I haven’t really been homesick since my fourth grade field trip. But lately, for some reason I can’t make out, I miss my home more than ever.
I miss my mom, and watching her in the kitchen, perfectly slicing vegetables for whatever masterpiece she’d be about to create for dinner.
I miss my dad and his weird ways, and how much more excited he gets about our dog than about us, but that’s okay because I miss our dog, too.
I miss my friends, being able to walk to their houses after dinner and watching Germany’s Next Top Model with their family, sipping way too sweet hot chocolate.
I miss the trees above our house and the lake nearby. I miss the smell of pretzels wafting from the restaurants as I walk my dog past them, trying my best not to let him snatch any food.
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I really miss being able to spend hours and hours in the barn, riding and taking care of my horses, taking them on long trail rides until the sun sets and it gets chilly.
There are many things, however, that I don’t miss. I don’t miss the people I used to go to school with, their constant judgement and disapproval. I don’t miss the ugly, gray parts of Germany, and god, I don’t miss not having air conditioning in the summer.
I guess being homesick is something natural, and in a sense I like how much it connects you to home. But gosh, I wish it would just stop.
As each day gets closer and closer to June 1, and the months pass, my heart yearns for summer to finally happen.
Today was the first sunny day in California for weeks, and as I lied by the pool with the sun beaming in the sky and minimal clouds in the distance, I imagined myself at the beach in front of my house, with my sunglasses on and the crashing waves against the sandy shores.
Now, as I accept the fact that I will keep having to imagine my summer days until they actually happen, I will live these daydreams through the stories I write and the dreams that come to me in my sleep.
I can’t write about every single thing I’m excited for about summer 2018, but here are a few:
The concerts. I’m always excited about concerts, but I feel like the shows I go to this year will be exceptionally memorable. I will see G-Eazy for a second time. The show will be in an outside amphitheater, and I will be at the barricade with the hundreds of people who showed up. The stars will be bright, but the streams of neon light beaming from the stage will be even brighter. Then there will be the Warped Tour dates. The days I wake up early and return home late, my body covered head to toe in sweat and dust, my voice will ache along with my legs. Yet as I fall asleep, replaying the memory of All Time Low singing on main stage with the sunset across the horizon peeking over the back of the stage, my mind will fill with memories and my heart full of happiness.
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The beach. Considering I have family both in Santa Barbara and Laguna Beach, I don’t actually spend time on the beach nearly enough. However, this time I hope that changes. I can’t wait to walk down the steps from my house to the beach, lie down my beach blanket and read my favorite book in the sun all day every day. Maybe I’ll go into the water if the waves aren’t harsh, or maybe I’ll get an acai bowl. At the end of the day, I’d head back up to my house with sun kissed skin and beach blonde waves. I’ll wash the sea salt water off my sandy skin, and I’ll curl up under the covers with popcorn, a scary movie, and my dog beside the bed, and I’ll know in that moment that life couldn’t get any better than that.
Lastly, I can’t wait for the freedom. I can’t wait to not have to follow a strict schedule from school, or have my adventures be limited to a mountain in the middle of Ojai. I’ll be free to wake up however early or however late I want. I can watch the sunrise from my balcony, and the sunset from a hammock. I can go take the trolley down to Banzai Bowls and get my favorite acai bowl. I can go to Disneyland or go to the gym. I can take trains up to LA to visit my friends, or travel to different beaches to watch the fireworks on the Fourth of July. The possibilities are overwhelmingly endless.
June is a long time away. I should be focusing on APs and English essays, but summer please come sooner. I’m waiting for you.
Looking back, I think I could have fallen in love with you.
And I think that if I let myself I probably still would.
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But now things are different and you’ve met someone who you seem to love even though you don’t talk about her much.
I wonder if you ever think of me that way anymore. I know you used to.
For a while I thought every word that came out of your mouth was arrogant. The few words we exchanged in passing made me sad, and I wondered why you were so polite to everyone but me. I thought that I would never know you the way I used to and I missed that. But now I realize you probably just said those things because you missed me too.
I forgot about how effortlessly eloquent you are. I forgot how good you are at communicating and how incredibly intelligent you are. I could listen to you for hours and never be bored.
I forgot how curly your hair gets when you let it grow longer and about the way you gesture with your hands when you get excited.
You reminded me that I don’t care when you laugh at me because I’m just glad that I get to hear your laugh again. You reminded me about how you actually listen to what I have to say, and you actually care.
You told me you wanted to hear me sing again. You said you’re learning guitar now and talked about how we used to play music together. I never told you badly I miss that.
I could see myself loving you someday. I could see myself loving you for a long time.
I’m sorry for the things I said about you. I think it was because I was sad that so much had changed so fast and that inevitably you had changed too. But when it’s just us and when you don’t have to worry if anyone is listening you somehow convince me that you haven’t changed much after all.
I sometimes try to imagine what it might be like now if you never left, but it’s probably better this way.
Maybe we were always meant to love each other but we just missed our opportunity. Maybe someday we’ll still be able to, if we’re lucky.
A few weeks ago I compiled a list of 25 things that make me happy. I’m not in the happiest of moods currently, so I’m creating a sequel in an effort to cheer myself up.
Music – the only thing that I know absolutely makes the world a better place.
The sore dents I get on my fingertips after playing guitar for too long.
Singing harmonies.
Hugs – good, wholesome, all-encompassing hugs.
Seeing my friends succeed.
Having good hair days.
Being proud of something.
Going a week without biting my nails.
Eating passion fruit.
Being able to sleep in, for once.
Having my driver’s permit (and the bragging rights that come with it).
The times when I feel pretty.
How silence isn’t uncomfortable with my closest friends.
Tea tree oil.
Getting buried in sand at the beach with only my head sticking out, and the sand that covers my body being carved into a mermaid.
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Laughing until tears come out of my eyes.
Finding the perfect tree for climbing.
Climbing said tree.
Being barefoot.
The satisfaction of overlooking a valley after hiking all the way up it.
How my nose gets red when it’s really cold out, and I can see my breath in the air.
Being so hot that I can feel the sweat evaporating off of my skin.
The comfort of a cool breeze in the summertime (the best feeling in the world).
Imagine if you could do anything you wanna do, be anyone you wanna be, go anywhere you wanna go.
Where would you go? What would you do?
You always hear parents saying to their children,”you can do anything you want, you just have to believe in it.” My parents never told me that. I’m glad they didn’t. I wouldn’t have wanted them to lie to me.
credit: dressage-news.com
I can’t do anything I want to, that’s simply not plausible. I’m not brave enough to become an astronaut, that’s for sure. I don’t have the time and endurance to practice enough to become a Grand Prix Dressage rider. I definitely don’t have the voice to become a singer, and I’ll never fit the standards to become a model.
But if I could, if I had all these possibilities, what would I do?
I would do everything I know I can’t do. I’d hike up Mount Everest, because why not? I’d ski the Olympic Super-G, race to the podium just for the heck of it. I’d start a band and travel around the world to perform our music to millions of obsessive fans. I’d create the most beautiful paintings of life and beauty and ugly love, so stunning that they’d immediately be displayed in the Louvre. Honestly, I’d probably successfully bake a cake for once, because I don’t see that happening any time soon with my striking lack of talent.
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There are so many things in this world, big and small, that I would love to do or achieve or become in my life, and I know most of those things will never possibly happen. Though I’d obviously love to become a world famous artist, that’s not what I need. Of course we need equal rights for everyone, the same opportunities. But it is good that not all of us have the same talents, the same passions, sometimes it is good that we can’t be anything we want. After all, that makes up our individuality.
Home is a loose word, I often find my mind and, in turn, my spirit in other places. Sitting wrapped in a blanket I’ll physically be here or there but, in truth, I’ll be far, far away. Henry David Thoreau once wrote, “At a certain season of our life we are accustomed to consider every spot as the possible site of a house.” House or home or somewhere in between? A trivial question when one is hunting for a place to rest one’s mind.
Photo Credit: hotelroomsearch.net
My tangible home will always be with my family in our small “faerie home,” surrounded by an unruly garden that seems to compete with the urbanity of the asphalt road and the ever shrinking street light (or perhaps I’m the one growing). Home with its boarding of white and blue, with a hand built white picket fence; home with a stylized and cohesive found object collection inside and hand painted walls of a whimsical forest land further from reality than the closest galaxy. Tangible home will be with my dad’s music blasting well above the sound threshold of his earbuds, shuffling in the Paint-Shack. Tangible home will be with my mom, picking up conversations we never started mid-way through a sentence. A home fit for part of my heart and part of my body.
But my true home, home for my mind, my spirit, the rest of my heart and body, that’s much harder to pin down. I’ve lived too many lives, I’ve walked the halls of Hogwarts and thieved the streets of Ketterdam. I have run through the Overlook Hotel and traveled the world in the Leviathan. I am inclined to call all these places my home despite the threat of horror and danger and pulse-stopping fear. But then again, I am just as inclined to call a solitary cottage at the edge of humanity surrounded by piles and piles of mugs and books my home.
When I was much younger I believed home would be among the pyramids and mummies of Egypt, studying a culture older than I could comprehend, dinosaur hunting while bouncing from continent to continent in search of the next great dinosaur find. Now I find myself lost, filled with wanderlust. Do I return to Ketterdam, Hogwarts, Brakebills? Do I follow the dust and jewels and bones of ancient history? Do I find my library tower with an endless supply of tea, coffee, pastry, and more books than I know what to do with? Do I find my corner of a city and people watch for the rest of my time?
Photo Credit: enlighten.pk
Maybe, what I’m getting at is I won’t find one home, there is no way to make that which is plural singular. I’ll always be hunting for the next city to make my heart beat faster and my lungs dance, the next country, the next world, the next universe. My home will be that glimpse of color disappearing around the corner, just slow enough for me to go skidding into the alley and see it go around the next corner. My home will be a sturdy pair of boots, one hell of a scarf, and a bag with an undetectable extension charm. My home will be that trip around the world finding the best food there is and then traveling to the Restaurant at the End of the Universe. Home will be that rare dinosaur in the middle of nowhere. Home will be Nefertiti’s tomb. Home will be finding that portal to Fillory, Hogwarts Ketterdam, Le Cirque des Rêves. Home will be the pens and paints I bring with me; home will be the countless notebooks of dreams, adventures, and future worlds.
Home will be the next great adventure. The never ending circular promise: the next place will be the place, the next place will be home. Part of me will always belong to the first home though, my little blue and white cottage in the forest of pavement and cars, but the rest of me? The rest of me is restless. Home will always be one step ahead of me, patiently waiting for me to catch up, always waiting for me to leave a little more of myself on the path.
I am one person out of millions. I may be small, but my voice will not be silenced. We will no longer be silenced by beliefs made centuries ago.
We will not be silenced by beliefs that are killing innocent lives, or by the beliefs that are discriminating against the people who are finally becoming proud of who they are.
We are the new generation. We are the millennials, the Gen. Z kids, and the generations to come, and we are proud of ourselves for the world we’re determined to create.
We may be young, and we may not know everything about the world, but we are still learning, still improving, and we are definitely still fighting.
We are strong
We are resilient.
And we are powerful.
But we aren’t defined by adjectives; we are the future. In just a few years, most of us will be given the power to vote, and we will remember when you ignored our pleas.
Photo Credit: ABC News.
You ignored our pleas for equal rights, our pleas to not feel afraid to walk into our schools, our pleas for an equal opportunity you pride your country over yet fail to fulfill.
We will remember what you refused to give us, and we will take it ourselves.
The years will come, and the world will become ours. Not just for one percent of us, but for everyone.
A world where students can walk into their schools without the fear that they’d never walk out.
A world where people are free to love who they wish to.
A world where people are judged by their personality or by what they bring to the world. Not by the color of their skin, or their preference of who they love.
So remember this
We may be young,
But we are angry.
And you can try silence us, but we will rise, and we will scream louder than ever.
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