Calwell: Happy Traveler

I feel like I belong here; I feel wanted.

On my last day near Caldwell it is this feeling that worries me most. I came to this journey with the understanding that disaster would in fact be ideal. That if things were to simply fall apart I could walk away clean knowing that it didn’t work and feeling proud that I tried. That is not the case. I, the traveler, now have some fear of getting back on the road. I want to stay.

But there’s some falsehood here, some naivety that I can no longer stomach. There is helplessness in that statement that I know is untrue and limiting. This fear of leaving rings of the same idealized view of love I’ve had since I was young; the belief that love is selflessness. That belief has led me to pain and attachment I no longer wish to feel. I reject those beliefs as a comfortable and unrealistic simplicity and as a lie. I rather choose to dig deeper, to remove myself once more and try to see things as they are. I know this will come with time and distance but I wont wait for either. I didn’t make this journey to wait for an answer; I made it to shake my soul.

After five incredible days there is this seed of an idea that tells me not to stay and that we are not right for each other. Why? I’ve been happier these five days than any five days in recent memory and yet something is off. Perhaps the very history that brought us here is the reason. I simply know too much. Too much about her, about myself and about us. We’re very good at making each other happy, I’m just not sure that’s enough. Maybe it’s her. I don’t think she pushes me to be a better person, more creative, open and confident. I feel like a better person around her because I’m happy and with happiness I can afford to push myself. But I don’t think I feel the push I want from her. Maybe I need someone to challenge me more. Is it me? Have I become a traveler, looking for more adventures? These few days have certainly been an adventure but a future with her may look all too familiar to me. And maybe that scares me. Maybe the missing piece is mystery.

I’ve heard people say things like "what are the chances you met your soul mate at fifteen" but I don’t believe in that. I don’t believe age matters when it comes to compatibility and I’m not sure I believe in soul mates. If it works it works. We work but maybe just ninety percent. Look, these past five days were a petri dish. In that time no single organism could have formed, rather a colony built of a spattering of feelings and images; the sum from which I hoped to decipher some answers. Perhaps, if given time the finally pieces of our relationship, the last ten percent, would bloom. Maybe that relationship would foster enough mystery for me to hold on to and she would learn to provide the push I need to keep growing and I would learn to balance comfort and exploration. But when I think about the way things are right now I can’t help but imagine a planet devoid of life; an empty landscape where those special circumstances that allow elements to come together and seemingly breath something out of nothing just cannot occur. Maybe that’s just what it's like to be with someone who’s already in a relationship.

“Perhaps this is why men of great curiosity choose to study either life or love, because it is the creation of something from nothing”