Plans

I am done being down, I have snapped out of it.
Things are good, it is so beautiful here, I love sleeping outside. After an unfortunate bed bug incident (very, VERY unpleasant) I have moved out of my tepee and into the best pagoda on the property. It is a platform of dark, hard wood raised about four feet off the ground, with a roof and drop down shades on the sides. This morning I woke with a unobstructed view of the sun rising above the mountain, and the breeze blowing through the thatch. I laid in bed for a little while, warm in my blankets, soft on my sheets, thinking about how fortunate I am and how many different directions my life could have taken. I thought a lot about time that I waste, time spent distracting myself rather than experiencing, the countless hours of watching shitty TV or reading trashy books instead of really living. I have no excuses now. I have survived heartbreak and the end of the tunnel is indeed near, and it is time to stop mourning and start living again. Thank god, I was getting sick of being bummed out.

I leave in five days. I didn't think that I would ever leave this place but I am having the urge to go home to Olympia and during these last few years of traveling I have learned not to ignore these kind of impulses. NYC next weekend, the big city with lots of friends, still need to buy my ticket back to Seattle. The east coast for who knows how long, but ultimately home sweet home to see all of my friends and family. I love summers in the North West! Sweet smelling trees and green green grass, swimming in the river, BBQs at Burfoot, sticky hot nights, watching the sunset at 10pm, fruit missions to Eastern WA and everything else about it.

So many trips planned this summer. I want to spend a week in the Enchantments and the Stuarts. I want to drive to Mexico, hugging the coast except when there are mountains to explore nearby. I want to live the life I have always wanted, footloose and fancy free with nothing to hold me back or tie me down, and I want to do it with a smile on my face.

Good vibes this morning. Cup of ginger tea and the wind howling through the pines and the world is mine for the taking.

Breathing

I took a long walk up the mountain behind my tepee yesterday and found a completely different world on the other side. Peaceful, no one else for what felt like miles! There was no trail, but I wound and twisted my way up and at the top I found a panoramic view of the Med spread out before me, with massive cliffs at my feet and seabirds soaring all around. I climbed a little way down and sat on a big rock and focused on my breath and felt the sun and the wind on my face and watched the sun sink lower and lower. Although I still struggle sometimes with quieting my mind while I meditate, practice makes perfect. At the base of the cliffs there is a spot where I would love to swim and something that looks almost like a cave, and so I will have to find a way down now to explore. This is a pretty place, that is for sure.

Grey

It is raining here in Ibiza this morning, the ground is just wet enough to keep the dust down, the trees and cacti here drink up quick, and I can really feel the weight of the atmosphere on my shoulders pushing me back into my bed.

I am homesick. Its a lonely world for a wayward girl running away from her problems. I am restless, I need to keep moving. When I stop for too long it really hits home that I have no idea what I am doing, no idea where I am going, how incredibly lonely I am. I love this place that I am in, the beach is beautiful and the trees smell so lovely, but I have realized that this is not how I want to spend my summer, looking after this yoga retreat. It would be so perfect if there were others around who were just a little bit like me, interested in living a healthy and spiritual life. As great as the other staff members are here, it is still Ibiza and the club scene dominates all else.

I dont know if I want to get back onto boats, I dont know if I want to stay in Europe, I dont know if I want to go back to the States... I dont know much, other than just existing is not good enough for me right now, I need a spark, something to really inspire me again. It is the grass/otherside thing again, I need to find peace and contentment within myself but it is so much more difficult than I had thought. I love myself, but I am alone in the world.

I have never had such an emotional few months, and I am so wanting to just be OK again, to be able to sit quietly somewhere and not have a constant stream of thoughts about my past and what I would have done differently; thoughts of him and her, and how I am the one alone. This end, its like nothing I have ever felt before. Everything is over, done, I no longer have that calming, protective presence around all the time. The lover, best friend, partner... its all gone and all that is left this little bit of myself that I dont recognize. I put my entire self into my relationship with him and the rejection, instead of getting easier to deal with over time, is sharpening, hurting deeper down after the initial shock has worn off, hurting in places I never expected. Now I am realizing that not only is he gone, along with the whole life I was living, but I am really, truly on my own.

Every day is different. Some days that thought makes me smile and I get excited thinking about how strong of a woman this is making me, how I will do all the things I want in life without anyone to hold me back. But some days I think back on how safe I felt in his arms.

The silver lining on today's cloud is the fact that I am still only a baby in the world. Twenty three years old and I was madly in love with my dream man for a few years, I learned so much, grew so much, and loved loved loved so much! If I can feel the amazing things that I felt with him when I was so young, I can feel it all again. I will fall in love again someday, all will be ok. Everything is going to be fine.

benirras

I love this island. It is so beautiful here, pine forests, dusty old roads leading to farmhouses and lemon trees growing out of bright red earth and everything is so full of amazing energy and life! The yoga retreat is amazing, with two villas (one is much more expensive and on the other side of the valley) and six pagodas and a calm, peaceful yoga deck to practice. It’s a very different life than I have been leading, just excepting things as they are, living as part of the universe and not needing much, not asking for anything. I do about three or four hours of work a day, five days a week, cleaning the kitchen or mopping the floors or helping make the dinners, whatever. Then it is off to the beach to lay out naked on the rocks around the corner, I have completely embraced this whole Spanish Hippie Culture! There are drummers on the beach most nights, and a massive drum party on Sundays at sunset with hundreds of people drumming and dancing and playing with fire pois. It’s a very special place and I am so fortunate to have found it. My life is on the mend, although still directionless I am not so lost anymore, this is a good place to heal a broken heart.