So – we are moving back to Providence.  I want to thank Kepler for so graciously taking the opportunity to update our blog for us. I also thought I would chime in with some thoughts and reflections on the past six months that we spent in Boston.  Mike also has a post coming soon with his own reflections.

My cousin Adri is a huge believer in signs, and while I don’t go looking for signs everywhere I go, sometimes you can’t ignore them.  I first started paying attention to the signs in my life when, in late August, I was driving from Boston to Providence.  It was in the evening to meet Mike and the owner of the company he had been working on a contract for over the past two weeks.  Earlier in the week they had offered him a full-time position.  When Mike told me that, I was filled with a couple of different emotions. I was excited – Mike really liked this place and they seemed to really like him, and it was in Providence.  I never really got over Providence – I missed its familiarity and I missed my friends. But, I was also frustrated.  I had just come from a meeting with the brother of a friend of mine, who has lived in Boston for quite a while now. We had a very nice talk about Boston, and people and places that were doing interesting work in the arts and non-profits. I had also, earlier in the day reconnected with a friend of mine from college who I hadn’t seen since graduation and who lives in the Boston area.   I was just starting to get my feet wet.

So as I was driving to Providence, I was telling myself, not to get too worked up about this – Mike had not made a decision yet, and was waiting to hear back from a large Boston based company about a job.  As I was entering Rhode Island on 95 South, I came around a bend and could see the Providence sky line.  Just then, one lonely firework went off over the city.  I couldn’t believe it, and kept my eyes wide open looking for another firework – but it was only that one.  It was like Rhode Island was showing me her excitement over the possibility of our moving back.  Mike laughed when I told him, but I knew in my stomach that it was a sign.

From that point on, I kept my eyes peeled for more signs.  Then – in September, I was meeting up with my Providence-based Book Club for our first meeting of the fall after our summer hiatus.  We always have a lot to catch up on – so we like to think of easy ways to update the group that don’t end up taking hours (which we are prone to do).  We were challenged to find a poem that summed up our summer.  For me it didn’t take too long to find just the right poem – it was at the end of our street in Boston.  Spray painted along a retaining wall at the end of our street was this poem.

“and she screamed life is beautiful you are the dust we are the wind”
Photo credit: Union Jack Creative

I had always liked that quote, but it took my book club assignment to make me realize just how appropriate it was.  My life the past few months has been like dust at the mercy of the wind.

As I was preparing to write this post, I went by the overpass (its on the way to the T stop)  and noticed that it had been painted over.   As if it was there just for us, as a sign for the months we would spend in Boston, and now that that time is drawing to a close, the quote disappears.

So, I am writing this surrounded by boxes.  The jury is still out for what we will title this blog once we are back in Providence.  But the hope is to keep it up (at least do a better job then we have the past few months).  And the contest is still on – Mike and I will be more than happy to show the lucky commenter around Boston, but we will be sleeping in Providence.