Home and Hearth from the Ice, Snow and Sleet

Christmas was such a blast.
I returned to SF late Saturday night, after spending a week at the enchanting home of Bubba's extraordinary sister, her boyfriend and three cats. We drove through icy sleet and rain from Tennessee to Indy.
The weather hovered in the low 30s.
Bubba's mom and his siblings all made the trip and made it into a very memorable reunion-like gathering.
The choker for me was bidding adieu to the family Saturday afternoon. In between consuming homemade meals, playing Wii interactive games, board games, watching movies and unwrapping presents, we laughed, we sang and we never left the cozy house.
I got teary eyed as I hugged each family member farewell.
It is especially hard not knowing when I will get to see Bubba next. For five-years, we have shared a roof, a home, a bed. The separation is heart-wrenching...but at least he is still a phone call away and if I’m bold—a mere flight away for a weekend…if I have the time and extra funds. But with my new SF apartment and holiday expenses, I’m going to have to tighten the reins on spending for the next few months to build up a safety nest again.
It might be a long haul before I see him...perhaps not until spring when Kat is out of school.
But, alas, my circumstances are not quite as intense as that of our friends—Bubba’s star Army students, whose wedding we attended in Hawaii in December of one year ago. The husband left today at dawn for a one year deployment to Iraq. I can just imagine the wife’s heartache and the burdensome weight she must face daily of the unknown.
What a journey she will have to conquer alone, continuing her job as an Army nurse, also in uniform, but on this side of the world.

Hibernatin' Weather

It has already been one full year since Bubba and I did our 'tropical' escape, having spent our entire mele kalikimaka December on the isle of Oahu, eating snow cones and roaming around in tank tops and flip flops on hot island sand.

This year, I am wrapped up in thick insulated gloves, binis, earmuffs, scarf and boots. I made it here to Tennessee. The temps are in the teens...but with the windchill factor, it feels like it is below zero. I'm overloading on my alcohol, sweets and taking extra naps. The days are short and I feel like an animal in hibernation.

Bubba has his apartment all set up here in the country. It is heartwarming to see him taking on such a pro-active role as a single father. I am almost tempted to dive right in and join him in this new world...but quick to remind myself of my new home that awaits me back in SF, the one on top of the cliff overlooking the lively, blue Pacific Ocean.

Kat remarked, ever so lightly, about having me here to 'raise' her. I tell her that I've considered it but I also have a steady job and life away from here. It is a set-up that I am not ready to abandon. She understood and said I didn't need to make the sacrifice.
It is refreshing to be able to reason with her and to have such openness with her. On the flip side, I am forced to question this detachment. Why do I choose to be so far away from the arms and warmth of my lover, from his daughter who I adore and get along with so well...to be on the other side of the country making my way in a job where there is daily stress and struggling?

However, I am also savoring my personal time. There is a reason for all of this.
As I get older, many of my friends are echoing the same universal sentiment and that is, 'everything happens for a reason.'

What's two years apart if Bubba and I are meant to have forever?

Winter Wonderland

I saw flurries today! I flew into Denver this morning, a generous business trip paid for by my company so I can partake in their annual holiday party get-together. I arrived to 13-degree weather and even though I was bundled up, I could feel my body temp rapidly dropping as I stood at the airport curbside waiting for my ride.
Weighed down with a jacket, a turtle neck sweater and boots, I contemplated getting down on the pavement and knocking out 20 push-ups to jumpstart my inner warmth...but then my ride showed up.
By the afternoon, the temps climbed to the mid-20s but flurries, flakes of frozen rain drops floated down from the sky. I happily stood in the way, catching them on my hair, sweater and tongue before they quickly turned into dew and evaporated. My colleagues schooled me on winter terminology by explaining that the term of seeing actual snow falling from the sky is for the flurries to 'stick.'
Then this evening, I saw snow piles lining sidewalks and lawn banks and I had to relish it. I stepped into a mound of snow to get that powdery, slippery sensation. I de-mitted my hands and scooped up a handful to touch. I'm enjoying my white Christmas. (We only had a brief interlude of hail in San Francisco last week.)
Unlike the autumn month, during the frenzied DNC, when I was last here, Denver now exudes a calm and soft-spoken aura.
A stroll down 16th Street Mall tonight evoked a sense of desolation, with only a handful of professionals making their way home and street people lingering on corners.
I chose to dine at Sam's #3 tonight. I came here for lunch during my last trip.
I thought there would be chicken soup on the menu but instead rediscovered its homemade chili repuation--served over hot dogs, burgers and nachos. Breakfast is served all day here. A warning though for french fry lovers, home fries do not live up to its name. Rather than a big wedge of fried potato, they emerge on the plate as freshly coined potatos, gently sauteed--a Colorado thing, according to my server.
I worked my way through the Coney Island burger plate (ground beef patty smothered with chili) sidled with a halved piece of thick texas toast. It was different but I made my night by pairing the platter with a hometown ale: Fat Tire. The mediocre meal then took on some fanfare.
Still tasting and feeling the effects of the consumed remnants of my glass of ale, yummy, I bundled up and made my way back out into the freeze-y night towards home, taking a little detour in the snowy sidewalks.
Tomorrow is our party and Saturday will come soon enough when I get on my next flight for Tennessee, to see my other half, Bubba for a week...a nice holiday present for the both of us.

Blissed Out

I still cannot believe that I live here.
Everyday, I wake up, I am treated to this bird's eye view. I feel like I'm on top of the world, literally and figuratively. I'm finding it unusual that I am having to repeatedly remind myself and readjust myself to my amazing, new surroundings. This is my new home. And even though, I'll be living here, at least for the following year (we signed the required one-year lease), I'm still waking up each day and finding myself sweetly stunned, surprised and breathless.
Each day, the sight gives me a renewed sensation of peace, bewilderment and contentment. I would say this is almost identical to the contentment I felt living in that attic studio apartment in France.
I'm all blissed out!

Surfacing For Air

How embarassing! I've returned. I can't readily recount in one blog entry everything I've experienced in the last few months. -Just that I'm finally surfacing for air and ready to try this again.
The last I reported, I was in Colorado training with a new job. I am still at this job and back in my town. There's been a lot of trial and error but I'm figuring out my own style. I get to make up a lot of my own rules since I work solo and run a satellite office.
On the love front, Bubba and I are doing a long distance thing-y. He went away to attend to an urgent family issue across the country. It felt like our love cocoon of the last five years suddenly vanished overnight. The person I was attached to at the hip is now reachable only via an address on a mailing label or via a 10-digit number.
I decided not to follow this time, not with this stable job and income. And really, I wasn't sure how to work with the new puzzle pieces.
So, I've been reexamining my goals during this period of solitude.
Feeling a little defeated one weekend, I spoke to the universe. I toyed around with the idea of escaping to France. I revisited the numbers again and again...cautiously asking myself how feasible such a plan would be with our ailing domestic economy and the impact being felt around the world.
I have a job...and as far as I know...it's a stable one. In fact, my company is bringing me to Colorado for the holidays and cutting me loose for an extra week to go see Bubba.
So, in speaking to the universe, it suddenly came to me - to seek out my light and space for now. And in the period of four days, my path revealed itself. I stumbled across an intensely beautiful apartment on top of a hill with an incredible view of the Pacific ocean. I've always wanted to live in a place with a view.
But, I couldn't afford this place alone. And yet, somehow within four days time, I am standing inside this apartment, as its new tenant.
Luckily, I had learned that my younger cousin was in a similar place in life and humored me on my talk of light and space. She liked my ideas and expressed that she would like to partake in this journey.
So, as a team together, with our credit rating and incomes combined, we got this 1200-square feet apartment--a penthouse situated on cloud 9, I'd say. Every room has a view of the ocean, the crashing surf and shore. The night is illuminated with the lights of a thousand homes beyond us. The blue expanse of the sea and sky reveals itself to my waking eyes everyday (I have my bed right by the window, blinds drawn all the way up--hey it's my home!). I'm cherishing and reveling in this new found place of therapy, of lightness of being and hopefully of inspiration and clarity to come.
"Once you make a decision, the universe conspires to make it happen." Ralph Waldo Emerson.