symphony of life.

i hope i am truly seeing the stars align, and
not just hoping that i am seeing the stars align.

we turned at a dozen places,
for love is a duel,
and looked up at each other
for the last time.
jack kerouac.

compared to some others, i feel like i am dancing
a different dance through this life.
when i begin to stand still and take stock,
i fear that i want what i don't want to .. want.

but then i remember where and who i am,
who i am becoming,
and that life is not just what it is now.
that this journey is only beginning,
and i have found freedom, hope, and life,
joy, beauty, and most of all, Love,
in this still point of this life.

the colors around me swirl and spin,
coloring in the grey that i once only saw.
they paint a symphony of life
that when i close my eyes ..
the world lights up,
catches me in its twirling grasp,
begging for my attention.
i grab my breath .. this
Love brings me to tears.

[photo credit to blaise vincz.]

[i adore this journey
& my company makes
it all worth it.]

kristinelaine.

except for the point,
the still point,
there would be no dance,
and there is only the dance.
t.s. eliot.

sister winter.

but my heart is
returned to sister winter.

and my friends, i've
returned to wish you all the best.
and my friends, i've
returned to wish you a happy christmas.
[sufjanstevens.]

but seriously,
happy christmas, loves.

kristinelaine.

Vivacious.

Big movements happening in this life.

A week long voyage has brought me back to San Diego, only for me to realize that this is finally my home.

Finally my home.

Who would have thought that I would be saying that about any place?  Flying in from Seattle, my heart jumped for joy as the ocean drew me back west.

But I had this creeping sensation that was burrowing a hole in my heart, a realization that I am being called away from the only place I am longing to stay.

An email today confirmed that.  San Francisco's liveliness and charm, as enticing as it is, pales in comparison to the life I have found in my friendlies here.  But it seems that to San Fran I go.

It's about time that some clarity befits itself upon me.  Even some self-induced clarity.

On to more important matters.  Back to the midwest for nearly a month in the morning, and my heart is trying to keep itself attached and whole as I say goodbye to the most beautiful people in the world.

My heart swells and groans, melts and reforms.  And through it all, I have to believe it is all for something more.

Trying for love,

k.

Roman vagabond.

Tomorrow I begin yet another journey.

At times, wanderlust can be all-consuming. But there are voices calling me to stay, and the lump in my throat is weighing me down.

There is a beauty in a family being strewn across a country. Across a world. But there is a strain when the hands you hold are so far apart. Then there is a choice of where to break.

This just came back to me from one of my very favorite books, Extremely Loud and Incredible Close. It's my heart's whisper at the moment ...

we need much bigger pockets, i thought as i lay in bed ... we need enormous pockets, pockets big enough for our families, and our friends, and even the people who aren't on our lists, people we've never met but still want to protect. we need pockets for boroughs and for cities, a pocket that could hold the whole universe.

Can someone just invent one of those, please?

This is all very dramatic. Too dramatic for my taste.

So I'm off to Omaha, Salt Lake City, Seattle, San Diego, San Francisco, and all the streets, highways, and smiles between. The symphony of the universe keeps unveiling itself to me, twisting and dancing in the melodies it paints. It leaves me in wonder and awe, drawing me in.

That's why I love.
It's what I love, how I love.

It is Love.

Road, play me a song.
Adventure, sing me a sonnet.
Life .. dance with me.

k.

A thought for every second in the day.

So here's a lowdown on the next two weeks.

Until Tuesday .. San Diego loving. Soaking it in.
Tuesday .. flying to Omaha.
Wednesday/Thursday .. driving to Seattle. With a bestie from college.
Friday .. old company and laughing at it all. Back to SD.
Saturday/Sunday .. San Francisco joy!
Monday .. San Diego goodbyes. Shit.
Tuesday through middle of January .. Midwest.

I am about to make a giant triangle across the western part of the country. And I am afraid it will be a whirlwind of relationships. At this point in my life, I am excited to see faces again, to laugh and remember.

But ... I am wanting - no, I am aching - for the real stuff. For the deep relationships that I have pushed away for so long. That have been so easy to pretend aren't necessary, aren't important.

Goodbyes are beginning to be what breaks me down. And it is almost too much to bear to think about coming back to San Diego in another month and these faces won't be here.

Again.

I am so blessed. I really am blessed. I could not be more grateful for the life I lead and the beauty that my friends infuse into my life.

But I need them close to me. I need people who aren't going to leave. And I won't leave them. But I am forgetting how to have those relationships, and I don't know when I myself will be staying in one place.

Do you ever have points where life just seems to wear you down? Not because anything is too bad, but perhaps simply because there are too many possibilities? There is too much to be lost when everyone says goodbye?

My real search for community is only beginning. A solid, non-transient one. The intimacy I fear is the stuff that is necessary and beautifully difficult. It's been both too easy and too hard to put that off.

And there is that one that I will miss more than the rest. I am tired of just forgetting possibilities with him, too.

Ugh. Life keeps messing with me. And the other people I love. It just gets exhausting, seeing everyone struggle. I know, I know that it has its beauty. That these points are necessary. There are just those days that remind you that life isn't the picture you have wanted it to be for so long. That there are struggles and it is ok to feel deeply about those struggles, both your own and those of the ones you love dearly.

I am waiting for a day when questions cease and my mind can rest ... but until then, adventure beckons once again. And like always, I cannot say no.
k.

six word #two.

Tea.
Scheming.
Baking.
Laughing.
Grateful.
Alive.

Flying a little.

Community. Here we go again.

I feel like this is a subject that I have so often written about. So often dwelled upon. So often dreamed about. And it is quite often that I have experienced community within an arm's reach of Invisible Children's tight grasp. It's always beautiful.

As I have mentioned in the past, it is a community that I have come home to not once, not twice, but many times. The first summer was an experiment in social skills and stretching boundaries. I found love like I had never experienced before. The second summer, damn it, my family began taking shape. Coming back as a roadie, my brothers and sisters took form, and within my team, I have three friends who I will never let go of. They are my rocks and I will forever be changed because of them.

This time, I am on the outside. I am not a roadie, I am not staff. I am not even a consistent volunteer. Instead, I am one who has been a part of this community in the past, and simply now, a friend. But it is with this group that I have found something that seems so rare these days: true friends. They are family, yes, but they are friends foremost.

We sit and talk. We have long conversations, whether it be over white russians, beers, tofurkey, pie, or the traditional cup of coffee, they are beautiful. I have found laughter and joy, been a shoulder and needed one myself, and have been brought out of myself once again.

Community.

The past few days, I have been dwelling on the idea of being created for community. Let's begin here. I don't have a job. And what I do for recreation is during the day, while the world is at work, I sit at home and search for jobs. Often for hours at a time. Social networks seem enticing but not in the least fulfilling, as they are the connection to the world that revolves without my presence. As I am reunited with my roommates, friends, whoever, I become alive again.

I am created for community. You are created for community.

It's funny how things fall into place. As I have been dwelling on this, I have been also remembering the community I came from in Uganda. And oh, it was wonderful. And man, do I miss those beauties. But I am also looking toward the future. As the intentional community we all dreamed of in San Diego is falling apart quicker than I could have ever imagined, what is being revealed underneath is suddenly taking form in something very different but equally as beautiful. And real.

Now I am faced with the eternal question: Do I stay or do I go?

Nothing in San Diego has worked out for me. In the past six months since being here, I have held one job, and working at Blockbuster for that month was hardly what I want to do with the rest of my life. Let alone for another week. Uganda fell into my life, and I am eternally grateful. For the first time in perhaps a year, I feel as if I have some direction, some idea in the shape of a dream to chase. The only thing left for me in San Diego is my friends. My group of dreamers. My precious idealists who have changed me forever. Who I want to stay with forever.

The world is calling me away. The appeal of another part of the country, another job, something that I actually want to do. And it's killing me. Because all I want .. is my community. Is that enough to keep me in this place? Should it be enough?

Or am I now designated to bring this light somewhere else?

There are no easy answers in this world. I am discovering that more and more and more. And as beautiful and intriguing as that is, the answers seem to break my heart at the same time.

I never thought it would be so difficult to leave a place. But I guess .. I guess when a place, when these people, have made me into who I will be forever .. they stick with you.

I am becoming myself. I have never felt so strongly about this as I do now. I thought I grew so much on the road, and that is the truth. But the six months after that intense period have shaped me even more than I could have imagined.

I need His light to be my guide. I think I forget what that looks like ... He is becoming more and more the epitomy of Love to me. And if all my doors lead to Love .. well, I think that is the Freedom we are called towards.

Ladies and gentlemen,
it's time to fly.
No. No.
It's time to soar.

kristinelaine.

to have faith is to have wings.
[j.m. barrie]