content. (in the arms of my...bunny?)

Is it possible that I have now slept SIX nights in my comfy double bed, in my little apartment which I have entirely to myself?  "How does it feel to be home?" Ahh yes, the familiar, inevitable, and thoughtful question. Be warned: If you ask me (and please do), you're likely going to get an entirely authentic and entirely non-brief answer, one that I am entirely thrilled to give.  My word of choice remains 'content'.  I've also been saying "zenned out" a lot.  I was content to spend the last 5 days of my trip in Paris. I was content while sitting on the plane for eight hours last Tuesday. And I am content, sitting here in my living room in Waterloo. Are there things on my mind? Of course there are. Do I feel how easy it would be to slip back into life "as it were" and into a number of old patterns that I am hoping to be rid of? Absolutely I do. But I also come armed these days with a fierce determination to bring the spirit of my adventures in Europe to my life in Waterloo.  My mind seems to have chilled out a bit, allowing me to rest, recuperate, process, and actually just be still and accept each moment I am in. I don't exactly know how to articulate this, other than to say that there is a sense of calm about me that I haven't felt in a really (really) long time. So the answer to "Could you have traveled for longer?" and "Are you glad to be home?" is yes. Yes to both, with acceptance and gratefulness for my three months of travelling and self-discovery, and also for my present reality, which is my cozy apartment, my incredible circle of friends, a career that I am thankful for, and my now rooted comfiness in my own skin.

My last day in Paris was everything I could have asked for, and more. With no "must sees", no sense of agenda, I set out to wander an area of the city I had not yet visited.  I sat in several sanctuaries, walked through the lovely Luxembourg Gardens, ate a delicious chocolate croissant (which, in combination with my previous day's baguette, was the extent of French cuisine sampling for this broke traveller), carefully perused my way through a second-hand English book store (while a charming cat purred and rubbed up against my ankles), and allowed myself to get lost.  More importantly, I sat for a good two hours in a delightful and slightly pretentious cafe, drinking my coffee black (as it cost an extra euro for a bit of cream), being served by a man in a tux, and sneaking nibbles from a bun in my backpack, as I was hungry but couldn't afford the pretentious prices.   Here, I wrote a letter to myself: from content-and-drinking-strong-black-coffee-in-a-Parisian-cafe-feeling-confident-and-empowered-Liz, to future Liz - Liz of next year, month, week, or even of the next day.  Abudantly clear that each day was not going to feel as zen as that one did, I was also abundantly clear that my experience of myself and the world while travelling - confident, empowered, guided by intuition and self-love and care, present in the moment, seeking beauty, connected to others while also comfortable in solitude - these things were real and true. I am well aware of my mind's tendency to rationalize away these kinds of beautiful experiences when I feel overwhelmed. So I wrote a letter about it all, from me to me.  It's documented. It happened. 

I will share one final trip anecdote, pertaining to my last evening in Paris, which I had planned to spend at a cafe drinking red wine and listening to live French chanson (at Au Limonaire, a spot Lonely Planet recommended to be a bit off the beaten track). I arrived at this cute, vibrant, artsy little spot at 7:30pm, and though the vibe felt like one I would enjoy, I immediately also got the feeling that there was a secret I didn't yet know, that my presence among these locals was a bit unusual. The music hadn't started yet, and I was being stared at. Endeavouring to remain confident, I sat down, and learned that indeed, on every OTHER night of the week, this is a great  place to come to hear traditional French music.  Mondays, however, feature "La Goguette": a 19th century French tradition, this is a kind of "open mic" night, except that the performers write songs which involve their own original lyrics, set to a familiar tune of their choice.  Traditionally, this form of expression was a context for stating one's strong political/social views in an often satirical and biting sarcastic kind of fashion, and this little group on Monday nights at Au Limonaire is faithful to this tradition.  And. To top it all off, on Monday nights, the kitchen is closed (the bar of course remains open), because everyone just brings an item of food to share with everyone else.

Yep. This is where I found myself. I heard this explanation, and briefly considered leaving, as I felt a bit intimidated by this sacred Monday night French ritual, I had no food to offer, and briefly, I was also a bit stuck on a different sort of image for my final night in Paris. On second thought, I realized that this was clearly exactly where I was meant to be.  No food to offer?  You can sing then, Liz.  And so I got to work, writing lyrics based on the evening's suggested theme, "Ce matin un lapin". There was a fabulous accompanist there, but I much prefer playing for myself when performing, and so I thought about what songs were immediately under my fingers but would also perhaps be remotely familiar to my Parisian audience. Sarah McLachlan's Angel was the first thing that came to mind.  "This morning a rabbit hopped through my yard, and made me think of my love".  Yes, I wrote a love song for a bunny, from a "cold, dark French city", words that I could only pull off because I was fairly certain that I was the only person in the room for whom English was their first language. My poor French introduction and my silly English words somehow endeared me to my French audience, and I was a happy girl to be singing.  And more importantly, I was thrilled to have found this quirky little pocket of French culture, watching individuals of all ages get up and sing lyrics that were clearly more heartfelt than my little bunny ditty, and being part of an audience that was so open and appreciative of each person's offering.

...We'll eat lettuce and carrots all night
It don't make no difference
I never liked steak
Or chicken, or venison, or...rabbit...

There it is, the final anecdote, and the perfect last night in Paris. I got up the following morning, jumped on the metro, and then promptly the wrong train (the first time I had done that the whole trip), but still managed to make it to the airport with loads of time. Oh yes, and I didn't mention that one of the movies I had to choose from on AC881 last Tuesday was the 1986 classic, The Labyrinth.  Dance Magic Dance. Those who know me well will be grinning already.  Two years ago my friends threw me a Labyrinth themed birthday party - that is how much I adore this movie, and watching it while over the Atlantic took our relationship to a whole new level (refraining from reciting every word of its dialogue and singing every word of its songs took a significant amount of self-control).

I've been a bit of a weird hermit since I returned to Waterloo. With the knowledge that my return to work will come soon enough (tomorrow, in fact), I have been staying home (with the exception of doing groceries and laundry, going for jogs, dropping by a couple of friends' places, and seeing my massage therapist (not Josef) this morning), cleaning up my space, reading, talking on the phone a lot, nursing my jet lag, and letting friends come to me. My week has been a constant reminder of how rich in people my life is. Amidst all of this richness in people, I have felt a strong desire to purge my apartment and simplify my life a bit further.  I know that I'm not someone who is bursting with material possessions, as all that I own fits inside my little one-bedroom apartment.  Still, there's something about living out of a backpack for 3 months that is a perfect and poignant reminder of what I need and what I don't need.  Admittedly, having more than two pairs of pants is a really nice luxury.  But I am filled with an urge to de-clutter my space; as one friend put it, I am throwing away my literal baggage now, as I have been throwing away so much of the meta-physical kind over the last few months. 

I've also learned the difference between physical exhaustion and mental/emotional exhaustion (aka burnout), and can see clearly now how much the latter had been a normal part of my day-to-day life.  Sure, I am tired after 3 months, 10 countries, 28 "stops". But I also feel rested when I wake up in the morning, I feel motivated to enter into the day, I feel steady. 

So. How does it feel to be back?  It's true, Waterloo is not as aesthetically beautiful as Paris, the Swiss Alps, the coast of Italy, and so on. And, it's also true, that I'm soon to enter back into a much more predictable way of life - going to work each day, coming home in the evening, staying relatively put in one place for a while.  As I said before though, there's a fierceness to my determination to live my life here and now with just as much intention as I did in the here and now in Europe.  I guess it is still feeling a bit surreal in some ways, this whole business of having more than two pairs of pants to choose from, of not sharing my living space with complete strangers, of being surrounded by that which is familiar. There are certainly many challenges associated with travelling, and travelling-solo, but finding beauty and adventure is not really one of them.  Divine beauty, riveting adventures - these were things I was blessed with on a daily basis, just through the nature of my day to day life.  But finding beauty and adventure, while living intentionally and authentically, within this more "familiar" setting -  this is my work now.  I believe it's possible.   

Wings.  Check.