I've been getting messages from Spirit lately about completion. The World card keeps showing up in my readings. I’m trying to figure out what it all means. Does it mean this difficult season is finally ending? Is something better coming? I wonder if part of this is regarding my house. I think it is.

Even if completion means something beautiful is on the other side of this, I'm still grieving. I want to say that clearly, because I think we rush past that part too quickly. We go straight to the silver lining because sitting in the grief is uncomfortable. But grief is real, and it deserves a moment.

So, this is me giving it a moment.

I poured a lot of love into my house.

I decorated it the way I wanted, for the first time in my adult life. I finally had enough space to put things up on walls and arrange things on shelves and make rooms look the way I'd imagined them in my head for years. In my office, I put my desk right in front of the window, so I could look outside while I worked. Sugarplum has a cat condo and window seat right next to me, and she sleeps and looks out the window while I work. I put up my grandfather’s picture and the wooden softball holder set he made for me. I'd been carrying that thing through my entire adulthood waiting for a place to put it. It finally had a place.

The kitchen had a huge island. I had been dreaming about a kitchen island for years because of my baking. I would turn on Christmas music during the holidays and just bake. I could spread everything out, decorate cakes, and actually enjoy the process without feeling cramped. Sugarplum would climb up on the rocking chair and watch me from across the room. I call her my supervisor. She took the job very seriously.

The living room had big windows that looked out on the backyard. We could watch the birds all day. Sugarplum had window seats, and she'd sit there and stalk the birds at the feeder attached to the glass. The second a bird landed, she'd launch herself at the window and scare it away, and then look incredibly proud of herself. She plays fetch (yes, she's a cat, but she loves it), and she has cat shelves on the walls with a little box she can climb into and sleep in. She slept in that box every night, until my roommate moved in and rearranged her world a little. Now she sleeps under the chair.

My favorite thing, though, is just sitting on my reclining sofa in the evenings with Sugarplum on the footrest. In that big open room, in my own home, just the two of us, at peace.

I was happy here. It was the dream. The only thing really missing was a nice big soaker tub. I thought I could live without one, but now I’ve realized that’s a must-have for any future homes. Otherwise, it was a great house.

Now I have to leave. I was laid off twice in this house and am still currently looking for a job. I am out of funds and can no longer stay. The market is so difficult that I don’t even think I can sell it. I’m going to have to work something out with the mortgage lender, but it means a huge financial loss for me. I tried to stay as long as I could, but it’s just not possible anymore, unless a miracle happens… or I somehow win the lottery without actually buying very many tickets.

I’ve been feeling the grief heavily the past few days. People don't always know what to do with that. They want to help, so they say things like "it's just a house," "you'll find something better," or "everything happens for a reason." Maybe all of that is true. I actually believe something better is coming. Spirit has been consistent about that, and I'm choosing to hold onto it. But believing that doesn't make the leaving hurt any less.

You can be hopeful and heartbroken at the same time.

I think we do people a disservice when we rush them through grief toward the lesson. When we skip straight to "what are you supposed to learn from this" before the person has even had a chance to feel what they lost. Sometimes what someone needs to hear is not "it'll get better" but "It was real. I know how much you loved it. I'm sorry you have to leave it."

So, if you're grieving something right now — a house, a relationship, a job, a version of your life you didn't get to keep — I want to say that to you.

It was real. You loved it. I'm sorry you have to leave it.

Grief isn't something to fix. It's missing something or someone that you loved deeply, and it's allowed to take up space before you have to figure out what comes next.

So tonight, I'm sitting on my couch with Sugarplum on the footrest, in the big open room with the kitchen island, the bird feeder on the window, and my grandfather's softball holder on the wall. And I'm just going to let it be what it is for a little while longer.

Home.

I thought that was the hardest thing on my heart. Then something happened that completely changed my perspective.

Sugarplum's eye got bad again.

She's been having eye trouble for a couple of months now. She keeps scratching it, and it gets all red and swollen. The vet gave me medicine. It gets better. I stop the medicine. A few days later, she's scratching at it again. We've been through this cycle three times now. This last time I waited until it was completely clear before I stopped. A few days later, there she was scratching again.

I need to take her back to the vet to figure out what's actually causing it. I’m giving it one more try because it’s looking almost better again. I’m worried that if it’s a larger issue, I might not have enough money right now to cover it.

That night I sat there and thought: I don't even care about the house anymore. I just want Sugarplum to be okay. I want us both to be healthy and happy. That's it. That's the whole list.

Something shifted in me after that. The weight of losing the house, I won't say it disappeared, but it got lighter. Almost overnight. Because when you're sitting there worrying about your cat's eye and calculating whether you have enough money to pay a potential vet bill, a kitchen island stops feeling like a loss and starts feeling like a detail.

The truth is, I'm ready now. I'm ready to get out of here, get a job, get my finances under control, and stop looking at gas prices before I decide how much to put in my tank. I haven't had to watch what I spend on food and gas in about eight years, and I am done with it. I want to go somewhere where it doesn’t take me an hour and a half to go grocery shopping because I’m out in the middle of nowhere. However, I do want a quiet, peaceful place to live.

I don't know exactly where Sugarplum and I will land. But I know what matters. It's not the kitchen island, as much as I loved it. It's not the big windows or the cat shelves or even my grandfather's softball holder on the wall — although that's coming with us wherever we go.

It's us. Just us. Happy and healthy and somewhere that works.

The World card keeps showing up: completion. Maybe this is what it meant all along, not just the end of something, but the clearing away of everything that was keeping me from moving forward. I had been holding on so tightly.

I'm ready to move forward now. Whatever that means.

Maybe that's what moving forward really is. Not forgetting the place you loved, but carrying its best parts with you until a new place begins to feel like home.

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