9 shells

The 6 month rental in Lerkenlund is over and we are back in our Hull Bay neighborhood. Coqui frogs sing through the evening until dawn, bats flit across a sunset sky, pelicans breach the point in pods and solitude. The roar of the seasonal surf is our own sound machine. A pale blue sky has more density with less Saharan dust. Fleeting breezes tease the senses.

Finding a rental on St. Thomas with two dogs proved to be very challenging. One is at the mercy of landlords and inventory, generators and air conditioning, caveats and extra deposits, let alone facing another transition, finding another place to settle. But this new spot welcomes us in a way the other rental never did. Northwest light, fruit trees and traveling palms, green grass. The gratitude in finding this place runs deep.

For our move, I was the base camp leader and Dave was the sherpa. I packed and unpacked, Dave loaded and unloaded. Our dynamic rhythm of uprooting and planting proved a harmonious balance, our yin and yang energies relying upon and appreciating each other's skills. A week in, we nest at 3-3 Hull Bay for the next 7 months with Cybil and Margo; 36 potted plants and trees; a stationary bike and a treadmill; my writing desk with files, journals, bills and birth certificates; all of our clothes for Caribbean living and elsewhere; sheets & towels; personal hygene products; jewelry; food, spices and oils; insulated cups and melamine plates; pet food & dog beds; and then those personal items that make you feel like you're living in your own home, even when you're just borrowing one- our books, paintings, puzzles, photos, tchotckes, games, crystals and candles. (We can thank my Taurus moon for all of these objets.)

Pre-move, I counted how many times we've moved in the last 4 years. 9 times. 9 relocations. 9 homesteads, since Covid, from Connecticut to Martha's Vineyard to St. John to St. Thomas. Each displacement has been a choice and an effort. A reconciling of what is needed and what needs to be released. What is expanding and contracting. Like the folds of an accordion, our family flexes apart and comes together in whatever size house we land.

As Dave and I shed and grow, while the kids launch towards adulthood and continue to call wherever we live home, I can't help but think we are getting closer to a magical ore (or, on some days, the brink of insanity). In our dance of lift offs and landings, perhaps, we are crafting a nectar that feeds our dreams and sense of adventure, our desires for security and harmony. With each hauling and discarding, we continue to build something sacred, sifting through the evolving ingredients to make wherever we live feel like home, as a couple, as a spread out family, as nomads who follow their own North Star.

Supposedly, an adult hermit crab lives in 9 shells through out its lifetime. 9 homes, 9 growth spurts, 9 events of extreme vulnerability to molt, release the ill-fitting shell and find one that fits. Maybe the hermit crab should be Dave's and my totem spirit animal? His traits of being resourceful, scavenging, finding comfort, belonging somewhere, calculating next moves, patience, socially aware and communicative definitely resonate. We've assuredly gone through times when things just didn't fit right, when we knew we needed a change and yet fear kept us frozen. And there were times when we shot before we aimed- when things moved too fast and we felt unprepared, too exposed without shelter. Oh, the anxiety the crab must feel when he's outgrown one shell and needs a new one... but, the fact remains, he must risk the exposure to survive, to thrive.

I'm not saying that this last move was easy, but it did seem to take less effort. There were friends who helped and there were buffer days to cart our things to their new landing spot. There was one destination instead of both a house and a storage unit. Other than sleep challenges and one twinge of my back that slowed me down, I think this move had some grace to it. Whether it's considering the delicate cross-hatched tracks on the beach made by the dainty and resilient hermit crab or looking back at our tracks from the last 4 years, or the span of my 49, the trails all lead somewhere and they all take us to here and now. The zig zags and the straight lines, the ups and the downs, the bumps and turn arounds. The truth is I am home, wherever I am.

With love from The Rock (aka St. Thomas),

St. Sunshine