I took my regular morning walk today with the dogs. We walked the same route we normally do, all alongside the water. Gazing at mount Rainier in the distance, a slight cloud layer separating the top from the bottom, the water as sparkling blue as it normally is when the sun starts to hit it just perfectly. I walked the same route I usually do. But I felt entirely different.

These past couple days have been really difficult for me. My contract with the Tacoma hospitals I was working through was canceled. This is an unfortunate circumstance that can take place with travel nurses, as if we didn’t already uproot our lives and displace ourselves every couple months, occasionally a hospital will do it for you, earlier than you were ready for. And it’s not as though we aren’t prepared to leave, most often I’m always prepping myself for that, the sad part of it is that usually we have time to close some part of the chapter we were writing, say goodbye, eat lots of food with the new souls you now love. Having that decision made for you, early, is like being pushed into a lake that is not yet thawed. It shocks your entire system. It is confusing, hurtful, damaging, sad. Ugh, it is so sad. What I’ve realized in these past couple days, is that what hurts the most about this situation is not getting to say goodbye. Or maybe not that even, not knowing that your opportunity to say goodbye was stolen from you and you never got a say.

I walked the same path I usually walk, with my two fur babies, and gazing at the horizon, I suddenly grew very apathetic to this magical and enchanting harbor I’ve called home for the past four months. And I hated myself for feeling that way. And yet, I couldn’t stop it. I was looking at one of the most majestic of all backyards and my soul felt so heavy, so complain-y, confused, and sad. And I realized in that moment that I need to see different things everyday. Different, new, dirty, wet, sandy, snowy things. I know I am very blessed to live here. To be living with the man and the dogs I live with, to be able to get a job less than a week after I lost the previous one, I know I’m blessed. So why don’t I feel that? Why is my frustration and sadness and apathy louder than this gift of a pure and peaceful island I live on. What in my heart is messy and wrong, drawing clouds to cover my grateful heart, creating walls to block my eyes of beauty. And if it is just my own self that is doing this, where did I get lost? And where can I be found?