What are my roots? If you’d asked me this at different times, I’d have given different answers. I guess the fact that those answers change show that my roots don’t anchor me like they maybe should.
This week, even more than usual, I feel adrift. I feel insubstantial and unrooted. There are many reasons for this and I try not to let them define me – it’s hard though. Without roots, I feel as though I am a ghost of an image in the lives of others. A temporary presence rather than part of a structure.
We moved around the country during my childhood. Not a million times but enough and into very established communities that ensured I was always the different one, the newcomer, the one who hadn’t been there at the beginning. I’m quietly envious of people who have friendships with people from their childhoods into their adulthood. I was too temporary in my friends lives for that.
It’s more than that though. Other people move and set down roots into networks and become permanently anchored. I didn’t learn how to do that. I was groomed from such a young age that I learnt to be separate. To be not included and to keep an emotional shield between myself and others. It’s unfortunately very easy to do and it’s unfortunately very hard to change from doing it. The only place that I do feel as if I belong is my family. The small world of myself and my children is so utterly right. We inhabit all of the spaces in that world and none of us hide. None of us are faded images flickering in front of others. I am very lucky to have this world. I am also lucky to be in a relationship with a man who I believe wants me. It’s still not easy for me to feel those roots but I am learning to trust that they are there.
Since my Dad died, two years ago this week, I have been more aware of not having roots. There is a distance between myself and my Mother. I avoid making demands, requests or revealing myself. I’m also struggling with lots of aspects of social media. Not least because I don’t appear to belong. The things that seem to resonate with and stir others don’t work for me. I’m clearly not that type of sub, that kind of woman, that kind of person. I feel more and more that my life is a part of a different jigsaw to the others I see and that stops me fitting. Maybe instead of part of the forest with strong roots, I am the mistletoe, clustered in the branch – tolerated but not really belonging. Instead of being rooted anywhere, my roots are wrapped around me. They are part of me, held fast to me by my resilience and woven around my core strengthening me.
I love mistletoe. When I see it in the trees it lifts my soul. I’ve tried planting it in the crook of an apple tree in my garden but it wants none of it. It is feircely independent and insists on finding its own way. It flourishes on its own terms in the hardest places, and we gather it into our homes where it is the very emblem of love. You may lack roots, but you have your own special way. You lift my soul.
So was about to leave comment about how wonderful mistletoe is, that is a rare beauty which only grows where it wants to be and that we bring it into our homes as a symbol of love and passion…. but I see 19syllables already said it and I think she is right to compare you to something so resilient and yet delicate.
Mollyx
I totally agree with what the two ladies said. You bring love and smiles to people’s lives, and that’s something so special, just as special as a mistletoe 🙂
I always joke that my parents were like nomads, never living in one place for longer than 4 years. I was like that too in my adult life, until I met Master T. I have now been living in the same place for 14 years and that really IS a record! I think I have finally rooted…
Rebel xox
What is difficult for us or hurts us often strengthens us too. My roots left me with a disconnect so I very much understand how you feel x
I found myself nodding along with so many parts of your post. I often think my roots don’t look they same as other peoples, and what makes them feel like they ‘belong’ just passes me by. I love your mistletoe analogy, and I think it was amplified by the comment made by 19syllables. This was a wonderful post x
I completely understand this, yet have no real reason to as I came from a big, loving family with it’s roots. What others have said about mistletoe resonates, perhaps that is about family etc. But also about you. Thanks for sharing xx
I can’t relate to your unrooted childhood, as once I came to England things were very consistent. It seems you have laid new roots with your current family though, which I am pleased to see.
I do relate to how you feel on social media, very much. I actually think that is one of the things a lot of us have in common – the feeling that we don’t fit in.
Aurora x