Mike, Linda and @lookie.lou.SHOE
have been our next door neighbors for 27 years. They’ve been a part of every milestone of our lives. They recently sold their home and left early this morning to move 430 miles away.
Good byes can be extremely hard for me. Some more than others.
I think this move hit me particularly hard because I associate meeting our neighbors with a time of my life when I felt extremely vulnerable.
In 1995 I was fairly new to the USA. I’m guessing their move is touching on an unhealed part of me. Most people don’t really think of immigration as something that can cause (dare I say it) trauma. But grief is complicated.
There are two types of losses. Physical (tangible loss like dealing with death of a loved one) But the often overlooked loss is symbolic loss, which refers to abstract loss, such as loss of a homeland, status, social environment, ego strength and social identity in which many immigrants experience the most. (Picard, Migratory Grief, 2016) I was reading up on the stages of grief recently. I learned that grief is completed in four stages: Numbness; Yearning and Searching; Disorganization and Despair and Reorganization. DISORGANIZATION! Aha! I knew there was a reason why my house is in constant in disarray.
Anyhow I digress.
Last night I made a Filipino meal (Chicken Sinigang) and we had them over for dinner. We shared have some favorite stories. Silently they have witnessed the development of our ever evolving family.
They’ve seen it all.
They have been the best neighbors ever.
The new neighbors will have big SHOES to fill. They had better ESTEP it up. (A pun on their surnames)
We miss them already.