I love this.

I live almost exclusively in the future. That is, in plans and dreams. In possibilities and abstractions.  At least, I did until last March. That set a course of alternate wandering and waiting, running and resting. I still try to live in the future. It is still where I derive meaning from. The only difference is lately, I have been rather unsuccessful. Still, I try.

And I wonder if that is as it should be. At the same time, I wonder if I can change that. My curiosity pulls me forward. I want to prove myself. Prove myself what? To whom? I am beginning to recognize that in this place, this desert I am being given a mirror that could show me what particles and pieces make and govern me. In this desert, it is becoming more difficult to divide what I want, what I fear, and what I believe God has for me. I find myself stopping puzzled, trying to remember, "did he really say that?" ...or was that some treacherous, false hope? Was it confidence or pride that led me to the decisions I have made?

I think I want to prove to myself that I can be happy, that I can find contentment. I think it terrifies me to give up on being a mechanic because it feels like putting myself further away from flight school. And flight school has been the goal for so long now that I can no longer imagine a future without it. I think I would like to teach flight lessons. 

I think I want to prove to myself that I can contribute to society, can take care of myself, and can be content all at the same time. Content. I want to know that I won't always be looking for something more, that my identity is not in the movement, the striving, the success, or the forward momentum. 

I want to prove to myself that I am capable. Capable of what? Of recognizing when I have enough. Of stabilizing in some way. Of success without greed. Of achievement without selfish ambition. 

And I think I want to know that it was not a waste, the path I chose. I want to know that I chose it for sound reasons, even if I could not always explain them. 

Most of all, I want to solve my paradox. That is this: that I am awed by and indeed ache for adventure yet I was born feeling already old and desiring a small life. How does one pair adventure with a small life? Do I want adventure because I am irresponsible, young, or foolish? Do I think about it to distract myself from monotony? (Why do monotony and routine seem as evil tyrants to me?) Conversely, do I desire a small life because I lack confidence? (I do lack confidence you know, except for very brief moments of boldness.) Do I want something small because I can control it? Ah, control! Is that what this is all about? Am I at war with myself seeking both to be in control and to lose all control at once? 

Possibly. 

Probably. 

I would do that to myself. 

It may seem easy enough to chide me with the advice to give control over to God. But really, what does that mean? What does that look like? And what if I have misunderstood God all of this time?

Yes, I am at war with myself but with the best intentions. 

I have begun to pray for solid ground to find my frantic feet.

On a totally unrelated note:

One day at a time. One. Without worry or an unrestful eye on all the rest of the days that are likely to follow today.

This is not the first time I have been taught this lesson. This is, however, the first time I have felt the least bit successful in learning. I know what it is like to suffer because I am holding all of my days like hot water in hands that were never made for such a thing. I have often recognized this scalding even as I persist because I did not know what it was to let go.

Success feels different than I would think. There is no victory celebration, but there is also no feeling of exhaustion from having arrived too late. It may sound simplistic but all I have felt is ease. To be sure, the ease is largely due to the previous struggles, the wrestling of my will, the learning of foreign movements. And yet, I am surprised. There is a lightness to living…and I cannot help but greet it with just a little confusion.

I do not trust things that do not test me. At least, not usually. But this? This is breathing. How could I stop or protest without punishing myself? There is something stronger than relief here. It is rest or peace or something else. I wonder if this is just a season or if that is my distrust talking. I often make life so much harder than it has to be just by trying too hard. It’s kind of funny. I am sure that I will find myself back in that place, but I think I will spend most of the rest of my life trying to figure out how to make this ease flow into the working, planning, and sweating parts of life.

It has been a long journey and I am only just now beginning to feel like I have come home to myself. 

In between boredom and busydom

These days it is harder than ever to get out of bed. My apartment is a great first apartment. It holds myself and my materials just perfectly. It allows me to breathe and I almost always look forward to coming home. But it is not without its quirks anymore than I am. Some of them are endearing, like its will to grow a forest of tomatoes. With the change in the season, I have discovered that my apartment is a bit drafty--though not the draftiest I have known. Moreover, the pilot light in the heater has no desire to stay light. Inside my house is just as warm as outside. And while I am glad that this is true of my apartment in Portland rather than in Montana, I still find it difficult to want to leave my bed. Compounding this feeling is my lack of job, school, or really anything that could motivate me past the initial discomfort.

I am in grave danger of becoming bored. and yet, my body automatically wakes up at 7:30 am with nothing to do. This is a strange time of life. I want to leave and stay at the same time. I am both resting and wearying. My body is restless. It is hard to do manual labor everyday and then just stop for a month. Balance is such an elusive thing. My mind and my body are forever leaving each other behind. Are they supposed to be in step? Sometimes. In the very quiet in between places, I feel as though I have snuck up on myself to be wholly present. It is always a gift when I recognize it. 

It is hard, though, to remember that it is healthy not to be busy but just as healthy not to be bored. In this space before the panic of a new job, I am relearning how to take one day at a time--not because I can't handle planning the future or looking ahead. Rather, because the future is not here yet, is not mine yet. It is hard not to look for change so I can adapt myself around it and plan accordingly. It is hard for me to be truly present. I am so much more gifted with the future. Yet, I am coming to see that the maturity of such gifts comes in being able to stand in the moment. And know when to plan and adapt. For now, I am in the long in between. But soon, I will leave. My task is not to mentally leave before the rest of me is allowed to.

In Search

I love the drive from Portland to Montana and back. The topography changes every 100 miles or so. The gorge. The endless plains and farms. The forest. The mountains. The valley in the hills.


I took too many of these photos while driving.


It is good thinking space though. The way the land stretches before you as if there are no more limits. I wonder at the ease of my vehicle and think back to the days when crossing 600 miles would have taken more than a month rather than a portion of my day. The last two times I have driven to Montana, I have been outrunning the rain. The first time, the lightning and thunder came in a few hours after I did. This last time, the rain took a few extra days on the trip. But it was the same rain. I am sure of it.

When I drive to Montana, I often leave the windows up. That is, until I reach the state line and cross from Idaho to Montana. When the window rolls down, there is an intense blast of pine and cedar. You are in the mountain pass. It is full of spruce and ponderosa. As you descend to the valley and meet the river, cottonwood trees greet you on the wind. I smell them always before I see them. Nothing smells more like home than river and cottonwood. Add the whistle of a train and the rush of water, and I am either profoundly homesick or already home.

Montana feels like home in a way that Portland never will. To start, all of Montana is home, even the places that I have never been to. Yet, Portland is an island inside of Oregon. Moreover, the topography of Montana calls out in the secret language of familiarity. In Portland, there are only places where I have lived and worked and spent my free time. Storefronts, book stores, parks, hiking trails, even grocery stores, but never the ground or sky by themselves. As I leave the Interstate for lesser roads headed to my house, I greet meadows and marshes that have always been empty, cliffs that have lost only a little weight, and lakes and rivers that tell me how much snowfall there was last winter by their wax and wane.

On this trip, I also smell the familiar smell of fire smoke. It reminds me of the summer that so much of the state burned that my uncle came from Arizona with his team of firefighters to help quench the blaze. The weekend that he came to visit our house, he looked so tired. He had aged 20 years in the course of a few weeks. He had hardly slept. It was the first time that I was aware that my uncles were mortal. I was so surprised to see him a few years later and see that he had reclaimed much of the youth that had left him while fighting those fires. That was the summer that the sun turned red from the thick layer of fire smoke--red all day long.

Where I stopped to take these pictures has no name. Only a mile marker on a highway between two small towns. It exists in what you call deafening silence. An orchestra of crickets pulses with such intensity as to cover the sound of approaching cars until they are upon you.

This post is far from finished but I am releasing it. I have fallen behind and it may take many more weeks before I have organized all of the thoughts that are attached to these photos. So, here you go. An abrupt end to my road tripping. One of several sagas in my chosen unemployment.

P.S. This is where my sister first learned to walk.

This woman. This woman is power. I have spent the morning listening to all of her poetry. It only gets better. There is part of me that wants to be her. To have something to say and the fire to get up and say it. But I am quiet and adaptable. I change myself to the situation before I even ask myself if that is what I wanted to do. I often guess what is expected of me wrong but that only makes me change faster the next time. Forming a solid identity is a slow thing. A clumsy thing. A graceless thing. It is so hard to keep trying.

Beet Soup.

Today is beet soup with red pepper and pear. Maybe I will like it. Maybe I won't. We will see. Also, Gregory Porter. 

The week has been a good exercise in the balance of desire and duty. Someday I will get the hang of living in the desert with a mysterious God. A God who desires good so deeply and is just as deeply committed to keeping alive my own ability to desire, even as he trains me to want honest but good things. How to be both unselfish and true to myself? Clumsily at first, that's how.