A Collection of Words From this Summer

Go where you feel loved.

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I’ve lived by the sea, deep in the desert, by rivers, and in the middle of prairies on the outskirts of cities. I’ve known a quiet like no other, the rush of water, ambulances at 2 am, and the hum of cicadas tucked into hardwoods. I’ve slept in deep heat, and tucked myself into the cold. I’ve driven all over this land, and I’ve learned that yes, to be seen is to be loved. To be heard is to be cherished. To live in a state of wonder, is to know joy. 

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When everything is changing, the world feels like it’s slipping out from under my feet, I return home. To the flatlands where I first knew the definition of the wind. Where the sunsets go wide and far, and everything slows down with the soft rising and falling of the land. Nothing hurries out here, not the clouds through the sky, or the water making its way to those Great Lakes. My dad’s sleeping in the same chair he always does, and my mom just made me a cup of coffee.

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I have felt small at least three times today. This is how I want to live out my days. 

It makes me scared when people get angry at me, but I’m learning to sit in that too. 

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Where was I a year ago? Two? Three? I was in the cradle of the Midwest, climbing giants in the northeast, deep in the desert way out west.

Yesterday I drove by the place my parents used to live when they were young and in love.

I let the sunrise into my eyes.

I do not know where I will be a year from now, but what a blessed thing it is to have a heart that aches for what it wants.

I want to go long and far, I want to follow this feeling, wherever it tells me to go. 

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I saw lightning last night and thought of a poem that has now slipped my mind but I think it went something like this:

It’s 1:45 am and I’m all wrapped up in you. I need to be awake in four hours, but I’m too busy listening to the rain drip from your clothes onto the floor, like you brought a piece of the sky inside with you.

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It’s 7 am central time, deep in the flat lands on a Sunday morning. It’s 6 am mountain time, and the sun is probably just starting to touch the mountains. It’s 5 am pacific time, seeped in twilight, the air smelling like sea.

It’s 8 am here, and I’m thinking about all the people I love. I am grateful to live so close to the ocean.

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Today I got to see big brilliant blue sky. I got to feel miles float by one by one. I got to dip my head under the Atlantic, and feel her hold me in her chilly embrace. Later, when we returned I had salt crusted eyelashes. From crying, or sweat, or the sea. Does it even matter?

There will come a day when movement does not hurt me anymore. When I can race down to the ocean and throw myself into her like my own wave. There will come a day when 14 miles on a bike turns into 100 turns into walking across this country. 

I have dreams here that will not cease. Love still in my heart. I am alive, I am here, I am breathing. And so there is hope yet to be had. 

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I saved a cicada yesterday, maybe it will be alright after all.