Well, hell.
You know, when little girls are growing up, learning to spin dreams like Rumpelstiltskin's gold off the spinning wheel of fairy tales, we imagine True Love. And it's true, as we get older, we have to shed the skin of expectation and hope that comes with all the bite-sized morals of these bygone stories.
Sure, they taught us to be bold, to be kind, to be hopeful, to be industrious. Unfortunately they also taught us the myth of the One True ______. The one true love; the one true home; the one true calling, the one true job, the one true meaning of life that was custom crafted just for me and will bring me fulfillment and joy.
I don't doubt that there are some women out there who succeed in finding and attaining a One True or two.
But boy, am I not one of them.
I'll leave a number of the One Trues aside for the time being, because I only have so much battery power. What is particularly afflicting me right now, today, in this very moment, is the question, "Just where do I belong?"
They say Home is Where the Heart Is. But what if your heart flits about like an adventurous sparrow, swooping and alighting in a million incongruous places? What if, with the intent of finding a One True, you instead begin to rack up multiple True, Toos?
I don't think I thought a lot about rolling back into Boulder. I mean, I told everyone I was excited about revisiting this place, but mostly because my mind was busy with other things and I hadn't really had an internal pow-wow to determine my thoughts and I had to say something and, "Gee, I'm super excited," sounded adequate and place-holderish enough to persuade inquiring minds to move on.
And now here I am, and 27% of my brain is saying, "Well, you needn't really leave. You could just come back; come home." And that's silly to me, because Atlanta should feel more like home than Boulder does, right? Or maybe no; maybe Atlanta is where I grew my wings but never really used them, and maybe a place cannot be a True, Too until you've struggled and ached and been lonely there, and discovered and dreamed and learned there.
What on earth is it that I want? I mean, the overwhelming irony is, of course, that not having an answer to that question is what brought me here in the first place. And although I didn't find the answer to that inner ringing What while I was here, I did learn to be okay with that unknown state of being.
And I left this place because it didn't have everything. It didn't have the theatre and music and opera and dance just a few blocks away, and it didn't have grand old buildings, and museums with an un-memorizeable catalogue of works. It didn't have the sheer number of friends that Philly has - my people who know me better than I know myself. It didn't have the music of St. Augustine's, and I never would have sung for the Pope if I lived out here. But what wonders this place holds, including a wondrous part of my soul that melted into the earth here for one very pivotal year.
At the very least, perhaps seeing the mountains, and feeling this high-altitude sunshine, and basking in the happy smiles of the denizens here, and seeing bikes and books everywhere I look, has reminded me of a lesson learned that had begun to fade: that life is what you make it, and while it can be challenging, it isn't meant to be a challenge to truly live.
Home is where the heart is – but maybe some of us have the unhappy pleasure of finding home in too many irreconcilable places.