In last week’s post, I wrote about timelines and how they can help us recognize the milestones of moving forward after a pivotal life-changing event. I have often drawn my own Timelines to keep events in correct order. I once recounted a story about my dog Quint and Rich. Later a friend reminded me that Quint could never have met my late husband, but in my mind, I’d seen them spending time together.
The other day, a listing for a local home for sale crossed my feed. A pretty A-frame log cabin. I smiled because it was the house that was listed two years ago that had first caught my eye paving the path to the house where I currently live in rural Central Florida. That A-Frame is once again on the market.
On a very hot day in early August, only ten months after Rich passed, Quint and I took a two-hour drive from Georgia to that home in Putnam County. Unfortunately, although truly adorable, that log home wasn’t right for us. Briefly disappointed, it turned out to be the Calling Card that initiated my path down here to meet the house that would become The One. By the end of that fateful day, another home I’d been secretly stalking, but had deemed out of my league, became my future.
At first I was just looking for a small vacation place for quick “get-aways” from a home that had once served as my haven, but now increasingly reminded me of a sad and difficult time. But, I wasn’t completely ready to give up that beautiful place. That little A-Frame turned out to be the catalyst to act on a vision I had for myself.
I knew Rich would be proud as he’d always encouraged me to be confident and decisive. We’d often talked of finding a log cabin somewhere in the South and I sensed I was being guided.
Last week, a good friend reached out to me. I hadn’t corresponded with her in years. She’d been a close friend of my late sister and she and her family had become close family friends as well. Her daughter adored my nephew Zac. She’d reached out because she’d only recently learned of Zac’s passing when she’d come upon his obituary online.
We had a good exchange recalling how years earlier, while I was living with my sister and Zac in Hackensack, she and my sister returned home from a high-end Sample Sale. My sister worked at Ralph Lauren at that time and was a Fashionista. Her friend had scooped up several wedding dresses and thought one was perfect for me.
It was very thoughtful, but at the time I was truly single with no future prospects in sight, I accepted the dress. She didn’t want any money for it, but declaring that it was considered unlucky for it to be given to me, told me to pay her a dollar and a legitimate purchase was made.
“Try it on!” she said.
I obliged, and when I did, it fit like it had been custom made for me.
That dress followed me as I moved to New York City, then back to Hackensack, before I’d meet Rich just a few years later. With a hem and a professional dry cleaning, that dress was worn on September 28, 1996 for our wedding that took place on a beautiful warm day aboard a two-story paddle boat called the River Belle in New Jersey.
I happily relayed to my friend that I still had that dress and it had since followed me from the Jersey Shore, to Georgia and now was housed in Old Florida.
We never know how the events of an ordinary day can foreshadow the unfolding of our future plans. For me, the key to accepting our fate is to pay attention to what the universe presents each day, be it an image on a realtor sight that inspires you to reimagine your future after devastating loss, or a wedding dress delivered so unexpectedly, one that fit so perfectly and quietly waited in the dark in a series of closets for its eventual life-changing day in the sun.
Detours and delays will part of everyone’s life. It’s how you choose to perceive your future that matters. With intuition, persistence and by keeping open to what presents, you can create the path forward that aligns with your vision. Everyone must choose their own pace.
Happy Fourth Angelversary, Rich, this Tuesday, October 28th. You are loved and missed by many. You left this world too soon under a Tornado Warning, a fittingly dramatic exit. We weren’t in Jersey anymore. Thanks for giving me a reason to wear that dress 29 years ago and then for guiding me here to a place and home you would’ve loved.
