and the journey leads here

So the other night I'm going through a box and I started doing the terrible, sinkable thing that I swear I actually hate doing. I started reading old diaries. Usually I feel a little embarrassed for myself when I do this, you know, once I'm out of the Big. Gigantic. Thing that I simply had to diary about. Anyway, I was reading my (ahem) diary from right before I left my home state (Maine) to move to California. I had just spent a week alone in the woods and was knee deep in all sorts of grandiose visions of changing the world and being this great activist and learning about permaculture and going to nude beaches; I simply had to move to San Francisco. And I did, despite a temporary glitch of homelessness and oh so little cash. And I met all sorts of creative, earth loving hippy friends. I was gloriously single and right in the full blown midst of total self-recreation, and in reading those diaries....I was pretty cool. I was the quintessential starry eyed 25 year old following the yellow brick road to California.

But in pouring over the pages of my past, I felt like I was reading from the life of some other girl. Not this girl. This meat eating, people magazine reading girl who yes owns cloth diapers for her youngin but can't let go of her poop scoopin Huggies. Who left her massage therapy license in the esoteric world of northern california and traded it in for a nursing degree in the city of Denver. Who could scrape the dust off her backpack with the visa card that paid for the last condo she rented. Who somehow ended up in Denver. Somehow, all of that landed me here.

So anyway, I'm just reflecting a bit. Having a baby sent me for a tizzy because my world suddenly is no longer focused on me. I don't have the freedom of those starry eyed days. I'm married. With a baby. And I'm far, far from home.

But I guess this is what happens. You follow your heart down life's paths and it just takes you where you need to be. Apparently I needed to be here. In Denver. With my new family, who I love more than anything else possible. Life has changed drastically from the crazy 25 year old me. I have some amazing life stories to bring to the table as I begin to raise this small, perfect being. But I assure you, somewhere, somewhere deep inside, that starry eyed girl remains. She's covered with lots of routine and habit, but every now and then she sticks her head out into this slow-paced world. And then you get blogs like these. Oh and lots of Ani Difranco.