A couple of weeks ago, I posted pictures on social media of
a camping trip my husband and I took here in the Northwest. It is situated in an old growth forest next
to a rushing river. Everything, except for the cleared tent, fire pit, and
picnic table areas, was covered in soft, green moss, including the tree trunks
and the bumpy ground. It’s one of the
first things I noticed and fell in love with about the Northwest…the lush
greenness of the landscape year round.
It’s quite a change from where I lived just 2 years ago on a small
island halfway between Hawaii and Australia.
Usually, the first months of a major life change are rough
to say the least, but I remember my initial days living on Kwajalein very
fondly. I did not work for 7+ months
after arriving, so I had plenty of time to get to know and enjoy the island
lifestyle. I quickly found my favorite spot, the white, plastic lounge chairs molded
into a permanently reclining position situated behind the 8-foot fence at the
adult pool. These chairs faced the ocean
side of the island where strong winds and crashing waves were the norm for a
majority of the year. This was good because it kept the flies away and made the
constant wet blanket of humidity a little easier to handle. I loved it so much
because the time I spent there smoothed out my transition from AL to the
Marshall Islands and from young adult to adult.
It’s the place where I sought out solace and found peace with my new
life, even while missing my old one. You see, I could sit out back with a book
(after a relaxing swim in the saltwater pool on the other side of the fence, of
course), and I could write, pray, cry, sing, read, study, or simply soak up the
sun in COMPLETE privacy. No one could hear me over the roar of the waves, and
during the work day, you rarely had anyone join you back there because it was
too windy or too hot for most to hang out for long. Over time, it became a reminder that life is
in constant motion and change is inevitable. I watched the tides come in and flow out again.
I saw the changes to the shoreline over the years after storms or erosion took
effect. I also dove in the lagoon waters on the other side of the island and
experienced how life is reborn on the WWII ships and planes dumped after the
battles. It is the first time I remember really connecting changes in nature to
changes in life.
Even though living stateside and in the Northwest IS, in
many ways, the complete opposite of life on a remote island in the Pacific
Ocean, there are ways the two are connected, just like nature and life are
intertwined. For example, hiking in the old growth forests of WA took me back
to diving on the forgotten ships and planes deep below the waves. As we walked
past tree root systems upturned where ferns and various mosses are thriving
after decay killed the tree, I thought of the lionfish making homes in the
bridge of the ships at the bottom of the ocean floor. When we admired the
ability of an aging, fallen tree to provide nutrients for its seedlings and
become a nurse log for the last decades of its own life, I thought of the coral
that attaches itself to the wings of downed planes providing a hang out for anemones,
fish, and other sea life. And it all
brings me back to the major life changes that seem to come about every couple
of decades for me. I consider them my “about face” moments because they are 180
degree changes. Just like the old plane becomes an underwater sanctuary for new
sea life, and the aging tree becomes a nurse log for new forest growth, I too,
change and find a new purpose, a new way of living.
Change in life is inevitable, but it is also still
intricately connected with our life before, even if it looks totally different
on the outside. Because of where life takes us, the bottom of the sea, the
forest floor, or a tropical island far from home, new opportunities present
themselves. The coral dust floating by the forgotten plane now has something to
attach to where they was nothing but sand before. The fallen tree provides nutrients
to seedlings previously stuck on the ground in the dark. The broken girl meets
a boy from the NW and falls in love with both. When life deals you a rotten
hand, new life will emerge out of the ashes of the old one like the colorful
coral that grows from the sunken ship’s port holes lying in the sand or the
beautiful, bright green ferns and strong, branches emerging from the fallen
Western Hemlock on the bottom of the forest floor. You just have to embrace the “about face”
moments as they come and grow from where you landed after the fall.
