In the midst of quarantine and isolation and remote working, I’ve been taking a lot of long walks recently. Some close by, but others I drive an hour or more in a southwesterly direction.

Today I stayed nearer to Salem and ended up on beautiful reservation land in Gloucester. Without knowing, I veered off my planned trail and ended up on another one, only to get the feeling that I wasn’t traversing in the direction I’d originally planned. So I turned around, and soon enough found the trail I’d intended to follow. It’s a trail that cuts through a gigantic swamp filled with lifeless red maples, a place created by beavers however many years ago. An eerily ancient and majestic place.

Then, the same thing happened, I veered off course. Or rather, I thought I remembered seeing that the trail looped around, but when I finally gave in and downloaded the All Trails app on my phone, I saw that the trail had ended and that I was once again off on another. So, I turned around. Again. And while the obvious landmarks were there, the trail looked different walking back the other way. I found myself questioning whether I was still on the right trail when I noticed a stone wall I hadn’t seen before, then stepped over a piece of green glass I remembered and was reoriented.

At that moment, it occurred to me how similar walking a trail back in the other direction is to experiencing our past through memories and reflection. We are bound to see things differently than on the way up, which is filled with veering and reorienting. We may notice things we didn’t before, or see things from a different angle and question our instincts.

The reality is that our remembrances are not concrete, they’re only memories, formed in the way we experienced and internalized them. They are whispers and shadows of a past lived, but not the whole story.

And as much as we might like to question and even walk back through time to start all over again, we can only accept what is right here, right now — the situation and our task at hand, shaped by the combination of choices we’ve made and the outside forces beyond our control.

This struggling to accept is where I find myself, in the midst of a divorce after an almost nine-year relationship, turning 37 in May, not settled in my career or finances, and realizing how much I want to be a mother despite it all. I could lament and question why I didn’t leave my husband when, at 33, I realized he didn’t want children after all. But what good does that do me now? Not a whole lot. It only sheds light on the hard lessons I’ve had to learn.

Acceptance. It’s not easy. There are some days that I wake up, and I can’t make it out of bed for another 30 minutes because the weight of loss is heavy. There are moments when I watch certain movies (i.e. Baby Boom) where I find myself convulsively sobbing when that adorable, curly-haired baby says “mama” for the first time to Diane Keaton. And I wonder what could have been if only…

Acceptance is hard, but that doesn’t mean it’s not worth striving for. And I do, every day. Acceptance is not the same thing as giving up or being passive, or at least that’s not how I interpret it. Rather, it’s being still and seeing our lives as objectively as possible. It’s finding inner stillness and peace, clearing space in the mind and conscience. Acceptance is fundamental to continuing forward on the journey with a strengthened set of values and a renewed purpose. One step at a time.

Today, I accept the decisions I’ve made. I accept where I am, I accept who I am. I accept that this is not where I’ll be or who I’ll be tomorrow. Every decision I make from here on out, and how I choose to react to fateful forces, will determine my tomorrow. Acceptance is hard, but choosing to accept my present circumstances — dare I say even love the lessons and opportunities I’ve been granted — gives me faith that someday, somehow, I will be a mother. And I will experience and see motherhood differently, perhaps in a more aware and acute way, because of the path I’ve walked.