Arthur Rothstein: Morning routine, nursery school,
Harlingen, Texas. FSA camp. (1942)
United States. Farm Security Administration

"Losing our Grooves leaves us wandering relatively aimlessly in wilderness."

Being Exiled separates one from their Grooves, their essential routines that pretty much define them. Grooves might seem non-essential, but after losing every other point of orientation, a Groove or two prove at least reassuring, perhaps even confirming. They are who you are and were inseparable before they weren't. Loss of home might feel like loss of self, but losing those Grooves seals the separation. Through early Exiled days, I moved around in a definite haze. I couldn't find my rhythms, the cadences within which I engaged. I suffered from a form of arrhythmia where nothing seemed to work right. I could continue doing anything I'd done before, but without an essential elegance, as if I'd been thrown back into rank amateur status. Even activities in which I'd grown skilled became difficult. I was more likely to slice my thumb when in the kitchen. I'd even nick my chin when shaving.

Grooves grow to become invisible.

Tags: #Exiled, #PureSchmaltz

George Inness: After a Summer Shower (1894)

It Cost Us Much More
I woke this morning to find Molly, our nearly feral girl cat, curled up on top of The Muse's open suitcase. We'd returned home the afternoon before to find our boy cat Max waiting and ready to mount my lap for some overdue petting. Molly had slipped in unnoticed later for her quick bite of supper before disappearing back out into her waning summer. The Muse harvested the week's worth of ripe tomatoes from our extraordinarily productive garden, and we took supper inside, the outside temperature having plummeted into Autumn in the short time we'd been gone. Our absence had made our hearts grow fonder for this place from which we were so long ago Exiled. Homecomings since have been uniformly sweet. They make the leaving seem worthwhile even though the world we find out there seems increasingly hostile to innocent visitors. Decent digs seem almost impossible to find. We traveled well again, our style honed in no small measure by our long-ago exile. We travel almost exclusively via roads few consider taking. We avoid schedules, often stopping to read and learn from those roadside readerboards. I gratefully slow to allow whoever's behind me to pass, lest they follow too closely and learn our sacred secrets. We learned to find our way by being rudely Exiled and thriving anyway. May we never have to go away like that again. I'm grateful, though, for the learning being laid low afforded us. I'd say our understanding's priceless, but it cost us much more than that. It's worth more, too.

Tags: #Exiled, #PureSchmaltz

Odilon Redon: Passage of a Soul (1891)

"The roads least taken tend to be the ones most worth taking."

The Exiled do not readily adopt their new home. They naturally resist assimilation because too easy an integration might serve to disrespect their "real" home. They will find many reasons why their new station seems inferior, however superior it might objectively seem to every other observer. Traffic became chief among my complaints when we landed in Northern Virginia. Traffic had evolved into absolutely unworkable patterns there, where the bulk clogged what were euphemistically referred to as arteries. These often proved to be among the longest paths between any two points, but paradoxically also the most traveled. I believed that this had more to do with habit than design. People often follow what appear to be the wider paths, for instance, when narrower ones might make more sense. Of course, if everyone followed these shorter paths, they'd become clogged, too, so I worked hard to keep my emerging SecretPassages secret.

Chief among my strategies for keeping my SecretPassages secret involved turning off any navigation apps that might be recording my passage.

Tags: #Exiled, #PureSchmaltz

W. Tringham, after Jacques de Sève:
Onbekend dier [Anonymous Animal] (1773)

" … I sense myself a better man …"

Anonymity might be the one utterly reliable superpower that the newly Exiled possess. Though stripped of most of their possessions, they all acquire this one in exchange. It might initially seem freeing to move about the world with nobody watching or anyone watching having no clue what they're seeing, but this gift has indefinite limits. The anonymous hold little influence. They have nobody they can call to help them out should they get themselves into a jam. They can go anywhere without fear of being recognized, but they tend to roam few places where such recognition might matter. It's as if they exist without any observers, without any risk or hope of accidentally bumping into someone influential and embarrassing themselves. The Anonymity, while initially freeing, comes to wear one down. If nobody knows you from Adam or Eve, it might become difficult to know what you believe. Acquaintances can at least remind you who you are or who you used to be, and without that feedback, it grows difficult to remember who you are or were in this world.

Anonymity reliably produces ghosts.

Tags: #Exiled, #PureSchmaltz

Eduard-Julius-Friedrich Bendemann:
The People of Jerusalem in Exile (c. 1832)

" … not actually sentenced to spend time in jail but still there, even if Just Visiting."

Before we'd found permanent housing, we discovered that we'd been Exiled into the one place with more Exiles than any other place in this country. Federal government employees are routinely sent "on station," assigned to work in Washington for periods ranging from a few months to a few years. Thousands are encouraged to volunteer for these assignments, promised better future promotions, and a deeper understanding of how the system they're a part of works. Many bring their families, but more don't, and consequently, there are thousands of people left wondering what to do on weekends. Many work right through their weekends, figuring that the sooner they finish their assignment, the sooner their exile might end. Local connections seem challenging to make. The locals have families to attend to, and other ExPats have their own lives to live. Further, the sheer size of the DC Metro area means that people who work next to each other throughout the week might bunk fifty or more miles apart. Consequently, an Expat's life can be lonely.

The Muse and I, within a couple of weeks of arriving, began hosting a Sunday night potluck supper at our temporary digs.

Tags: #Exiled, #PureSchmaltz