at end of a journey, with hope and love, we go

I left San Marcos on August 11th. Left a brother and a sister-in-law, left friends, left a boyfriend. I've spent a lot of time thinking about those people, and what role in my life they have played, and who I am now in relation to our lives together.

I wasn't happy when I left Texas. I wasn't where I wanted to be emotionally and spiritually. I had been lost, fighting with myself for a whole summer before the time finally came for me to go.
I went early. I went by myself.

I have found love here in art supplies and guitar lessons, in conversations about life and the world and who we ought to be in the middle of it all, late-night ice cream runs to talk about cutie pies and the places we came from..

And I feel so much more empowered, because I have been shown that all of who I am is important, not just the 'cool' non-embarrassing parts.
Because someone will think that even those things are cool.

Because someone can love the girl who plays Pokemon Blue on her 14-year-old Gameboy color when she feels anxious or depressed.
Someone can love the girl who wants to swap comic books and then talk about them later.
Someone can love the girl collects monocles and maple leaves.
Someone can love the girl who would rather play drunk Scrabble than beer pong, and watch B Sci-Fi horror films and make up life stories about the people walking down the street.
Someone can love the girl that doesn't want or need to end every night drunk or stoned.

And I feel so happy to be aware of the truth in that, and to know that even temporary things can remind you of how wonderful it is to be alive, and that every pretty word in the world is nothing beside a single genuine statement.

Even as the clouds move, the sky remains the same as ever. I will not forget either. I am glad we met.

My time here is coming to an end, but I will always love the people I have known here, and one day I will delight in our paths crossing again.

But for now, there are some things that I must do. My life turns around right now. This is where everything gets better. It has already begun.

if you ever wanted words like flying

let's jump off of things together.

I want nothing more in the world than to jump off of many things with you.

December

In the back of an old school bus painted sunflowers on the side
it is never and always raining inside and out of here
and if happiness is the last truth, let this be a long night ahead
keep us awake, keep us warm, keep us together

if I never told you how I felt about leaving Los Angeles, here it is
a cold-hearted, able-bodied reminder of my past
I gave it a necessary burial, finally, seven years after leaving
and I have no plans to ever go back

And you, swimming in oceans warmer and clearer than the ones I had known
singing songs about the world as it could be while I was stuck in what Is
to free ourselves is a bloody knife and we are all killers
vultures circle miles above us, if you want to think of it that way

I never remember the plans I made in years passed, the little things
like making marshmallows and cleaning out the neglected garden spaces
I never could care about just one thing at a time--
ashes of old notebooks sit in urns along my mantle