As I write this, I am sitting on the floor of my apartment, in the spot where my table used to be. The table sits in a storage unit in SoHo, with most of my other belongings.
For the first time in hours, I am alone. There is still work to do, and I need to eat, to hydrate, to sleep.
But first, gratitude.
For 13 years, these walls held space for me. Through great hopes and disappointments, triumphs and tragedy, love and loss.
This space saw me through several careers, relationships, breakups, health scares, and heartbreaks. These walls witnessed my most intense moments of anger and my greatest joys.
Three nephews and two nieces entered my life while I lived in this space. A parade of friends from around the world took shelter here as they passed through New York. Some for a night, others for a month.
In this space, I hosted some nights of revelry, and intimate circle. I danced. I laughed. I shouted. And I cried.
These walls have held space for flow of all types, from rivers of tears to a gushing of words.
From this space, I watched as buildings around me were torn down and rebuilt, more beautiful than before. The neighborhood around me evolved. And I, with it.
13.5 years ago, I entered the adventure to owning my first home planning to stay for 5 years. I was turning 30 when I signed the contract, and assumed that by 35 I would be married and ready to move on to something better.
Life doesn’t always deliver what we expect or assume. That hasn’t yet been my fate.
But somewhere along the way, I stopped expecting it. In this space, I learned to be whole and complete in myself. I learned that the shape of the space and the location matter much less than how you fill the space and who you welcome to it.
And I learned that what truly makes a home is not found in walls and floors but rather emanates from within.
Standing in the emptiness, it feels full with the life that was lived here, the emotions that were felt. The growth that was witnessed.
In this space, I built a life, and a home.
This space held space for me, through all of it.
If these walls could talk, they would tell you that they are just walls, just witnessed. The home I built here is within me. It is the life in my soul and in my body, it is the life I live with my friends, my family, the people I love and those who love me.
I couldn’t imagine a better home than that.
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