Stay Where You Are... Or Not?

When I was child, my parents frequently counseled me to “stay where I was”.

Every summer, we vacationed as a family to our beach house. It was the highlight of our year. We knew there was always one night our parents would leave us to ourselves. We would attend the boardwalk lined with rides and shacks and shops and people.

It was a child's dream come true. We were each given some money (a treat for us kids back then, before every 10 year old had their own cell phone and iPod) and were left to our amusement with merely a meeting time and place for a few hours later.

You can imagine how beside ourselves we were. We had to immediately get on rides which would spin us around ferociously. We had shaved ice and french fries to purchase. THE WORLD WAS OURS.

But one year, I suppose I was younger than an adolescent, I found myself in a precarious position. I was lost. Lost on the boardwalk I had grown up on. Somewhere between riding some wagon-wheeled, rotating, puke inducing ride with my sister and purchasing an ankle bracelet trinket which jingled with my every step, I looked up one way and down the other and realized nothing looked familiar.

“Stay where you are,” rang in my ears. It was a phrase I had known expertly. It had been used many times either in its authentic form or its many derivations. “Stay put.” “Stay still.” “Stay right there.” Freeze, if you will.

The ending to the story matters little. What is relevant is the feeling I have come to attach with it. It’s become synonymous with the solution to danger. To harm. To a threat. To things which would and do hurt me.

Ironically, I find myself in an interesting station in life right now. I’m paralyzed with… confusion. I just watched one of my closest friends get married recently. And though the actual incident had not left me in a tail spin, the idea and accompanied feeling of everyone else indeed IS moving on has.

What’s worse, my notion to freeze in this moment is instinctual though I can think of fewer bad ideas for me than to actually “stay where I am.”

I am weathering through it. I’m not depressed. Not today at least. I’m not dramatically chattering as I have been known to do in times past. I’m trying to keep my mouth shut and man up. Actually, there is an element of ‘ignoring it’ as my coping mechanism of choice for the meantime.

I am learning (or rather re-learning) one thing. There IS value in adversity. The friction of life is generally highly unwelcomed and regarded with even less worth. I have been toiling past the impulse to stay put and am embracing a newer philosophy more appropriately age geared to adults. “Get to it.”

Now, if only someone would hand me a twenty dollar bill and send me on my way to buy a funnel cake.