What now, T.S. Eliot?

Do I dare 

Disturb the universe?

In a minute there is time

For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.

...so asks T.S. Eliot, in his poem "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock." And I, in turn, ask myself, "Do I dare?" This question can mean so many things. When is a risk beautiful? What is freedom? On how many levels can one rattle the foundations of this universe and perceive new inklings of beauty?

I'm musing about Mr. Eliot because of Major Life Decisions, unsurprisingly. I'm musing because I just decided not to go to Alaska. I decided instead to move home to Eugene, Oregon and overwinter conceivably close to my family, listening to the sound of rain. "WHAT?!?" you ask, "Is this the Caitlin I know, the Caitlin who climbed an Egyptian pyramid in secret and stalked alpaca in the high Andes?" I dunno... the Buddha said that the self is an illusion. I just know that I'm not quite sure what "home" means anymore, and that I've been running for a long time. I know that after I bought my plane ticket to Alaska, things just didn't feel right. I've been to the plateau of Tibet and, spurred by some intangible itch of the soul, sprinted down the Friendship Highway through a nighttime thunderstorm. Everything has been preposterously beautiful, but I feel a bit lost and I can't pinpoint what I'm looking for. Yesterday when I was breaking up clods of earth in the garden beds it occurred to me that I need to be grounded for a while; to get in touch with my roots. 

So I'm going home. 

"Home."

Home?

...to the rain. The Northern Lights will wait.

Time for you and time for me,
And time yet for a hundred indecisions,
And for a hundred visions and revisions,
Before the taking of a toast and tea.

Geography and Other Frontiers

There is something inevitably metaphorical about islands. I mean, to get to the island where I'm currently living, I have to board a ferry and motor across buoyant sea-scapes and gleaming clouds. Then, when I disembark, my feet encounter something new. The secret coves with their purple and orange starfish, the fragrant forests, the gnarled orchards drooping with fruit: they are beautiful in their own right, but, beyond that, they're gleaming with luminous ideas. There's more space here for people to bring their far-flung notions and bring them to life (or cast them out to sea). There's a fierce independence to islands, like their making some sort of noble last stand against the corruption of civilization. I feel like I'm living on a real frontier. And the stark geography can push me to the boundaries of my mind.

Today I walked with some friends down the beach through a fierce gale. I wore rubber boots and tromped through the seaweed while the wind ran like vast invisible herds of horses over the surface of the Pacific. It's fall here now, suddenly--the blustering wind felled pine needles and apples by the dozen. This morning I made the sad discovery that most poems about autumn are terribly preoccupied with mortality. Poets love to muse about fleeting moments and impending frost in the fall. They talk a lot about final flairs and shadows. But I dunno, even in the rain storm I felt a beautiful golden texture to the turning of the seasons. Yesterday I plucked a ripe fig from the orchard, and today I pulled perfect smooth clay from the seaside. Both were malleable and fleshy, earthbound, beautiful. I'm not quite sure what I'm saying. There is still clay under my fingernails, and the fruit is ripe. I feel optimistic about autumn.

Pesto and Walruses

So I made 68 cups of pesto. If you are curious, 68 cups is equal to 4.25 gallons. I realize that this is a great feat, and I am proud. In Wisteria, the cabin where my friend Kendra and I reside, you can still catch the occasional fragrant whiff of basil.

It is worth mentioning that I met Kendra at a national park in Patagonia (for a reflection on that experience, you can glance at this post from the archives). We last parted ways in Bolivia, and then I sent her this e-mail saying, "So I'm going to this island in the fall... wanna come?" And, miraculously, it worked out. I picked her up in Seattle and now we're here, unfathomable latitudes from our meeting-place, laughing in the basil-patch. And we also happened to meet a bunch of Chileans on the ferry and practiced our Spanish in the open water at ridiculous odds.

Being back at camp Indralaya is beautiful. It's been exactly a decade since I was last here, and I can feel the presence of the past selves of my childhood here--the Caitlins that believed in magic. I've been meditating every morning with the resident managers and my co-volunteers, listening to vast silence punctuated by the occasional airplane or soulful loon. I've been thinking a lot lately about the crazy mental barriers we so often insist on building... you know, barriers against freedom, or magic, or love. I've been thinking about breaking them down.

Oh and NEWS FLASH: I've been informed of an unfathomably exciting volunteer opportunity. Apparently a marine wildlife rescue center outside of Anchorage, AK is currently seeking volunteers to spoon with baby walruses. I am not kidding. There are baby orphan walruses that need humans in walrus suits to cuddle with them. I'm currently scheming ways to incorporate walrus-cuddling into my Alaska winter. It just makes sense.

Forward ho!

So after a bit of a hiatus, I've decided to resuscitate this narrative. Because I'm a million percent convinced that I can find something beautiful in every moment that's worth writing about and reflecting on. And, of course, my life continues to be ridiculous. I'm trying on questions and lifestyles like so many hats; traveling still; trying at once to figure out my future and rejoice in the present moment. Reminding myself that bewilderment is sacred.

So here's the lowdown of what has happened in the four month gap since I last wrote: I flew from Peru to Minnesota, where I visited Carleton for about a week, and then I flew to Seattle and took the train down the Pacific coast to my hometown of Eugene, Oregon. There I used my dwindling funds to purchase a car (a 1995 Subaru, Delilah), and proceeded to drive down the interstate to my summer job in the mountains of Southern California. After spending 11 crazy/wonderful weeks working with kids and reveling in starlight, I drove back up to Eugene by way of San Francisco, said "Hey," and then promptly filled Delilah's trunk to the brim with anything I could possibly ever want and drove up to the San Juan Islands in Northern Washington. I'm currently living on Orcas Island, working at a beautiful camp where I used to come when I was young. I'm making pesto, drying plums, eating ripe figs off the tree... and in my spare time applying to graduate school. Days ago I accepted a job working with sled dogs in Alaska for the winter, and that's another adventure looming on the horizon. The Northern Lights.

The other night I was sitting at the beach at Indralaya, the camp where I'm working, with my co-interns. We watched the sun sink and the almost-full moon rise, marveling at the way celestial reflections slither on the ocean without ever moving. Then, one by one, bioluminescent particles came to life in the tides. The little lights were a violent shade of aqua, and they darted about almost playfully -- they kissed and swirled, and then, without warning, extinguished. I've had Joni Mitchell's "Circle Game" stuck in my head incessantly since my arrival on the island, and I can't get over the smell of things. I'm excited about everything unfolding (with a healthy amount of fear and confusion for spice).

So that's that. It's all boundless, and I'm writing again. Stay tuned for stories.