This notion of rootedness has, ahem, "taken hold," even as I metaphorically start to make my way by boat down the new stretch of river. It is particularly poignant as I spend a few days in my hometown.
You know how it is, people blithely ask, "Where are you from?" What I think they mean is, "where do you live?" I usually tell them where I was born, then say, I've lived several dozen places, most recently "X," kind of thing. But right now, I am looking at the landscape of where I am literally from, and it continues to mystify me how foreign it seems. I think it did when I was a child as well. I do not feel a sense of rootedness here now, nor did I then. I watched a British show on PBS last night, and was struck once again by how a landscape on television or an online photograph grabs me as "home" far more than being feet-on-the-ground in America's northeast. But for the moment, I am letting go of this, not as I did thirty-five years ago in a snarky, irritated way, but more in a tired, "I'm 62 and have the scars to prove it" kind of way. I'm heading for the one place that I think this battered but proud American female pioneer in the field of English church music can find the space to creatively express her passions and experiences, every single one of them.
Yesterday, I picked some black raspberries at a friend's house. I've learned to look beneath the canopy of leaves; all the ripe, luscious berries seem to cluster under the horizontal green camouflage You have to lean over and peer up from below to find the best ones. I continue to trust that this same kind of "looking at life from an unexpected perspective" thing will reap a bountiful harvest for me, too.
