Losing Kate

I am sitting on a rented porch on Solomons Island, MD. It is my second day here, and it has thankfully cooled enough for me to be outside for the day without a thick sheen of sweat to wipe away every five minutes. There are two sailboats, ones I will likely never be able to afford, and a smattering of speedboats on the docks just below me.

I got three weeks unpaid from work to be with my husband as he interns with the Navy to make helicopter simulators more accurate. Jets fly above me from the base periodically, drowning out the sounds of the waves, cicadas, birds, and various nautical bells with its deafening shriek across the sky. We will live here for at least two years, and likely longer if this is where we decide to raise a family.

I have been creatively starved for some time now. I have stayed at my job, started learning graphic design, and attempted to keep hobbling a draft of my novel along. So writing essays for this blog have fallen to the side as I try to keep all three endeavors afloat.

As I sit here, in a place that will likely become a home, it is hard not to be reflective. I set this blog up as a place for myself to reflect on my life and hopefully impart some writing advice for those needing a kick in the pants to keep going. But I couldn’t muster to get my own heel up my own ass for the past couple of months until we hit the road.

How I know I am an American through and through—despite how much I sometimes struggle to see the good in this country—is how much getting on the road does to my spirit. I wish more than most that we had comprehensive public transportation, but when I got behind the wheel, car packed full of my crap and two howling cats, I felt an energy returning to me.

And as we pulled into the state we would soon live, I drank in the energy of the waters as we weaved along the shore of the Patuxent river.

As we crossed the bridge over the island, the sun set over the bay as boats linger on the calm surface of the water. Once unpacked, we walk along the pier, purchased ice cream, and quickly eat it before it drips too far down our arms.

I can envision a life here. Plot points began to weave together in my head. Covers of books assemble themselves in Photoshop. Pictures are taken before I can press the shutter.

The next day I read on the porch, walked to a taco truck, and napped next to my cats in a room we’ve somehow managed to make feel a little more like home.

When Duncan’s work day is done, we get in the car and run some errands, picking up cat food and more film for my Polaroid. He shows me the neighborhood he stayed with a coworker in last summer—a sprawling suburb where most people who work on base settle.

Another vision of the future comes to view of a house among many in the woods with plastic siding and a concrete porch. There’s a lawn to be mowed, groceries to be procured, and children to be reared. And while I do think I want all those things, the thought of that actually happening feels overwhelming.

We looked to see if we could live on the water, but most of those houses go for millions. The idyllic dream of sitting on a porch writing novels and designing seams to fall to this.

So I cried in a new-age tap house in a strip mall with tiki paper cutouts strung from the ceiling as my husband holds my hand. I look at the group of women sitting at a high-top chatting over appetizers as a game and Big Bang Theory play on multiple screens.

“I never envisioned this kind of life for myself,” I told my husband as two baskets of chicken fingers were placed in front of us.

He squeezed my hand and held my gaze. “It would only be two years,” he said, “Or not at all. We are committed to nothing but each other.”

I laugh, remembering that I have a tendency to get ahead of myself, hoping to glean a future from three weeks of subletting a room on a small patch of land.

I thank Duncan for pulling me back to earth as he always does. We finish our meal talking about the psychology of Superman before going back to our home for the next three weeks.

So now I sit, about to make myself a peanut butter sandwich remembering that I only need to give what I can. Because I know that the people I love and the water below my feet will give what they can right back.