places

This is not the first time we've been homeless, but it is the first time we've been wandering with no solid decision on where to land. It's the most I've ever thought about place - how we define ourselves by place and are shaped by it. I cherish new places, being wooed by the tantalizing ones and coaxing beauty from the mundane ones, and wondering all along what makes a particular place home to people. I wouldn't make a good longterm homeless person. It has been just less than a year of traveling, and I am yearning for home.

We watched Into The Wild tonight at the theatre. There were scenes from many places we've been, places that have defined us, like the Northern California desert, the bottom of the Grand Canyon, campsights with other road rats, and most movingly, the mountains of Alaska. When I saw footage of the land, of caribou, snow, fireweed, and moose, my heart swelled with love and loss, fullness and emptiness. I miss her! Jason leaned over and said, "Let's go back. Right now."

We have so many ideas of what to do next in life, but unless they involve Alaska, they don't feel very permanent to me. Alaska's vastness is hard to be away from, especially now, when we drive for hours and are never out of identical suburbs. Alaska represents for me independence from the conveniences of society that insulate people from anything raw and real and enduring. And yet, people must be okay living out east here, because 2/3 of the US population is within a 500 radius of DC. I saw that in a pamphlet so it must be true.

Here are a couple of places that make life okay for now: the first two are at Catoctin National Park yesterday, and the last is today in Bethesda.