Sorry I didn't blog

If I had blogged during the last three months you would have heard all about my life.

You would have heard about the end of my time in the south of Thailand, my obsession with diving, the thrill of doing a night dive surrounded by bioluminescence, the arrival of my mom and dad in Kho Panangan our time together sunbathing along the picturesque, white sand, turquoise water beaches, caving in the Ko Sok national park, rock climbing the limestone buffs in Railay (one of the top ten rock climbing locations in the world), and touring Bangkok in a whirlwind, smog filled, two days, my stressful bout of “they’re-not-going-to-let-me-on-the-flight” standby-itis in Japan, and, at last, my arrival home.

I would have written about the mixture of emotions that comes with returning to a place that you so deeply love and leaving behind a place that taught, thrilled, and given you so much for three fantastic months, months that have changed you and even make home seem different.

You would have heard about reunions with friends and family, the constant retelling of my journey, the shear pleasure of being in the familiar again, the pangs for pad thai, my somewhat successful attempts at cooking curry with the pastes I bought back in Chiang Mai, fantastic times with the friends I missed so much while away, another round of goodbyes as they all went back to school, and the nagging anxiety that began to creep in of what I would do next.

I would have told you about how I filled my time with a new passion, guitar, and all the time I spent learning Dixie Chicks, Taylor Swift, Bob Dylan, among tens of others, all the while annoying the hell out of Josh with all the singing and playing. I resumed work with Teens Turning Greening, helping to coordinate for a new initiative called BYObag, an effort to ban plastic bags and tax paper bags in Marin County, and organizing the National Summit. I babysat. A lot. I did yoga and went to the gym. I visited friends at their colleges on some weekends. I started knitting again and read. A lot. I cooked. I had a wisdom tooth (bottom right) pulled and spent a week in bed watching a British TV series from Nexflix. The anxiety of the unplanned, the unsure, crept a little deeper, then a little deeper still, and all this did was make me want to think about it less and cook yellow curry.

Next you would have heard about my epiphany moment, something I attribute, oddly enough, to knitting. I could not do it anymore. I could not spend the next three months knitting, I decided. After all, what would I do with all those scarves?

I would have described the lightness that followed, the excitement of knowing there was something ahead that would thrill, awe, teach, and excite me in the same way Thailand had, and the planning. Awe, the planning…. Do you know how much fun there is in buying a Lonley Planet guidebook and equipment at REI?

You would know how I am about to spend my next three months.

On Sunday I fly to Lima, Peru with my mom. We will travel together around the county until the 17th of April, when she flies home and I fly to Ecuador. I am going to spend a month in Quito, studying Spanish and living with an Ecuadorian family. Finally, I am taking a month long course in sustainable agriculture on an organic farm. Words cannot describe my excitement.

If I had blogged during the last three months you would have heard all about my life. Sorry, I didn’t blog. :)