Goodbyes

There are a million different ways to say goodbye. Some goodbyes are casual, over-the-shoulder affairs. Some are teary, heart hammering whispers forced through clenched throats. Some goodbyes really aren't said, but are delivered silently on the wind to their unknowing recipients. Some feel surprisingly relieving. Some leave us with a lot to think about in the time to come.

.
I will cover the whole spectrum of goodbyes in the next couple weeks.
.

In 13 days, I will climb into my car in the early hours of Saturday morning after carefully checking that my red kayak is securely fastened to the roof. That will be my last physical act taken with my feet still planted on the ground in Yellowknife. Then I'll hop in the car as if it were a time capsule ready for lift-off, and take a big breath, hoping enough air gets past the big lump in my throat. I'll put the gear in reverse, wave goodbye, and head down the neighborhood road in the direction I always do when I am on my way to work. But at the last intersection, I will take a different path. I'll turn left on the highway instead of right this time, and I will follow that highway down for over 1,000 kms before I take any other significant turns.

.

I will travel under the vast open skies of the North, through an endless expanse of wilderness. I'll see buffalo, coyote, and fox. I'll think about the only other time that I've driven that road, which was four years ago in the very same car, on the way up. I will have a lot of time to think while I'm alone in that car. But then, I don't really consider that I'll be alone. I'll be with a whole lot of people in my mind; all the people I've come to know in four years, including a few special ones that I would call true friends.

.

Thinking of leaving Yellowknife brings me sadness, and I'm not sure why. I never fell in love with this place. I've tried to appreciate its rugged, barren wasteland appeal, but it didn't really shine for me. Perhaps a few times last summer when I biked up the highway, the landscape sang for me while I listened to the wind in the grass and saw the sun in the trees. But mostly the magic was hidden like a secret to this little west-coaster. And a couple of the jobs I took here felt more like doing hard time, paying some kind of karmic penance for evils done in a past life (what a tyrrant I must have been). For the first time in my life, I became chronically ill, and for a prolonged period of time. There are a list of shortcomings I found in this dusty, dry little town, but I don't intend to indulge in them. When I drive away, I will probably think about some of them, but I will also think of what I've learned and how I'm going to use it to move forward. I will think of it as a rite of passage in my life. A passage into what will become more clear to me in time.

.

I know that by my second day of driving, the departure from my driveway will already seem like a world away. All the tears I've cried will have been spent over the course of the first 700 kms on the day before. On the second day, when I hop into my car, I'll be ready to enter into another phase of my life. I'll have closed the old door. I'll be walking through a new one. It might feel like breathing air for the first time.