Being nomadic means most people start conversations by asking where you are or where you've just been. Being nomadic for longer than six weeks means you probably can't answer them correctly on the first try. Especially when you run into someone on the street in San Francisco, someone you'd only expect to see in LA and suddenly you're not sure what year it is, let alone what city you're in. Then you almost get stuck in an unlocked bathroom because the workings of doorknobs have ceased making sense. This is when you start to wonder if the life of an exhausted nomad is for you. I've been moving around a lot, is what I'm saying. I got home from Costa Rica last week. Where home is the Bay Area because my mom is nice about letting her 30-something daughter use her house as storage for her extra clothes. I went straight to a wedding where Carl the Balloon Donkey led the conga line and the bride went crowd surfing. Now I'm in San Francisco before I leave again on Thursday. I'm legitimately concerned that I'll accidentally try to pack for a month in Amsterdam when I'm really going to Portland for a weekend.
My family has been remarkably genial about shuttling me back and forth to the airport. There's something comforting about bookending month-long stays in a foreign country with family members. Especially because they're biologically required to love you even when you're jet-lagged and cranky.
There Should Probably Be a Segue Here. There's Not.
Yesterday, Bob and I launched one of my favorite pet projects, Random Love Punches. I'm staying with Becca for a few days and when I showed her the site, she said, "I like it, but I want the mean version." In two hours, we had its evil twin up and running and I'm pretty sure I like it better than the original for sheer clicking entertainment.
As exhausted and confused as I've let myself become, I'm loving this homeless thing. I love testing new beds and seeing random airports, some of which should not be called airports so much as cement benches alarmingly close to a runway with one plane that looks less flight-worthy than a 1992 Chevrolet minivan. I love being in different places and doing and creating fun things on the fly. I love eating fried cheese and fried plantains and wondering how my laptop got so filthy.
In the midst of trying to track where I am and where I'm going and when I'm going to carve out enough time to work, I don't want to lose sight of the fact that this is exactly the life I wanted for myself. I'm living it. So I'm trying to remind myself daily to stop and look around. To enjoy it, instead of constantly looking toward the next thing.
It's sunny in San Francisco today. Searching for my third cup of coffee this morning, I remembered how charmed I am by this city. My last day in Costa Rica, I went out to dinner with some friends and we ordered fish and watched the sun set over the ocean. I sat in the audience at the wedding of one of my favorite couples, listening to their vows and thinking, That's the kind of relationship I want one day. I ended up on a friend's couch at exactly the right time for her to have a genius idea that we were perfectly prepared to implement so that the love punches could go all Gretchen Weiners on the internet's ass. Today, we're going to a museum and tomorrow there will be margaritas and fireworks.
So many good things are happening every day and there are so many good things to look forward to. Dear self: Savor it.