When I started this newsletter in August, I had high hopes for crafting regular posts as a way of documenting our lives during this period of transition. Taylor and I both value this opportunity to capture and share our experiences as we made the decision to sell our house, downsize to a short-term rental, and begin taking tangible steps towards our “tiny living” dreams for the future.
We knew that much was going to change…and, oof, change it did.
I’ve been wanting to sit down to write—to process and acknowledge all that’s happened since then—and to offer an update on our progress towards plans for tiny living. But to be honest, I just haven’t know where to start. In the six months since my last post, our world has shattered and shifted and tessellated in so many ways (both anticipated and unexpected) that it’s been difficult to figure out how to even describe or sum it all up in a single cohesive “catch up” post.
And then, the other day, I read a piece of writing that resonated deeply and offered up a word to describe what the experience of the past few months has felt like: rupture.
This feels so intensely like a new season of life for us, both by choice and by chance, but what the past few months have clarified is that we will undoubtedly look back on this moment in our lives as the awkward teetering between “life before” and “life after.”
So much of what we define ourselves by has been broken apart: in the relocation of our home and home base, the revision of my identities as defined by my work and relationships, our sense of our own health and recognition of the fragility of life.
We’ve leaned into rupture in ways with intention: disturbing the known entity of our home, way of living, and work with a desire for change and drive to build something new. We’ve felt rupture in painful and destabilizing ways, too, through grief and loss and the traumatic experiences of caregiving, mourning a parent, and feeling our hearts and our health ripped apart. But we’ve also welcomed generative elements of rupture in the spaces we’ve created for newness and potential, in the birth of a healthy and much-beloved nephew, and the first coming signs of the rebirth of spring.
By month, and in brief:
September 2022 - We sold our dream home in St. Paul, after 5 years of making it ours.
October 2022 - We intentionally downsized and signed a short-term apartment lease in Vadnais Heights, the community where I grew up and where my family lives.
November 2022 - Taylor and I both got really sick. Taylor threw his neck out (a multiple-week ordeal) and I got simultaneous strep, tonsillitis, and a sinus infection. Both were stark reminders of the fragility of our own wellbeing and forced us to take things one day at a time.
December 2022 - My dad died, exactly 3 years and 78 days after his initial diagnosis with Stage Four lung cancer, having never smoked a day in his life. 3 years and 76 days after our wedding. 3 years and 62 days after Taylor’s dad Randy also passed away, suddenly and unexpectedly. I got the chance to speak at my dad’s memorial service, which was perhaps the hardest and most meaningful thing I’ve ever done. Nothing will ever be the same.
Late December 2022 - We flew to Scottsdale, AZ to spend a week with Taylor’s mom, sister, brother-in-law, and our two nieces and two nephews. Our holiday gift to one another—in addition to the time with family—was two nights in Sedona, where we ate well, slept in, went on long hikes, built rock cairns in honor of our beloved dads, and grieved through movement and reflection in nature.
January 2023 - We welcomed our sweet nephew Liam Michael (named after his grandfathers William and Mike), the first child of my sister Annie and her husband Corey. Liam has been our bright light in a dark time.
February 2023 - I quit my job. Overwhelmed by a crushing workload and untenable circumstances, feeling burnt out and betrayed by another institution taking advantage of people who will do the work (for too little compensation, with not enough support, at their own cost) because they care deeply about the mission and know it needs to be done. I’m currently doing some independent consulting and continuing to bake.
Late Feb. 2023 - We bought flash sale tickets to Tahiti and spend nine days exploring paradise, decompressing in nature, and soaking up the glorious sunshine and color.
Taylor and I are still talking and dreaming about what comes next for us and how we can move towards a smaller, simpler lifestyle and home. But this period of movement and planning has been punctuated by rupture in all of its forms: loss, grief, birth and new beginnings, stepping away and pulling back.
Like the tentative spring buds, I feel as if we are finally reemerging after a long hard winter, reconnecting with friends, and reimagining what our next few months will look like. We are putting the pieces back together and we’ll get back to sharing updates as we continue to move forward.
Much love, Laura and Taylor