January 5, 2012

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    And just like that, I'm back. From the aisle seat of the airplane, I stole glimpses out open windows and watched familiar brown fields turn into clouds, and then into city lights blooming like a galaxy beneath me. I walked home from the subway station pulling my suitcase behind me and almost forgot the codes to the front door. I was sadder to leave than I expected, not because I would miss anything but because in folding and packing and flying and saying goodbye I felt, briefly, the ache of being in between. I have so thoroughly outgrown my life with my family, but I am still growing into my life here, and for a few moments this afternoon I felt like all I had was nowhere. 

    But that isn't true. In the airport I watched planes roar in and wrote pages in a journal I have barely touched in weeks, and as I flew from there to here I spent three hours reading prose that made me want to cry and laugh and trade my whole life for pens and paper, and I made faces at the curly golden baby sitting one seat behind me, and I tried to find the right word to describe the sky as it began to blush pink, and wherever I am I will have this place within me, always. Everywhere. So it's okay. 

     

    h.