4. Life-altering Events

 

I rocked through a few more years – and a few more jobs. A sales position I loved ended abruptly six months after it began, when I discovered that the product I was hired to promote did not exist. I secured a new position, selling yellow pages advertising – and loathed every minute of it.

In no way a part of the long-range plan for my life, I was divorced. My sons were old enough to have jobs and cars and didn’t require much of me anymore. My best friend had married a tyrant and had suddenly disappeared from my life. I had fallen deeply in love again, only to have my heart broken when that romance ended without warning.

Three years went by. My best friend came back but my boyfriend did not.

I kept hearing little voices saying, “Move to Dallas.” Those voices belonged to my parents, who recognized that the events of recent years had left me in emotional and financial straits. They pointed out that I was rattling around by myself in a big house, dealing alone with its daily upkeep and general maintenance, and lying awake at night, worrying that the huge pine trees in the backyard would one day blow over and crush my neighbors’ homes and children.

I listed my home for sale with the realization that it could be on the market for months.

Three weeks later, I had an offer on the house, and, three weeks after that, I left Nashville. I sold or gave away everything that wouldn’t fit in the U-haul truck I’d rented, and, in true Clampett fashion, made my way to Texas.