I had coffee with a woman today who moved to Stratford from Toronto a few years ago for all the reasons a person would move from Toronto to Stratford. She loves it here, she told me. “You are in your territory,” I remarked. We explored that concept for a few minutes.
I am a big believer in territory. We are most content when we are where we belong. We think of territory as geographical but it can be other areas of our lives too – relationships, career, interests, etc. And territories can change with time.
It is said a wolf that is blown out of its territory by a violent storm and can’t find its way back to it will lie down and die. Members of the animal kingdom invest a lot of energy, not to mention gallons of pee, in marking their territories. Those boundaries are very important to them. They will defend them to the death.
Sometimes when people get driven from their territories and can’t get back to them, they will suffer, like the wolf. Richard Nixon almost died of a blood clot after he was forced to step down as president. It was not the humiliation that almost killed him. He was driven out of his territory and couldn’t get back. He eventually made it back as an elder statesman of the Republic and served his country again before he died.
I wandered in the wilderness for a while. Moved many times. To Alberta for a few months. Worked all sorts of jobs. But then a few decades ago, I stumbled into my territory. Journalism, a little blue house. A wife, a family. Contentment. After all my wandering, I live just a few miles from the hospital where I was born. I always joke that I never got very far in life.
Only one of two things will remove me from my territory: a cannon or a court order.
©2016 Jim Hagarty
