Dean Walters
Guest Writer
The editor of this magazine asked me to write about something huge that I am up to; ‘The Big Game’ was how he put it, and I took immediate exception to this expression, for I thought he was referring to my life as a trivial pursuit of the merely fun.
And, because he knows I just sold our home; and I am moving from a huge city – out from under the weight of a mortgage – to a small community away from my family and friends; where the wind is more prominent than cars and earth outscores concrete and asphalt, I could not accept this as a ‘Game’.
It’s too important to me.
This man knows that just two and half years ago, I left two decades of heavy, meaningful work to give my middle years an opportunity for health. I was disturbed that he might be thinking there is something ‘trivial’ to my days. Aren’t both changing jobs and moving ranked in the top five of the most-stressful life events people face? I am in risky business. It’s as overwhelming as the uncontrollable market forces I experienced in selling and buying a house.
Perhaps you can appreciate that I am a little angry that this move might be considered something someone might waste money on in a wager. But this is no ‘Game,’ this is my life. And why would moving away from all that makes up my life’s story be fun? You might say that I am sensitive and under stress by the prospects of ‘The Big Game.’
Still, my trust of the editor of this magazine runs the depth of my deepest parts; so I figured his asking me to write this article was inspired. When I find I am judgmental about a word I look to its etymology, or what a teacher of mine referred to as ‘the story of a word’s birth.’ There is an app for this and I found that ‘Game’ is rooted in the proto-Germanic ga which is a collective prefix; and in mann or ‘person,’ giving ‘game’ the sense of ‘people together.’
Bullseye! There are people together with me everywhere in this move. It was he, the editor of this magazine, who reached out after the demise of my men’s group in Atlas1 last summer, and put to me a little exercise to envision my life in the future.
This was a turning point, not a crap shoot, out from which this move to a new home grew. And everywhere I turn others are with me in this enormous risk. My wife, my children, my very elderly parents; my family, my friends, my ancestors, and even my not-yet-born grandchildren.
The men of the now-deceased group in Atlas gather with me on-line monthly, to bear witness to the unfolding of this story and to ask how I am. I tell them I am scared by this move, especially when the fears of not having enough for the future show up, which they do often.
I am scared that my daughter is moving in with her partner and I will be further away from her. I am scared that we will not be welcomed in our new neighborhood. I am worried for my wife being further away from family and me from my parents who need care. And I am sorrowed for leaving friends and a home and community I know as the back of my hand.
But, I am buoyed by joy, like the joy I feel knowing my grandfather loved fishing at the lakeside of our soon-to-be new home. And I feel awe at how life moves in ever greater concentric circles, because the local park has been a destination for Emancipation Day celebrations for over 200 years and recently it was revealed to me that I come from ancestors who enslaved people as chattel. And I am angry at the injustice of home ownership that is unattainable to many, and the racket of a real estate market where I am now solicited by moving companies I never told I was moving.
I am sleeping fitfully and taking too much caffeine. I am fearful of idealizing the new home and community at the expense of other areas of my life that need work and my attention.
There are contradictions swirling about, but I am never alone with these forces. People are with me. Asking me about this great move, providing me the way to tell the story of a kind of homecoming, so that it makes deep impressions on me and chisels me into the shape of my life that is claiming me; and shows me where I am soft, where I am hard, and that I am both.
And these forces are tempered by the people I play this ‘Game’ with; who are blowing on the flames of my heart, making consistent the inspiration for a vision taking shape. I am ready for where this enormous Game is taking me because I am supported, and I especially relish the parts that are fun.
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- ‘Atlas’ is the online division of of Mentor, Discover, Inspire ↩︎
