change begins.

so the adventure has ended.
an era has ended in my life.
and i am not sure what to do now.

i am home for a couple of weeks, which i suppose is a good thing. it is beautiful to see my family again, and i am excited to see my friends throughout the midwest. truly.

but to wake up in the morning - or afternoon - and not have anything to do, not have my dear friends to turn to, not have any adventure to begin, is more than slightly overwhelming.

for the past four months, i have either woken up in a house of over fifty people, in a stranger's home that is housing my three closest loves, or in a car with three incredible friends. believe me when i tell you that waking up alone and without this close, tight-knit group is much, much harder than i anticipated.

i discovered while on tour that i want to be around people who make me alive. i need it in order to grow. i need to keep growing, to keep being challenged, to be around the people who do those things to me. here at home, i hate to say it, but i am not around those people. i have friends that i will visit that wake me up in certain areas of growth and in my life, but i am too easily complacent here. it is too simple for me to slip back into a period in my life that i simply do not want to revisit.

but it is not home that i fear the most, as it is here that i am only visiting. soon i will return to san diego for an untold amount of time, and it is there that i am seeking refuge and solace in order to process this life i have lived for the past few months. and it is here that i hope to continue to grow and seek guidance for my future.

but again ... i want to be around those who make me alive. who make me grow. who make me ... me. but i fear that i have lost those people. one has gone to the desert: my source of comfort and wisdom. another has gone to san francisco: my source of challenge in knowledge and the way i act. and yet a precious another has retreated to the central valley of california: my source of joy, growth, frustration, and life.

so herein lies the dilemma. i can follow them. i really can. i am not connected anywhere, i have no commitments, save an apartment that i have already warned the residents that i may bail on. i have no job, no family, no real set of friends there.

or i can make my own life. i can separate myself from them, let them be themselves, and therein become myself ... in a way that is separate from them.

i know what i would like to do. it is so easy to be a leech. it is so easy to be the one that doesn't create her own path.

it is so simple to be that girl.

but then something can backfire. they may not stay there. i may rediscover yet again that they mean more to me than i mean to them. and then i may discover what i am realizing now - that i need to be my own person.

but how do i stay in their lives? i ten to be a little overbearing ... i tend to miss people more than they miss me. i tend to hurt ... and i ache right now. ache so much.

i miss them.

in the airport on the way home, a dear friend said to me that yes, this is difficult, and yes, this is a crazy transition. but to take comfort in the fact that God is a God of change.

damn it, ad, let me mope.

but i don't want to leave this era behind. but i must. someone must take my place in his life. and his. and hers. and that sucks. where will we all be a month from now?

i need you guys.
i miss you guys.
i love you all so damn much.
i am hurting without you.

it is time to begin a new era, but i am not sure what that will look like. all i know is that i must begin to live more intentionally, because i know that it is going to take more effort than ever to continue this growth. to not slip back into who i was before. because that darkness scares me. and i must begin to become myself. or continue becoming myself.

the processing has begun.

off to eat with my mother.
k.