A Time to Rebuild
“To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven.”
Has 2022 started with some seriously stormy weather and other questionable conditions for you? Beyond the constant threat of Covid, I mean, which seems to have just become a global metastatic condition for all of us.
I had a lot of 2021 hangovers -- an apartment still waiting to close in New York that needed all the remaining furniture removed, my finances in limbo between financial institutions, a home in Bermuda still lacking security gates, heat or completed construction, a dog with a UTI, a broken LCD, and a lot of heavy stressors about who I could trust or rely on, and the Big Question Mark of my own legal status here….
All of this building up into what felt like a natural disaster in the making was taking me away from all the reasons I’d come here to Bermuda this time or every time I came as a child and rediscovered it repeatedly as an adult in varying stages of health and terminal illness.
I came and have always come here to REBUILD.
Whether it was myself physically in 2016 after 5 months of cancer treatment, or mentally and physically in 2020 after 6 months of Covid and a near re-election of Trump. Even back in my early childhood, our vacations here allowed me to breathe, to eat orange sherbet, swim endlessly in the warm aquamarine waves, to sleep restfully, despite the giant flying roaches, to play with the seaweed and horseshoe crabs that lined uniquely pink beaches here. And to just be me, falling asleep on the back of the moped with my head bobbing against my anxious father’s back.
This was and has always been my happy, healing place. Especially living here during the 6 months of Covid when I really got a chance to understand the culture and people better.
So, the rude awakening of the last several months threw me out of whack and into stormy weather I never anticipated. Especially as wise locals smiled sympathetically and said, “Gotta be careful around those Bermudian women!” Or “Bermuda is a paradise to vacation in but hell to live in!”
So, I had to ask myself. Did I make the right decision here? Should I have left New York? Should I have engaged in this home-building process? Is everyone looking to take advantage of me?
I got my answer on Thursday and Friday, when my dear, dear Bermudian friend and client here, Tracy Marshall, packed me into her car and drove me round and round the island looking for a lawyer to notarize my closing papers, keeping her lovely smile on her face saying “It’s all going to get better. Don’t worry.” And the next day as I finalized my outreach with local attorneys soliciting information from landlords and others, the winds began to pick up, literally… This then capped off, as Tracy and I rushed to a gorgeous birthday dinner for her followed by gushing rain, gale-force winds and the safe harbor of a local driver, now good friend, ushering us both home safely.
That night as I lay in my new bed holding Pippa close while the gales rattled at the doors, I breathed to myself “I think God is coming, please let this be a sign of good change that there is a chance to stay here. A sign of a new season after so many years of global loss and pain. Let this be a time of peace to truly rebuild my whole life here. Please don’t let it be too late.
And the very next morning, that new time began. And so did the rebuilding.
So, if you too are managing a lot of hangovers from 2021, please don’t forget to have faith that you can weather this storm and seize the opportunity to rebuild like I have.
Holly Lynch is a 20+ year communications veteran and life-long social impact advocate and strategist who has helped individuals, educational leaders, and companies tackle the toughest challenges in their worlds.
Having survived countless life setbacks and two rounds with terminal cancer, while seeing the country-wide collapse of the systems and safety nets for the most vulnerable in and outside our communities, she is now shifting her life and career trajectories to focus on coaching those facing down fundamental shifts and transitions as they try to navigate and rebuild their lives, institutions and businesses during these unprecedented times.