Silly Aimee, Feet Don't Grow -- Grand Junction, CO

Good Earth tea wafts fragrant steam under my nose.

The black, yellow and red striped cup is just the right size for cuddling.

My favorite blanket is wrapped around my waist like a skirt and I sit in my favorite corner of the leather living room sofa.

The clock ticks loudly. I love that it's a world map clock, even though it feels slightly out of place in a house where people are so settled.

Slightly out of place. 

I've been struggling with feelings of "slightly out of place" for the past month and a half.

But I always feel slightly out of place. In other countries, it's exciting to sense all the ways in which I don't truly fit -- that's how I discover the shape of my edges. But here... I suppose that the expectations are different. I don't expect my personality to smoothly slide into Istanbul. I expect a bit of pounding me flat or greasing edges or trimming back a side or two. And if I opt out of changing my shape, it means that I've learned what's important ABOUT me TO me. 

But in the town I called home for seven years? 

I see so many lives. So many shoes I used to wear that don't fit my feet anymore. 

And so many people who are still offering me the same shoes. 

"Silly Aimee, feet don't grow."

"Silly you, shall I show?"

So many lives. God, it's hard to look at some of them. Was that really me? 

I see, "Aimee, the horse girl." 

I see, "Aimee, the Jesus girl." 

I see, "Aimee, the actress."

(Horse girl = lonely girl

Jesus girl = confused girl

Actress = suffocating girl)

I see, "Aimee the perpetual victim." 

I see, "Aimee, that one chick who had the maddening tendency to overreact to EVERYTHING."

I see, "Aimee, the girl who was too insecure to allow herself stillness." 

None of these lives fit anymore. 

Thank god. 

I came across a list of goals I'd written with my older brother. After my traumatic breakups, we'd drink wine, eat cheese and fill papers full of dreams.

I've only achieved one of these dreams. And the rest? Goodness, I'm so not interested anymore. 

I wanted to give Grand Junction a blank slate.

But blank slates aren't so easy to obtain/maintain when those around you can only see your old shoes clomping around with old yous.

*clomp, clomp, clomp*

I've spent the last 16 months learning about who I am through the eyes of people who only see me in the now. 

But in this place? 

I'm relearning who I was. 

*clomp, clomp, clomp*

Perhaps the lesson here is to flip through those angsty Jesus journals and those lonely horse girl photos and find some peace about it all. Put those old shoes to rest without resentment, judgment, sadness or disgust. 

If I can be compassionate with myself now, I should be compassionate with myself THEN. 

I had a painful conversation with an ex wherein he told me I was completely the same. Nothing had changed.

*clomp, clomp, clomp*

"If we're going to have any sort of relationship, you need to allow me the space to change. You need to allow me to be a different person from that girl who left on an adventure a year and a half ago. If you can't do that, then I'm not interested in being around you."

*clomp, clomp, cl --*

"Okay."

An insightful friend helped me to understand and not to take personally the attachment of others to my old shoes.

"It's like cilantro. I hate cilantro. If I go to a restaurant and order a plate of chicken and it arrives with cilantro all over it, I'm going to ask them to send it back and fix it. So they take it back. They change the sauce. They get rid of the carrots and celery and give me peppers and aubergine. Hell, they even change the chicken breast for a duck breast. But... they leave the cilantro. So I still hate it and feel like it hasn't changed."

When people tell me I haven't changed, I'm going to try to see the whole duck. 

See the whole duck, Bourget. See the duck. In yourself and in others. Get your tastebuds off the cilantro and see if you can better understand the people around you NOW. 

*sigh*

This whole beginner's mind business is SO much easier when I'm actually a beginner. Blurgh. 

I leave for Mexico in two and a half weeks.

I'm prepared, but not.