Pumpkin Takes on California

I give you Pumpkin's first ocean-encounter.  She confused sand for snow and ate a ton of it.  She puked and pooped piles of sand for the next day. Gross. 

My recent trips to California have been both physically and emotionally draining.  They are a black and white, face-to-face, smack in the face by reality that Nate now lives in California, and I now live in New York.  It's a simple concept, yet somehow continues to pull the rug out from under me over and over again.

I'm here. In New York.  I live here with my dog Pumpkin.  My job is here and this is my "home", however recently things have felt strikingly similar to Fall 2007, the year I left California and moved to NY on my own for the first time.  I had to find a new grocery store, new friends, and create a whole new life.  Little did I know I'd be doing this 4 short years later all over again, in the same city, ironically enough.

I spent the weekend in a little studio by the ocean.  So close that I could hear the ocean as I slept at night.  Granted, the carpet has a cigarette burn and the bathtub is less than desirable, but this little studio apartment just over an hour from LA and just under 3 hours from the place I was born and raised has more love and more of a sense of family than I have ever experienced in my life.

But I'm here. In New York, in Brooklyn.  Still here!  And I'm here for a reason, until further notice, that is.  So I need to be here, enjoy this uncomfortable chapter I'm in at the moment and take it for what is it.  Finish the 300 hour program, which fulfills me enough to keep me here.  And continue to ride the roller coaster and be present with whatever life has to throw at me.

My favorite yoga teacher once said "if we broaden our sense of who we are, we might surprise ourselves".  I wrote it down after class, I loved it so much.  Lately I've been trying to broaden my sense of sense, my sense of what I want, where I want to live, what I want my future to be.  I'm trying to loosen my grip on what I "need" in every sense of the word.  I'm trying to relax a little and be ready for whatever life has to throw at me.   I think this is an excellent thing, by the way.  Most people get more hardened and stuck in their ways with age, but I'm trying to become less so.  Because if we broaden our sense of who we are, we just might surprise ourselves.