Newburyport, Giving Up?
November 8th, 2006I have a lot of friends who are for the first time seriously talking about leaving Newburyport, MA. Believe me, it has occurred to me too.
A friend of mine said, “Newburyport is at a crossroads, it is either going to go this way or that.” And we both said at the same time, “probably ‘that.’”
The people I talk to, although they don’t articulate it this way, feel that Newburyport already has, or is on the verge of losing its “soul.”
In one of my most favorite books “Healing and the Mind” by Bill Moyers, Rachel Naomi Remen talks about 4 steps: “show up, pay attention, tell the truth and don’t be attached to the results.”
Somewhere I believe Ms Remen makes the remark that the most difficult step is to “show up.”
The people who I hear talk about leaving Newburyport, MA (or who frankly have already left) have been here for a while. They have “shown up,” they have “paid attention” and they have told their own kind of “truth.”
What appears to be so hard is the “not being attached to the results” part, especially when the results aren’t anything like the way even the most vaguest expectations might expect.
They are tired. Bone weary.
And if I end up staying, much less continue the Newburyport Political Blog, “letting go of the results;” accepting “this” or “that” would be obligatory.
I can continue to “show up,” “pay attention” and “speak up,” but there is no controlling the outcome, Newburyport is far too complex and multi-determined for that one.
The choice appears to be “acceptance” or find some place else to live. I would hope Newburyport has been home for far too long for me to really permanently want to high-tail it out of this place.
Mary Eaton
Newburyport