Coming to you from Whidbey Island, Washington this is Stories From Women Who Walk with Wednesdays on Whidbey & your host, Diane Wyzga.
I’m often asked: “What brought you to Whidbey Island?” It’s a standard ice breaker question here. My cheeky response is: A ferry brought me; ferries being a mode of transportation among the Washington islands.
Many folks come here, vacation, fall in love, and return to claim their spot. Not me. It wasn’t love at first sight. In truth, I washed up on the shores of Whidbey Island. My relationship with this place is more like an arranged marriage than falling-head-over-heels in love.
An arranged marriage flips the traditional hook-up, dating, live together, get married sequence. Matchmakers introduce the partners, a wedding occurs, and love and intimacy are expected to develop afterward during marriage.
While Hollywood movies often frame relationships around immediate romance, arranged marriages rely on a partnership built on shared foundations where emotional bonds grow over time. It’s a pragmatic mindset requiring work and compromise that helps offset early disillusionment when one person’s habits rub up against the other’s expectations.
Unlike the traditional scenario where attraction might peak during a “honeymoon phase” the gradual growth of friendship, love, and meeting milestones together sets up a long-term companionship supported by those strong ties.
Just like our marriages, traditional or arranged, the place we live shapes our identities, behaviors, and well-being. Places we live—like the tides— direct our attention, movement, social interactions, personal growth and development. The community molds our sense of culture, belonging, what is normal, expected, possible and accepted. In ways large and small place fundamentally influences our daily routines, opportunities, and personality.
After almost a decade in this semi-rural place, with all the highs and lows that come with starting anew in unfamiliar surroundings how have I come to love thee, Whidbey? Let me count the ways.
There’s the cool Pacific Northwest climate, the landscape of old growth forests, farms and farmer’s markets, abundant wildlife (sometimes too abundant in the garden), a slower pace because of narrow, winding 2-lane roads and reduced speed limits, the November to May Rain Festival that turns our attention and activities quietly inward.
Ours is a deliberate lifestyle. We don’t have malls or the hustle and bustle of city streets, or easy access to stuff one can get over in AmeriKa. Of course, that means we rely on ourselves and each other, especially when the power goes out and the hum of generators fills the night sky.
Ours is a deceivingly robust community of varied social fabrics, politics, spirituality, intellects and economics. We support writers, artists, hikers, fisherfolk, entrepreneurs, farmers, poets, seniors, educators, and volunteers. Every meeting and gathering comes with a potluck. Yes, it can take time to find your people in a tight-knit rural place, but it’s also a matter of stepping out the door, inviting people to share your front porch, building connections, building trust, learning tolerance for others. By and large people on Whidbey are friendly, welcoming, smart, clever, willing to shed big city ways to make room for patience. Maybe even understanding because we do not see all things the same way.
Ours hosts a plethora of outdoor spaces, free public transport, and the most wonderful library system that is the hub of our social connectedness. Sure the prices are higher than most, we do struggle to make ends meet, healthcare service could be better, and ferry schedule might be sketchy at times; but I knew I belonged when people greeted me by name in the grocery store or ACE Hardware or I was invited to begin teaching story courses for adults.
Don’t get me wrong. Whidbey Island is not unlike your community. It’s not all rainbows and rhubarb pie here. We have our share of folks who behave like dumbshits. But for every person who behaves like a dumbshit there’s a dozen who are truly kind and decent.
That’s the bit to remember because despite the ups and downs a time must come when you agree with yourself to set aside feelings of uncertainty, venture out, expand your horizons, engage with your new found community. As an introvert’s introvert the idea of making a coffee date was not in my toolkit; but once I did step out it became easier and I learned that others were just waiting to be invited.
This place called Whidbey Island is the place I live; even more important are the people I’m still coming to know who are shaping who I am.
“But now that I am in love with a place that doesn’t care how I look and if I am happy, happy is how I look and that’s all.” ***
Question: What is it about the place you live that has charmed and shaped you?
*** Weathering ~ by Fleur Adcock
"My face catches the wind
that will never wholly settle.
Well, that was a metropolitan vanity,
wanting to look young forever, to pass.
I was never a pre-Raphaelite beauty
and only pretty enough to be seen
with a man who wanted to be seen
But now that I am in love
with a place that doesn’t care
how I look and if I am happy,
happy is how I look and that’s all.
My hair will grow grey in any case,
my waist thicken, and the years
work all their usual changes.
If my face is to be weather beaten as well,
for a year among the lakes and vales
where simply to look out my window
makes me indifferent to mirrors
and to what my soul may wear
over its new complexion."
You’re invited: “Come for the stories - stay for the magic!” Speaking of magic, subscribe & spread this episode with a generous 5-star review & comment—it helps us all—& join us next time!
AND! Stop by my Quarter Moon Story Arts website during reconstruction, email me [[email protected]] to arrange a no-obligation Discovery Call, and stay current with me as Quarter Moon Story Arts on Substack.
Stories From Women Who Walk Production Team
Podcaster: Diane F Wyzga & Quarter Moon Story Arts
Music: Mer’s Waltz from Crossing the Waters by Steve Schuch & Night Heron Music
ALL content and image © 2019 to Present Quarter Moon Story Arts. All rights reserved. Enjoy my work? Share & attribute it to Diane Wyzga of Stories From Women Who Walk podcast with a link back to the original source.
