to mind (An existential muscle memory?). That’s neither good nor bad per se: it depends on whether I put things in their former places because it works well for everyone now or whether I put them there without considering other/better options.

Sometimes I think it’s the same in my inner life’s home. Without thought, I return to the same places and actions – prayers, ponderings, and spiritual resources that have been reliable ways to welcome God into my life. There’s nothing wrong with this, I guess. Unless familiarity prevents me from moving the spiritual furniture to make the place more welcoming for me, for others, and for God. Whatever prompts me to answer the door when God or neighbor knocks, whatever creates a home where who I am includes them both – old or new, that’s what I want in my inner sanctum.

We’ve been gone long enough to forget where we used to store things. There are new pieces of furniture that replaced the ones we took with us three years ago. And there’s Franklin – our son’s three year old cat. It’s not just a question of putting things back in their old places: it’s about creating a space that works for all of us – three humans and three cats – in the here and now rather than the here and three-years-ago.

It won’t be pretty or convenient for a few weeks. Right now, stuff is everywhere, in no particular order, making daily activities challenging (where did I put the French press and kosher salt?). It’s a period of cleaning, organizing, and adjusting; it’s not fun or easy, and if I could snap my fingers and have it all taken care of immediately, I’d do it. Who wouldn’t?

But a small part of me, perhaps a wiser part, thinks it’s better to have the mess and the work of getting the house back into a state that works for us all. Perhaps I won’t try to slip back into the life pattern three years past its expiration date. Perhaps I’ll find new patterns emerging from the chaotic mess that is my current situation. After all, if I have to put in this effort, why not take the opportunity to grow just a bit…

Tomorrow, I’ll hand in my keys and leave the Bennington Free Library for the last time as a staff member. My shelf and drawer are already cleared out, and I’ve only a few more emails separating me from completing my to-do list. I’ve said goodbye to coworkers who won’t be working on my last day, and I’ve left my contact information so everyone can keep in touch. I’m pleased with the time I’ve spent here, and thankful for the people I’ve spent my work days with.

If I had worked somewhere else, I’m sure I’d have found meaningful work and connections with a different group of people in a different town. If I had arrived a few years earlier or later, the particulars would be similar, but not exactly the same. And the particulars matter. I wouldn’t trade the specific people – Wendy, Diane, Kathy, Linda, Karson, Jeanne, Linda, Chris, Tom, Richard, Teresa, Joyce, Abbey, Ellen, Renee, and Kane the library dog – for any of might-have-beens.

It’s the view I see when I work at home – Main Street from the second floor of the rectory. There used to be a lovely but dying hydrangea tree a dozen feet in from the sidewalk, but it was removed a few months back. The house across the street was up for sale back then – the offices for Tost. I don’t know whether it sold or the owners changed their minds about going elsewhere.

In less than two weeks, this won’t be where I write and work. I won’t see life from this particular vantage point. It won’t be Manchester people I see as I look out, tending to their daily lives as I tend to mine. It’s something I’ve pondered.

I hope I learn the lesson of this particular perspective – that what I see is always limited, framed by who I am, when and where I live, and what I notice. What I see, the particulars of my life, offer a specific view. It could have been a different view with different particulars, but it wasn’t. It is in this place, with these people, that I have lived. There’s a grace to that, to seeing the hand of God here…

And mindful that the same can be said of all the places and times. Even the ones still to come. And that I’ll love the next one as much as I have the ones that came before.

(The header image is the view I had three years ago at this time…)

The one in the way back is from the staff at the Bennington Free Library – my coworkers for the last two plus years – many short thanks and well wishes. The lighthouse is from a coworker who retired; she came in to say goodbye at my last staff meeting a week back. The Garden card is from the woman who has been my Baby & Toddler Story Time partner; her work and creativity added so much to that program, and she made each Tuesday fun.

The final card is from Arlo. I’ve watched him grow over the past couple of years, and watched him become a big brother to Finn. His mother helped him by writing the words he spoke verbatim. The drawings are all his.

In a relatively short period of time, most of the people who signed these cards won’t think of me often; in a couple of years, very few will remember I’d spent time in their presence. And that’s as it should be. We risk losing the gift of those who are in our lives in the present if we spend most of our lives dwelling in the company of former neighbors and colleagues. That doesn’t mean we didn’t have an effect: it means that the love and grace we gave has been woven into the lives of others without us being recognized as its source – the gift is still precious, it’s just lost it’s tag.

Thanks be to God for all the precious gifts I’ve been given, especially the ones whose tags have been lost to time.

Unless you happened to look closely before yesterday, you wouldn’t know that the empty cubby used to hold more cookbooks. A few are already packed up for the move, but most are in the recycle pile.

The same is true of this book case. Books in poor condition, books not opened in years, and books that can bring joy to others have been removed. What’s left is an emptiness that’s taken up residence between what remains. What has been present in my living space is absent.

No longer present, Absent, is not the same thing as leaving a Void behind. This Absent isn’t removing anything vital or necessary; instead, it’s leaving room to see more clearly what is left – and offering me a chance to see if what remains is truly vital or necessary. Absent relieves my arms of lugging heavy boxes that crowd my living space; Absent also relieves me of the weight that too many possessions places on my mind and soul.