Written for an Indralaya Publication:

I grew up coming to family camp at Indralaya with my mother and brother. I vividly remember the sense of magic that permeated my experience of this place: we would always stay in Apple Cabin, and the carpets of my secret workshop that I built during guided meditations were deep purple. All year long I would look forward to painting my nails for the Sock Hop, or watching my intricate beach mandala vanish in the tide. That was back when I thought that “ferry” and “fairy” were the same word. It was easy for me to see the halos around trees.

A decade has intervened since my last visit to Indralaya. I started High School and then I graduated; I enrolled in college and emerged with a degree in Religious Studies and Neuroscience. I’ve studied in Egypt and Turkey, taught English in Tibet, practiced Buddhist meditation in India, and hitchhiked across South America. I’ve engaged critically with the questions that I find beautiful, been lost and confused, and grappled with the implications of my own freedom. I don’t know about “growing up” but I’m twenty-three now. I’m striving to carve out a place for myself in a chaotic world.

And now, ten years later, I have returned to Orcas Island to spend six weeks at Indralaya as an intern. And it’s beautiful. Again. I meditate in the morning, comparing bells with gulls and remembering the limitations of my analytical mind. I’ve laughed in the basil patch, made gallons of pesto, and stuck my face into plum trees in search of their perfect purple fruits. There have been moments where time collapses, and where I sense the presence my childhood self—the girl who believed that anything is possible. After being swept away in a whirlwind of continents, résumés, and unanswerable questions, it is so relieving to plunge my hands into freshly turned earth and breathe.

Of course my path is still loosely defined, and my thoughts still get the better of me. But my hands are stained with beet juice, and the other day I watched bioluminescent lights kiss and spin in the nighttime ocean. I’m remembering exactly how deep a moment goes. Although many years separate me from wide-eyed childhood wonder, Indralaya continues to be a beautiful place for me to plant my feet and remember my spirit.