On Arriving in Tucson, Bobcat Families, and Hope

Taken the morning we left Boston, headed to the airport.

We're here in Tucson, and have been for a week. I'm beginning (we're all beginning) to acclimate. That first day, my heavens, was so disorienting. I started the day in the heavy, vibrant, humid green of a New England summer, and it seemed like I blinked and by afternoon I was here, in the middle of the desert, and all of the Summer green was delicate and dry. It felt like my entire previous life had vanished, like I wasn't sure it had ever happened at all.

taken yesterday, on a walk. you see what i mean by contrast?

As we talked about this move, I kept having an inexplicable longing to drive here, instead of fly. We opted not to, because it would have been insane, but I think once we arrived, I knew where that longing came from: maybe if we had traversed the entire country to get here, I'd feel like our arrival made some sense. I'd have seen the physical distance mount. Instead, wham bam, goodbye East Coast and hello completely different world.

big western sky, mountains

just outside my mother-in-law's front door.

To be fair, I hadn't slept much in the days leading up to our departure (who does, right?), and I had spent the day wrestling Henrietta in airports and planes. But still, driving from the airport to my mother-in-law's house, I felt like we'd made a mistake, like if we'd been able to spend even five minutes here with the intention of transplanting, we would have known that. The landscape didn't look at all like home. I tried to be cheerful, but the feeling stayed with me while I moved our bags in and we got ready for dinner. And then, out on the back deck, three baby bobcats arrived.

They jumped up in a tree and swatted at each other from various branches. They chased each other between deck chairs and strutted their stuff around the potted plants. We watched them play and lounge while we ate dinner, and it suddenly seemed like this place was just fine. That this place was maybe even marvelous. And that we hadn't made a mistake after all.

Some of these pictures are from a few days later when their mama came too, but the truth is that I was having the same sort of feeling on the day she arrived with her babies. It seems like every time I'm discouraged or feeling displaced, they show up. She's so beautiful; they're all so beautiful. I love the markings on her legs and belly. I love the babies' little tails and pointy black and white ears. I think maybe I'm supposed to be frightened of them. My mother is worried they'll haul off Henrietta while we're not watching. But we stay on this side of the glass and make no attempts to interact with or bother them, and for some reason I'm not at all worried. Instead, I'm grateful. I think I've seen them three times, and every time they've healed an ache in me.

We have a lot to work out here. We're still very much in transition, and will be for some time. There's a lot that's uncertain, a lot I worry over. (Namely, our buyers dropped out four days before we moved, so we're still paying a mortgage. Ugg.) But I'm remembering this is what helps me whenever I move: I attach to the landscape, the new animals and plants, the beauty I've yet to grow so used to that I don't see anymore. And then I'm okay. I look up at the enormous sky and picturebook clouds and blue outlines of mountains and towering saguaro cacti, the lizards and jack rabbits and orioles and cat families out the back window, and then I'm better than okay. I'm hopeful. I'm happy. I'm here.