This past Friday afternoon, I sat in circle with women on the beach in Santa Monica. All strangers. I’d answered an invitation in my inbox from a virtual circle I’d attended when my skin felt like it was being peeled off and I was desperate to reground, to find somewhere that felt like home again. I was on the East Coast then, facing the end of a certain part of motherhood, the abrupt ending of something I treasured. I’d packed up my home, put everything in storage and left my hometown drenched in grief.
The last circle of women I’d sat in had been arranged by my friend at her home as a bon voyage gathering for me with the women I’d stitched my life to as a mother. The women who’d been there when my parents died, when divorce and addiction ripped the fabric of my suburban life. The women who’d cooked for each other when we had babies, or miscarriages or funerals. The ones whose milestone birthdays we celebrated. Whose kids we’d watched kids so one of us could eat a sandwich in peace somewhere for an hour. Thirty years of mothering together at different points with each of them, linked by our children.
I’d chosen to move away. I couldn’t fathom being left behind. I couldn’t bear the empty space where they’d all been. I didn’t feel like I belonged there anymore, a single woman with grown children. I didn’t feel like I belonged anywhere really. This particular transition, although inevitable, felt especially devastating.
I forced myself go, hoping for something resembling connection. Fourteen women arrived, most of them strangers to each other, all ages, all cultures, all called that day to come together. Prior to making our way across the sand, we didn’t know that we’d take turns talking about belonging. We took turns, holding the “talking stick,” like I’d done with my daughters Girl Scout troop, telling our stories. A time when we felt like we didn’t belong, or did belong or what belonging meant to us individually. It wasn’t a time for feedback or advice giving. Only hands on hearts or fingers snaps to say, “yes, me too,” or “I feel that, I feel you.”
I left questioning the idea of belonging, the nature of it, the ache for it. When we first opened the circle, Radiohead lyrics played over and over in my head, “what the hell am I doing here? I don’t belong here.”
Those women made me think otherwise.
What if you do though, just belong here, belong everywhere?