I'm an Astronaut

[Written in June, posted in August. Thought about all the time]

I'm riding my bike on a Sunday night between two blond, free-spirited and open-hearted Brooklyn babes with an iPhone sitting in my bike basket blaring this song as we ride through Brooklyn. We are riding toward the Manhattan skyline with a pink sky illuminating in the background, and SS says the thing my dad always said about this kind of sky: "Red sky at night, sailors delight. Red sky in morning, sailors take warning." I smile. I feel home.

I'm in the front seat of LS's red Pontiac Grand Prix with my outdated iPod in hand playing all of our old favorite jams. We are driving though new, yet familiar streets of Kansas City toward a beautiful Catholic church for a beautiful Catholic wedding. Though our seat belts restrict our dancing, our voices are loud and free and slightly off key. Drives and jams were always our thing. I feel home.

I'm unpacking my suitcase on a Sunday night and picking up my disaster of a bedroom when KS stops over after work to debrief about both of our weekend travels. We sit in my bed with a bowl of green grapes between us sharing all our secrets and reflections and confessions of the past 5 days. I feel home.

I call my mom, and we talk about plans for upcoming South Dakota adventure. We talk about bon fires and boat rides and laying under the sun for hours at a time. I can hear Blue Dog Lake. I can smell fresh walleye. I can see for miles and miles along highway 19. I feel home.

I'm at a garden party in Brooklyn drinking rum out of a cliche party cup with new friends and old friends and a hammock in the background. I laugh and laugh and laugh and feel so much love. An Asian guy named Johnny who is manning the grill brings me a plate of grilled asparagus and pineapple. I eat it with my fingers thinking how sweet this whole night tastes. I feel home.

I feel home here, and I feel home there. I live and travel between two extraordinarily different planets, and it's lovely and wild, but it's also exhausting on both physical and emotional levels. I'm a girl who loves energy and mayhem and spontaneity. I'm also a girl who loves simplicity and tradition and stability. I love gravity, but I also love to float.