Ooooh, vacation. i love it. i have all kinds of new clarity. I even started making jokes. Been way too tense lately, and it's super lame.

Took four days off for a road trip to one of my favourite places in the US - the mountains in north carolina - to see a friend and his partner and their new(ish) baby. i drove out there with one of my favourite people in the world, and we barely stopped talking for the entire 13 hour drive. Seriously, it was non stop. We only listened to one CD, we were talking that hard.

There's a lot to talk about. It seems like an era of roommate living is slowly coming to an end. I famously loathe change, but am starting to feel excited about the prospect of all the things to come. I think I am finally accepting that I can't just keep adding on to what I have. I can't move on to the next without adjusting some of the things in the present. Making room in my life for new things will necessitate some shifting around of the older things.

I often joke about the commune where we're all going to live one day, and really, it's only a half joke. I have been unable to articulate a vision for my life that doesn't look exactly like what i have right now (even with all its flaws), but just MORE. As though somehow I was going to figure out a way to bring my parents closer, my sister and brother closer, and group my friends all in one place. And keep travelling. Oh and someday, kids, probably. And we have fulfilling jobs. And then we all live happily ever after, the end.

Well, it turns out that the commune isn't going to materialize any time soon, and I need to start being more proactive about what my thirties are going to look like. All of this is so hard for me to accept, but I've been lucky enough to have an obscenely long time to sit with it. I no longer jump to feeling bereft when I think of what I will lose. I am finally able to think about all the things I will gain. All this might sound obvious, but this is one of the major ongoing struggles of my life: I hold on to things too hard, even when it's clear they have shifted and that it's time to take a step in a new direction. Historically have gotten around this by planning periodic Very Long Trips, which have usually taken care of the need to consciously make a change; By the time i get back, everything's different and I didn't have to watch it go down. Otherwise I typically leave it to the other person to make the change, and then I adapt (in the most heartbroken manner possible). Romantic relationships, platonic relationships, family relationships... I don't care, I don't want any change.

Not the new proactive me! So i'm thinking specifics. How to move BT and i closer, which will mean some major changes in residence. I will still need to stay here to write my dissertation, (heretofore to be known as That-Which-Must-Not-Be-Named), but maybe it will look like longer visits here^ for BT and longer visits there for me. Which might mean living alone here, if I can afford it, so that he can actually come and stay for a month without major roommate negotiations (although mine have been amazing about long visits, I recognize it might not be ideal for anyone except me).

This all feels right. I do not feel panic. My stomach doesn't hurt. I even feel... excited. About change? That's how i know it must be right.

(^in new orle@ns for now. baby steps.)

7:36 a.m. - 2011-05-23