Lonely Newcomer Syndrome
Driving along the South Shore of Nova Scotia yesterday near Lunenberg, I stared out at the cars filling the highway at rush hour and my oldest blurted out that she loved our life.
“We have a great adventure every day mom. Nova Scotia is the best place ever.”
It seemed like the appropriate moment for that revelation. We’d just spent a fun couple of days tooling up and down the South Shore from the Acadian villages of Pubnico to wool mills, beaches, UFO Museums and lots of ice cream with friends from Vancouver who are spending a summer out here. Returning to Halifax all sandy, exhausted and hopped up on mosquito repellant meant lots of smiles and some seriously fun summer memories.
More than one or two summers zoomed by without much acknowledgement in our oldest daughter’s life. She has worked booths. Taken farm tours. Spent a whole lot of time with me on the job site. But, I have hardly been present for her until this summer. While I know I should be in the office – really should be in the office – her face, the absolute joy and love of having her parents fully engaged with her exploring this new world together is irreplaceable. Whenever someone asks us to adventure with them, we simply go.
For her, it’s the thrill of looking behind her on the path and seeing mom and dad right there. For me, it is the only way to curb the abject loneliness.
I’m used to being the person in the know, connecting folks who are new and finding their legs, showing tiny legs the path and finding familiar faces with warm smiles at every turn. One of the most intense and emotionally nuts parts of moving a zillion miles from familiarity – even to a place as charming and friendly as Halifax – is that first year when play dates and friends, a sense of self and place and comfort constantly stands about 100 paces away from anyplace you find yourself. It teases you – like it wants to wrap you up and give you some love, but not right now.
My preference in life is to be in full go mode anyway. But, lately, lonely newcomer syndrome rules my world. No adventure to be overlooked for the sheer sake of not sitting around in the quiet of our unfamiliar house in our unfamiliar neighborhood lamenting being alone.
Really, though, I want to think that no one would blame me.
It’s summer. The kids are out of school. Day care is a distant dream. The time for friend-making and settling in will come as soon as the vibrant September sun brings school days, schedules and sweater weather. I think about baking bread for the neighbors. Setting up a craft space in the back yard. We make daily walks to score local meat from a farmer who sells at Alderney Landing, hit the library, say hello at the folks who pop up on our regular route.
But, the wall of strangers taking in the sights on the Halifax Wharf or walking around open-mouthed at Peggy’s Cove seems so much simpler to process than the work of discovering and cultivating new friendships right now.
I mean, I have friends.
Yes, the ones I would call for a beer are generally 6,500 K from our wee bungalow. But, I linger in that strange ether with them – lonely and wishing making a new life for ourselves was easier.
Meanwhile, our oldest daughter is busting tail to bloom where she is planted. This lack of companion thing is SOOOOO not going to work for her and she’ll stop to talk with anyone who looks even close to her age and willing to goof off with her for an hour or two. The wee one seems to be in the same mode.
I so admire that about them as I would love to feel even remotely capable of slowing down long enough to complete a conversation with a potential new friend. I want to tell Mhari when she is so missing her friends in Comox that it’s OK to live in her head for a while. But, if she’d find me there – writing books, chatting with my pals, trying to remove myself from the angst of not knowing how to navigate much of anything right now – she’d find me feeling so very blue.
That’s why that inner world gets a straight arm from me holding it at bay. We’re busy figuring out how to literally navigate the outer world. Every trip in the car, every new inch of highway, city road or sidewalk covered means another space to check off my list – it’s a list that has no purpose right now other than that eventually it will not exist because I won’t feel like I NEED to physically walk or drive or ride along a path in order to know my way.
I’m determined to make friends with the loneliness and change it into loveliness along the way – one classic summer event filled with strangers and strange places after another.
Category: INSPIRED ACTION, Mom & Dad, On Motherhood
About the Author (Author Profile)
Robin Rivers is Our Big Earth’s Publisher and Sr. Partner. Able to survive on coffee alone. Often can be found leaping tall buildings with the help of great friends. Predisposed to odd hats and the color orange. In love with imagination, her kids and that crazy guy who married her.Subscribe
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I miss you too!
It will get better, Robin! I know of the amazing things you did in the Comox Valley. It’s only a matter of time before your full-go-mode nature grows roots in your new community. Don’t ‘they’ say it takes a year to really settle into a new place, make the routines, dial familiar phone numbers? We’re all excited to see how time plays out for you and your family in Nova Scotia. It will be worth this bit of loneliness
It will come, Robin, but I know this feeling all too well. I’ve heard from others that Nova Scotia, for all it’s cozy warmth, was hard to root in and find a tribe. But if anyone cn do it, you can. Sorry it feels rough right now, though:(
I have to say that when I saw you were moving again I wanted to scream “don’t do it!”. You have friends and connections and a perceived sence of self. All the thing I have struggled with and longed for with every move. I wanted to find out how you find it in yourself to do it again. We are looking to do it again and every voice inside me is screaming NO! I have loved seeing your adventures since the move and they have made me feel that maybe I actually could do it one more time. The wonder in investigating a new area and trying to find out how to fold yourself into its fabric. But I so appreciate your honest account that makes me feel less crazy about our situation and makes me feel like my personal fight for Me right now is so common among many women. Enjoy your beautiful family!
Blessings,
Kat
Miss you too my friend:) Cheers to changing ‘loneliness to loveliness’…..big hugs from this coast to yours:) xo
I can honestly say I know those feelings very well. I went from spending my days surrounded by other mums in my little shop (super comfortable and fun! Requiring 0 effort to be social!) to knowing one other mum/friend in Calgary, with no way to really connect with new people over the summer. I call that period “mommy dating”: where you are looking to find new friends, but also have to consider if your kids will get along. And it came with that weird geeky feeling when asking for someone’s number :s. But I gotta tell you, I am way more of a recluse, and less of an adventurer than you, without nearly as many fun adventures in our new home under my belt as you even now, and it did get better. And the joy of finding new friends, and other like-minded souls is really great and rewarding after that lonely mommy time. It’s nice to talk to a grown up once in awhile
This little beautiful film ‘How to Be Alone’ is hard to apply to mothers in some ways but it does address the idea of embracing your inner world for a time…You might have seen it before; it’s lovely and shot in Halifax. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k7X7sZzSXYs
Here’s hoping you settle into your rhythm soon.
I really enjoy how you write Robin
And i totally agree, kids are so lucky and uncomplicated…Mauri is extra special too….as adults we build so many rules about how we “have to behave” within ourselves, and it is strange and wonderful to free ourselves and get a clean slate to start over!
Im just on the verge of changing my life big time, so i often think of that saying that sometimes we need to jump, and build our wings on the way down…ha ha ha
Hey there Robin, GREAT WRITING, first of all.Really Wonderful! Secondly,I can relate. The kids keep you going,cause you have NO choice, and that’s “a Good thing” If you don’t miss someone, or something, then you haven’t loved, Either.It’ll be ok, it really will.One day, without you noticing, you will find your balance,until then , slow and steady, wins the race. I love all the old cliche’s , cause they’re true. We miss you all, I’m sure the Comox Valley REALLY does. Your family contributed SO much here, you made it a Better Place.Really. I love to travel, but I love my Home. You just have more than one “Home” to Love, and that’s also “A Good Thing”.Kiss the girls for me. Give yourself a Hug , and Ken, he probably is feeling the “blue’s’ too. Like , who wouldn’t? I’m in Courtenay.(it’s a good thing too) hee hee. You go Girl!
Hi, My mom sent me a link to your site months ago, largely to intice my family to move to the comox valley- from Halifax! we are now living in montreal (baby steps west), and I am missing all my mommy friends in halifax. I think you will find amazing people very quickly. having moved all over the country,I found the people there so easy to engage with and really easy to develop relationships with. There are lots of home school families around, often at the library, and I am so jealous you get those farmers’ markets!!
good luck!