Leaving the past behind (153/365)

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June 2, 2015 – Travelling today……it was a strange sort of homecoming.

Hard to explain.

I was travelling to Vancouver Island for a three day work meeting. The meeting didn’t start until 1pm, but I took an early (6:30am) ferry to Nanaimo to meet up with someone at a different meeting.

A conference I used to attend all the time when I was in grad school, and after that, when I was working at a teaching institution here in town. When I stopped working there, I stopped attending the meetings, and I discontinued my association membership.

It was partly due to a different personal direction, but it was also partly due to an attempt to divorce myself from a painful experience. Coming back to this town always brings challenging memories, many that include heavy self doubt, and some simple straightforward anger. There are people I’ve managed to avoid for as much as ten years.

It’s sad actually, because I enjoyed those meetings and the people attending. There were a lot of very fun times.

So on the ferry I was asking myself why I was about to walk into a trade show at that meeting. I could just as easily see the person I was heading to see any other time, any other day, any other place. She’d made this suggestion, I could have said no and taken a later ferry and had a few more hours of sleep.

But I didn’t.

And here I was.

As I was walking down the street towards the conference centre…aprehension, anxiety…… I pulled the meeting agenda up on my phone. I wasn’t planning on attending any sessions, I didn’t pay the registration, I only intended to enter the trade show and that’s open to the public. And as I started skimming the talks…and seeing the names…I realized it might be hard to slip in and out without seeing anyone I used to know.

I saw a name from UBC, someone I once shared a small room on a boat with during a week travelling on the Amazon River, not someone I wanted to avoid, and as I turned to open the door, she was standing right there… Hug!  She said I should just go into any sessions, no one would notice. She was probably right, but I was still “…just stopping in for a brief conversation with someone…”

I climbed the stairs, found the person I had come to see, and we had our chat. She offered me her name tag, I declined. I wandered off to the washroom, not intending to stay any longer, but then I looked at the sessions again, and a few physiology talks caught my interest….maybe…maybe I wouldn’t run into anyone else….

As I walked back to her booth I came face to face with two women. Old friend to each other, former colleagues to me. One of no discomfort to me, the other, someone I really didn’t want to see, a former colleague, a misplaced friendship, a person who used me for personal gain and then tried to undercut me and steal something important to me. Another mutual friend had used to admonish me “You know she’s using you….” I didn’t, not back then anyway.

Brave face, big smile.

“How are you, I hear you got a great position. Saw your ex, can’t believe how old your kids are now.”

Then she swung the discussion sharply.

“Are you still with DFO?”

“Yes”

“Are you permanent yet?”

(Seriously?) “Of course not”

“Are you running your fish health course this summer?”

“Yes, but up north”

“Well, that’s not convenient, I have some techs that I want to take it”

(There it was, ‘I need to use you for something’  The inner voice wanted to reply:‘It’s not a public course for YOUR techs, it’s for OUR program staff and volunteers.‘) “Yes, well, it’s needed up there, that’s just the way it is this year, maybe next year”

“Did you apply for the job up the hill?”

“No”

“But why not…you’d be perfect for it.”

“Yes, I know, I held it at one point, but I wasn’t remotely interested in it this time around. I’ve been there already, and I love what I am doing now, regardless of the insecurity.”

“Oh…. well…. I’m short-listed for it, I’m not really interested though, too heavy a teaching load, not enough research focus, and the pay sucks”

“Excellent, good luck, (I’m somewhat surprised, never thought she’d entertain moving here…but honestly, why did we just do this dance?) I hope you hear something soon. Nice to see you, have to go, take care.”

Interesting exchange, and strangely liberating. Our worlds have diverged and perhaps we finally aren’t in competition anymore.

I borrowed the offered name tag, and sat in on some interesting talks and at coffee break wandered back to the trade show where I ran into a company rep I know, made contact with a fellow replacing someone I know at an aquaculture company, ran into a fellow I once TA’d at UBC when I was in my Master’s program and who now is the GM for a very successful aquaculture company. I had a brief discussion with a UBC professor about possible collaborations for research with out programs, we agreed to think on things and get together to brainstorm with some others at a later date, she suggested we do so a couple of times annually. Fabulous! I chatted with a woman I met when she was working for another government program, and a couple of former UBC students, I ran into a fellow I went to grad school with and who now works at the other end of the country. Hadn’t seen him for at least ten years or more.

Then out of the corner of my eye I see a man with a mildly wild shock of white hair start to walk by, stop, stare at me, and walk towards me…stopping…hovering… to my right while I was talking to a friend-of-a-friend from UBC.

Shit!

One of the old boys club who so badly treated me years past. One of the people behind the reason I have never returned. But also someone with who I had managed to compartmentalize the past and work closely with after the fact, but it hadn’t been any less painful.

Put on the smile…turn, extend the hand, make the gesture first….”Hi, how are you…”

Pleasantries.

He lit up.

“What are you doing now, where are you based, tell me all about it…”

I am reasonably sure that there is some remorse there, he is a kind person, but circumstances weren’t. We’ve never discussed a word about what happened. And we didn’t again, not now, not ever. Instead we talked about photography, and traded images of bears, and smiled, and said goodbye.

And it was ok.

Again, it was oddly liberating.

The smile was forced and fake initially, but it was real when we said goodbye.

I went back in for a few more talks before needing to head off for the meeting I was really in town for. Then I saw a woman sit down a few chairs in front of me. I started to send an email to her (Nice to see you!!), then deleted it, stood up, slipped up the side, and dropped to kneel next to her, she looked down, and her face split into a massive smile and she threw a hug around me.

We worked together, for two or three years, on a program right after everything went sideways for me in this town. I acted in a scientific research advisory capacity, an advisory/liaising role to a core that sat between a public forum and a group of researchers (basically I could speak the language and interpret it). The provincial forum was funding $14 million dollars worth of aquaculture related research over those two to three years, and it was an excellent experience for me at a time when I desperately needed something to prove, to myself, that I still had value. After the program ended, she left for the East Coast and although we’ve had a bit of contact, I’d not laid eyes on her since. That was about six or seven years ago. We agreed to meet for breakfast in the morning. I’m thrilled.

So strange to approach a building nervously and walk out with a bounce in my step and a huge smile on my face. No tears today. No tissues or towels needed.

I feel lighter.

We all have demons that masquerade.

Facing fears based on past and present self doubts.

Sometimes it ends very well.

Sometimes you regain something in yourself that you didn’t realize you’d lost.

The people you think hold some power over you, don’t. What you give power to, has power over you. I remembered how to create my own validation.

Someone once said something along the lines of “Holding onto anger is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.”

Old wounds heal, if you let them. But it’s up to you.

I may even rejoin the association.

Maybe….

Quite the day. All that before noon.

At the very least, I’m glad I took that early ferry.