Thoughts on Loneliness.

The universe has been sending me a lot of signals about loneliness lately. There is a clear distinction between loneliness and aloneness, and my new life path is including a lot of aloneness and I’m thankful for it.

I’m thankful for it because I can sit alone in a room with myself and not hate or resent what I see. At the end of the day, you’re all you’ve got, and it would be a waste if you expelled energy on trying to change the past and couldn’t just accept who you are, your wants, and accepting whether you’ll pursue them or not.

Two people that I used to have relationships with are with new people. One of them is stereotypically him; he can’t be alone at all, which is why things between us had to end, and he has continued on the hunt to find someone to fill the parts of him that he hasn’t found yet. The other is someone I had very deep feelings for, and we’ve maintained communication as friends, but it’s pretense, because whenever I’m in his town he blows off hanging out with me and if we DO hang, it’s awkward and he ends up being rude in his eagerness to avoid me.

He was always lonely. He could never be alone with himself, but didn’t feel like he was worthwhile to be with anyone. So yes, I hope that now he feels worthwhile and that’s why he’s in one. My roommate is going through a divorce with his wife, a woman who can never be alone, and she has already sprung into another rebound relationship only months after leaving him. All of these people; so normal, so average, and they can’t bear to be solo.

I definitely miss intimacy, but my last few relationships have been so lacking that I don’t see the answer in another one unless I’m really confident they’re the right partner for me. The Naked and Famous say it best, in a lyric I can’t get out of my head:

The bittersweet between my teeth
trying to find the in-between
fall back in love eventually
yeah yeah yeah yeah.

Today, I woke up and made coffee and eggs for Brandon and I before he went to church and I wrote for a few hours. When he came back, we went to Pebble Beach and I was in rock hound heaven, picking up stones I want to tumble and make into jewelry. We walked the shore for a few hours, and my usually quiet friend talked a lot about how he’s been feeling, how he’s been dealing, what he hopes for. I tried to just listen, and let him know how supportive I am of him.

I walked around the city after they left for work. I found a house I would be able to buy for my own in my dreams. I feel hopes and plans budding in my chest, like Redwood roots twining down into my lungs. I breathe out wishes and optimisms and love.

I’m going to finish carving our pumpkin and make some dinner for my guys.

It's a golden life and I'm thankful for it.

First impressions.

It's my second official day as a NorCal transplant. My first day here I walked down to Pebble Beach and looked out at the rocky outcroppings just a couple hundred yards in to the sea and I felt my heart peel open. Open towards the sun sinking low by the waves, the freezing wind whipping through my hair and undoing the two-minutes I'd put into styling it, the cows mooing behind me.

The Safeway lady already knows me by name. Everyone at my Orientation was amazingly kind, in a way that says it's normal to be like that here. Like every smile isn't hiding a conniving corporate plan to undermine you and make you look ill-equipped at the earliest opportunity.

I have to relearn how to breathe. Deeply, so the last dredges of smog can be rinsed out of my lungs. The way people who live in a slice of heaven breathe when they smile at each other in the aisles and laugh when it takes two heads to find the butter because one can't do it alone.

I'm one of those people now. I need to learn the simpler way of living.

I have arrived.

I pulled in right before 12:30am on Sunday morning, with Brando there to welcome me with a hug. It was just the two of us for awhile, which I think was the best possible arrival; we talked for almost an hour and a half about life, what I’m hoping to find here, how I’m okay with absolutely any schedule the guys might hold as long as I can stay here while finances are figuring themselves out. We talked about his marriage, about his heartbreak, and I’m happy I’m here so that we can adventure together and find our respective paths to happiness.

I’m going to go make a copy of the key today, and walk down to Pebble Beach since it’s so lovely and not yet raining and take stock on where I’ve transplanted myself.

I’m excited.

I’m ready.

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.

I'm sorry I haven't posted in awhile; it's been a very busy time.

I got the job in Crescent City, making significantly more than I'm making now. So, without hesitation, I accepted the offer and knew that in the three weeks before my start date I would need to resign from my current position, pack up everything I couldn't live without into my tiny Mini Cooper, and start somewhere new.

That's a big concept you know. Starting somewhere new. For someone like me who was born sixty miles from where I currently live and has only lived within that 60 miles their entire life, up and moving 800 miles on a whim and some hopeful grace has a lot of apprehension associated with it.

I am surprisingly calm. Mainly because I have this loving, bright, inexorable force of support from my friends and family. No one has whined about me moving. Everyone is smiling, and glowing, and squeezing my shoulders and saying "Good LUCK." Be the one that gets out of San Bernardino. Be the one that lights the way so we can leave too.

My friend Star gave me a lovely note that did, in fact, reaffirm everything I needed to hear, which was exactly her intention. She put one of my favorite poems with it, which is Our Greatest Fear by Marianne Williamson.

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.

Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.

It is our light not our darkness that most frightens us.

We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous,
talented and fabulous?

Actually, who are you not to be?

You are a child of God.

Your playing small does not serve the world.

There's nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other

people won't feel insecure around you.

We were born to make manifest the glory of
God that is within us.

It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone.

And as we let our own light shine,
we unconsciously give other people
permission to do the same.

As we are liberated from our own fear,
Our presence automatically liberates others.

And the last part punched me in the gut as I read, tears welling from my eyes. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others. My loved ones see that and push me forward so that I can be that example, and I am beyond grateful.

It is because I am loved that I am able to dream so big. It is because I am loved that I have been able to accomplish what I have in this life and hope for more. As I have said before, everything I am and everything great I try to do is nothing but one huge living testament to the people who give so much to me.

Today I'm packing. I've done so little traveling that I only have three small duffel bags, so I'm running over to Goodwill to see if they have any cheap luggage. Of all the things I'm feeling though, fear isn't one of them. Neither is anxiety, really.

I am open and loving and joyous and grateful. I have enough gas money to get there and that's all that matters.

Ready. Set. GO.