all change at Barnes

Will any­one who does­n’t live on a Lon­don train line under­stand my post title?  It’s what they say when you come to the end of a line.  “All change at Hammersmith/Waterloo.”  So we do.  All change, that is.

You know how every­thing’s about “mind­ful­ness” these days?  Our local book­shop is filled with tomes on the sub­ject of mind­ful­ness, liv­ing in the moment, appre­ci­at­ing life as it hap­pens, BEING there, focus­ing atten­tion on the here and now, and beloved­ness of the ordi­nary.  The book­shop own­er even com­plained to me that she had lost valu­able chil­dren’s pic­ture book space to the new genre of adults’ col­or­ing books.  Because appar­ent­ly when you’re col­or­ing, you have no choice but to be “mind­ful” and live in the moment.

I think I, by con­trast, need to write a book on “mind­less­less.”  If I appre­ci­ate things any more, if I live any more in the beloved moment, my head will explode.

It’s final­ly come to this: Avery’s last day at home before start­ing university.

We are all a bit like peas on a hot shov­el today, to quote Lord Peter Wim­sey.  Full of last ques­tions about things to take with her — cut­lery and tow­els, push pins and a copy of “The Great British Bake-Off,” our com­fort tel­ly-watch­ing these last few days.  The inevitabil­i­ty of depar­ture hangs over the house, a com­bi­na­tion of excit­ing, exhaust­ing and not a lit­tle of the Great Unknown.

Clothes have been sort­ed, her books put into piles of “Take to Oxford,” “Take to New Apart­ment,” and “Oh, God, I have no idea.”

The church jum­ble sale lady has come with her sta­tion wag­on and car­ried away all the things no longer need­ed before this big move out into the real world: sweaters and pota­to ricers, Avery’s pho­to­graph­ic white box and my pas­ta machine, nov­els I have two copies of and mis­matched drink­ing glass­es.  Quite over­whelm­ing, the clob­ber.  “Jum­ble” was just the right word.  I was too trau­ma­tised by it all to take a picture.

It’s real­ly the com­bi­na­tion of Avery’s going and our impend­ing depar­ture lat­er this month that’s made it all so over­whelm­ing.  Either one would be enough to make me a bit crazy, but togeth­er they form a per­fect storm of ner­vous ten­sion that is hard to describe.  And yet per­haps it’s eas­i­er this way, leav­ing the home where the three of us have been so hap­py, to set­tle our­selves into a per­fect­ly new emp­ty nest, a pris­tine place with no mem­o­ries, yet.

Although I’m excit­ed about what the future holds (a bit), it is a wrench to drag myself away from the safe, cosy cocoon of Barnes (where I’ve been hap­pi­er, real­ly, than any­where since we left New York) and to the urban, edgy, cool and rather intim­i­dat­ing world of South­bank, our new home.

Leav­ing behind my beloved ring­ing cham­ber and the friends I’ve made over the past near­ly five years…  How I will miss them!

Con­tem­plat­ing say­ing a bit of a good­bye — at least good­bye to our almost week­ly play­dates — to my lit­tle twin friends, Fred­die and Angus, with whom I’ve shared so many hap­py hours…  This was an idyl­lic game of hide-and-seek in yes­ter­day’s sun­shine, cap­tured by their beau­ti­ful mom Claire.  They have become irre­place­able peo­ple in my life, so a jour­ney on the train, rather than a hop on my bike, to come back to them is def­i­nite­ly in the cards.

We’ve filled the week with the most deli­cious things we could think of to feed Avery before she goes — beef fil­lets and mush­rooms, chick­en ten­ders, roast­ed red pep­per pas­ta, John’s mar­i­nat­ed pork chops.  Tonight because she wants to, we’re hav­ing BOTH spaghet­ti car­bonara AND Orlan­do’s pota­toes cooked in goose fat.  Because we can.  And who knows what tomor­row’s food will bring.  It’s so hard for me to lose con­trol of mak­ing sure she is fed prop­er­ly!  But it’s time.

“At least you have your fan­tas­tic, sup­port­ive yoga teacher to keep you calm,” you might say.

But no!  Yes­ter­day a group of her grate­ful stu­dents host­ed a deli­cious lunch to say… good­bye to her!  Car­rie’s heart­less­ly leav­ing us for green­er pas­tures in Cal­i­for­nia.  How I will miss her.  But I sup­pose it makes it eas­i­er to leave Barnes.  Our beau­ti­ful neigh­bor­hood will be a lit­tle less shiny, a lit­tle less warm, with­out her.

And thank good­ness for occa­sion­al moments of lev­i­ty like today’s vis­it from a brand-new neigh­bor­hood kit­ty, a vir­tu­al twin to our Hermione, only nice!

You can pick her up!

Tomor­row will see us head­ing off in our rent­ed sta­tion wag­on, head­ing packed to the gills to Oxford.  John and I will return home to a new chap­ter, the emp­ty nest.  And real life, for all three of us, will nev­er be quite the same.