The Quest for Community, Led by Heart — #3
A story of comfort and love triggering personal scrutiny on our vagabond adventure spirit, and new friends serendipitously leading me to trust our path.
Sitting in my navy blue rental Kia Sportage in the parking lot of Sunset Park, I ended a quick conversation with Ryan, who had called to check in on me.
“I’m here. They should be any minute, too. I’ll call you on the way to our Airbnb. Thank you. Love you!”
With a heavy sigh, I placed my phone in my lime green Patagonia hip pack, cracked the window and closed my eyes. The weeks leading up to this moment were full of anticipatory excitement, but also an anxious heaviness of worry and overwhelm—I made it here, please let this be a good experience, I half prayed and said encouragingly to myself.
The park was full of trees and a variety of little-kid and big-kid playground equipment, most of which was covered with giant shades to protect children from the intense Arizona sunshine. Sedona’s red rock formations could be seen in every direction, beneath a partly cloudy December sky. It was the perfect spot to meet up and kick off a long weekend with a best friend and her three-year-old daughter, who calls me Auntie Lew Lew in admiration.
Meghan, who I’ve known as a close friend since our first day of kindergarten, lives in Minnesota, but half an hour from the street we both grew up on in rural western Wisconsin. We’ve remained friends and have somehow become closer than ever after my move to Colorado and now Oregon, mostly thanks to the ease of connection through long-winded video chat recordings using the Marco Polo app. Our never-ending conversations, usually shared with another close friend from St. Croix Central Elementary School, have been a years-long everyday blast from the past that has evolved into a chosen sisterhood.
When Ryan and I moved to Colorado, Leo had just turned five years old and Meghan was pregnant with her daughter, Harper. I remember feeling a sense of sadness that I wouldn’t be there as a part of her life to fully participate in her growing up, but also knew we could have a unique relationship from afar.
Leo, despite his diagnosed genetic disorder and the laundry list of differences to other children his age, was always simply “Leo” to Ryan and I, as we avoided the daunting and obvious comparisons. Witnessing Harper grow up from a baby to a toddler to a vibrant little girl—while Leo stayed a perpetual infant—was amazing as it was, at times, heartbreaking for me. While Ryan and I gave Leo an incredible life, (as he also did for us), there were daggers to the heart while getting a front row seat, even virtually, to Harper’s growth and expansion of hitting milestones Leo could not reach, and we wouldn’t get to experience with him as parents. These moments were few and far between, especially once she seemingly overnight evolved into a little girl who ran and easily chatted up a storm, leaving Leo developmentally in the dust.
The warranted pangs of jealousy were natural, maybe even healthy, and went away for years— until Ryan and I were tossed into the grief-stricken stages of coping with Leo’s untimely, unexpected death. Those who have experienced deep grief know that, while it may start out as a blanket of intense sadness, it turns into a cyclical myriad of feelings that can harshly pop up out of nowhere. To me, my “grief mind” is separate from the grounded, articulate, kind and thoughtful person I was before experiencing the unimaginable, unnatural loss of my son. The difficult feelings, much like the ones of jealousy followed by guilt and shame I would experience when Harper was a toddler, now violently bubble up without trigger or warning.
In our daily lives—especially since moving from our beloved neighborhood in Fort Collins, Colorado, where we were constantly exposed to young children playing in the giant shared green-space, just steps outside our courtyard and seen through the large picture window of our home—there are not many experiences that involve kids. It has felt easier this way, shielding our tender hearts for the time-being, yet knowing we won’t always want it this way.
While we miss the proximity to connecting with neighbors who became close friends, thanks to thoughtful planning and design including front porches, sidewalks and shared green-spaces; our current townhome on a quiet street, with a secluded balcony versus a yard, suits our situation in grief well. While lonely at times, it feels overall cozy, surrounded by towering moss-covered pines, and kind-but-distant neighbors going about their lives without much interest in ours. Knowing that Portland is our first Pacific Northwestern stepping-stone in a series of ones to come, in hopes of landing in a community we cherish, our current home feels right where we’re meant to be.
Meghan and Harper pulled up in their white Toyota rental car and we walked down to the playground, with Harper’s eyes immediately lit up at the sight of the swings and slides. Meghan and I hugged as Harper ran on her tippy-toes toward the swings. My under-the-surface worry was mostly washed away; however, I did wonder to myself how spending 24/7 with someone other than Ryan, with a rambunctious child in tow, for the upcoming three days would unfold.
Their initial plans involved traveling with another mutual friend to Phoenix and then Sedona for a couple days, to which I mentioned being playfully envious of their opportunity to visit Sedona. Meghan simply responded with an enthusiastic, “you should come!” Expressing just enough interest, but feeling in the back of my mind I’d stay close to home in my comfort zone, my bluff was called when our mutual friend needed to cancel. Given that they already had an adorable and conveniently located Airbnb reservation, I just needed to book a flight.
Having a couple hours to burn at the playground before we could check-in was like wading into a pool from the shallow end. Since moving to Portland, and overall since Leo’s passing, I haven’t spent much time with friends, or anyone besides Ryan, in person—let alone close friends who have known me for a lifetime. I was comfortable, yet maybe a bit awkward, knowing feelings associated with grief could be lurking around the corner. I was the same person she’s always known, but also not. We caught up on how their travel had been thus far, my flight and debacle renting my car, what our husbands were up to back home, and eventually the weather (considering Arizona is quite the change of pace from Minnesota and Oregon in the winter), as Harper gleefully went up and down the slides.
We drove in our separate cars to finally check into our home for the next few days. Noticing the sun was just under an hour before setting, I opted to get out for a solo sunset hike at a nearby trailhead before dinner. Prior to the trip, I hoped and planned for the necessity of potential alone time to buffer, decompress and touch in with my heart—boundaries and self-compassion being a priority. The delight of setting foot onto a new trail brings me close to Leo without fail, as new trails were always his favorites. Crunching gravel below my feet with the red rocks in the distance and the potential promise of a famous colorful Arizona sunset hung in the balance of heavy clouds on the horizon.
Opening the door to our Airbnb—a colorful desert-themed open concept style, including an impressive view of Thunder Mountain—a children’s yoga show was on the TV, while Meghan and Harper were playing on their mats in matching Christmas themed pajamas.
“I left your’s on your bed, if you want to join in! Ryan said he’d thought you’d find it fun. No pressure, though!”
In all my mental planning, matching pajamas did not cross my mind. The allure of my intentionally packed soft cowl neck Prana brand “cozy up” sweatshirt, paired with equally cozy jogger pants, could always be given into at home. Matching pajamas awkwardly felt like something a family would do, but maybe that was the point of Meghan’s thoughtful purchase.
I wore the pajamas. Harper and I played countless games of hide and seek, where surprisingly she wanted me to hide most of the time, encouraging me to jump out from behind doors and shower curtains to scare her. They joined me in my commitment to early-morning sunrise hikes—even hitting the trail to the birthing cave in the dark, allowing us to welcome the morning sun from high in the cave. I shared my favorite place in Sedona with them, the Buddhist Peace Park, somewhere sacred in my heart I planned to only visit alone. Instead, I found Harper reaching for my hand as we walked along the trails adorned with peace flags. We shopped for souvenirs. And played more games of hide and seek.
When it was time to part ways after one last sunrise hike at Bell Rock, we were all sad but ready. Meghan and Harper headed back to Phoenix to catch their midday flight and I had the remainder of the day to myself in Sedona.
The weather was less than ideal, with chilly air and thick cloudy skies that warned of rain at any given moment. I drove toward one of my favorite trailheads that we passed more than a handful of times at non-peak hours with a construction letterboard referencing the lot was full. Seeing this message displayed again, on an early Wednesday morning during icky Sedona-standard weather, I took a chance and drove down the windy road toward Cathedral Rock.
Throwback rap and R&B hits, courtesy of radio 101.1 The Bounce, bumped in the background, as I drove and reflected on the past few days with nostalgia. Loneliness has been an accepted negative tradeoff for the life we’ve chosen to live—first leaving our friends and family behind in Wisconsin, and eventually doing the same when escaping from our community in Colorado, which was now surrounded by the harsh reality of things that were and never would be again. I had forgotten how wonderful it feels to spend time in real life with loved ones who love unconditionally, and wondered for the first time in years if Ryan and I were just running away from the love and community we already had in other places. We spent many years unhappily living in Minnesota and Wisconsin, but I found myself wondering if it would be a worthwhile sacrifice returning to, given convenience in the established warmth of love and friendship? If not there, what about Colorado? Maybe the Pacific Northwest that we’ve fallen in love with was just meant to be temporary—not a true home—and we’re putting eggs in a basket that has a giant hole in the bottom.
Feelings of hopelessness and despair sat heavily on my heart as I jumped out of my car in the half-full trailhead lot, pacing forward through the slippery rock gulley and toward Cathedral Rock towering ahead. The vision of our last visit here came into view. It was a month after Leo’s passing and in a zombie state of shock, we spent a week van-camping in the snow-covered valley. We hiked along Cathedral Rock with the trail completely to ourselves, coated in a fresh dusting of powder—the wet red rocks turned to a dark rust, juxtaposed by sage green cactus and glistening white snow. Leo was on our minds, no one else was in sight, until a small pack of three coyotes trotted through the creek bed below. A now-familiar lightness to my heart was elicited as a sign of my sweet son’s presence.
This time I was met by a woman gifting poems as part of her birthday celebration, calling it her Poems2People Project. Feeling an immediate connection to her, we chatted about our mutual adventurous lifestyles. Cynthia told me of her professional days as an English teacher in California, turned to now years of boondock camping out of her truck in places all over the American West, and her eventual plan of building an earthen home outside of Sedona. I told her of our adventures with Leo, our current vagabond predicament of being lost on a trail that somehow also feels right, and an exciting upcoming writing publication. It started to rain, so I chose my poem, titled “The Peace of Wild Things” by Wendell Berry.
When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.
Through glassy eyes and many pauses, she gifted me this poem, beautifully recited from memory. I listened with streams of tears rolling down my cheeks—doing my best to at least somewhat keep my shit together amongst the many hikers who were now descending, due to the skies opening up with rain.
I thanked her, wished her the happiest of birthdays with gratitude that I could be part of her unique celebration, and exchanged email addresses to stay in touch—because we were obviously meant to serendipitously cross paths, sharing such kinship and experiencing a good mountainside cry together.
With the cloudy sky now turned into a steady rain, I cut my hike short and headed back toward town. On my casual quest for the perfect piece of jewelry to wear in Leo’s honor—as well as a cute placeholder until I stumble upon the piece—I popped into a local artisanal jewelry and crystal shop. I met the coolest young woman who had recently moved to Sedona. We chatted for a long while, as I meandered around the shop and she stood behind the display case counter. We connected over hiking, the magic of sunrises and sunsets, and the meaning of life. Before I left with a beautiful placeholder teardrop carnelian necklace, we followed each other on Instagram to stay in touch.
Smiling to myself, I wondered if my new friend would end up taking me up on my offer to show her around the Oregon Coast if/when she planned her at-the-moment highly anticipated first time visit to the Pacific Northwest, as I drove to Whole Foods for lunch. While waiting for a fresh vegan pizza to finish in the wood-fired oven, another local—also waiting for the pizza—started chatting with me as though we were long-time friends. Seeing me in my bright yellow flannel, topped with a Patagonia puffy vest, hat and hiking shoes, her immediate impression was that I was an Oregonian. We laughed at the fact that I was new to the PNW, but apparently pulling it off. She was also from Colorado, so we chatted about our favorite hiking trails and places to visit, and how Oregon and Arizona compared.
Walking out to my car, I felt a tinge of sadness that I literally made three new friends in the span of less than two hours—all of whom it would likely be years before I'd potentially spend time with in person again, if ever at all. This feeling quickly faded when I remembered how Leo likes to show up for us in unexpected ways. I feel these new friends were a breadcrumbs in evidence that Ryan and I can make community anywhere we truly want to, and I shouldn’t second-guess our intuition-led choices in leaving Wisconsin and Colorado. We’re on the right path, whether it’s leading us to a home here in the Pacific Northwest, or—who knows—maybe eventually Northern Arizona.
Every time I read one of your pieces I am struck by how perfect it is for where you are in your journey (or at least where you seem to be from an outsiders perspective). You don't mince words, it is what it is and that's what makes it so perfect. Thank you for sharing all of your feels Lewann, the world needs them. <3
Truly a once-in-a-lifetime trip to get to experience Sedona with you. Harper loves looking at pictures of "Auntie Lew Lew" (and talking about when I tripped with her in the Tula 🤦) and can't wait to meet again somewhere, sometime.
I don't think I heard the stories about the other people you met after we left! It makes me think of the Brandi Carlisle line "Wherever is your heart I call home" -- doesn't need to be a single place when there are connections to make all over this wide world.
P.S. And I would choose one of the Mary Oliver poems 😆
P.P.S. I forgot about her funny tiptoe run on that playground!