If I could help it, I'd still be walking. I wouldn't stop. I can still feel the rhythm of the sidewalk underneath the soles of my shoes.
I had a lot to think about this morning. I still have a lot to think about. My brain uses the perpetual movement of walking in one direction as a backdrop in which to let go, and to roam freely.
I walk and I think and I don't get freaked out by my thoughts, because I am walking, and walking is a rhythm and rhythms are calming.
I listened to this playlist I made when I was 14 called Things I'll Never Say, about the first boy I ever loved. A boy who has long since forgotten me, and except for passing moments of curiosity and nostalgia, I must admit I have forgotten too.
But the playlist remains as the single, solitary best combination of songs I have ever put together.
I walked and I crunched the leaves underneath my feet and I tried to avoid stepping on cracks because ever since I was a child I have been afraid of the responsibility of breaking my mother's back.
Summer is officially over. Redundant, I know, because it's October 9th and you're all thinking, "Hello, Hannah, summer ended almost two months ago."
I didn't want it to end, though. And so I held on to it. But it ended this past weekend. I went back to CB for 24 hours. It was for Bek's birthday, and it had been on the calendar since we left the beach in September, so in that respect, I hadn't let go of everything because I knew I was going to be back in a few weeks.
Which was acceptable and I don't regret that.
But I'm home now, again, and I've grown a little bit sad because I've realized this time it really is goodbye. It's not just goodbye because I don't have a set date to return and see everyone again, it goes beyond that. It's goodbye because I have to let it all go, now.
It's goodbye because now it's time to move on. I can't carry the life I had this summer over into the rest of this year. The life I had this summer doesn't fit the life in front of me, here. That's.... A little bit painful.
There are lessons I learned that I can use in my life now, undoubtedly. There are people who will never leave me alone for long. There are memories that I will never lose.
But the days and the moments are gone. The mindset has changed. The worldview is shockingly different here, and so are the people.
Home is exhausting, but God has made me strong.
I must not let the will to experience wither. The past nine months have been all about experiencing new things, conquering fears, feeling alive, breathing in and breathing out, staying active and achieving happiness.
Discontentment did not exist when I lived there.
Here, that old frightful Devil whispers constantly in my ear about what I don't have, and how many things are happening that I don't want to happen. His companionship seems omnipresent.
But what he always seems to forget, or just refuses to acknowledge, is that I have God. And he can whisper all he wants, but that's all it ever is: whispering. And even though I am tempted to fall into his trap of discontentment every now and then, I remember that I am exactly where God wants me to be, and that He will not leave me here alone.
And He has proven that. Yesterday I spent some time researching Ballymaloe again, with a concentrated tone of seriousness this time, and my eyes were opened.
I had forgotten my love of Ireland. My love of food. My love of gardens. My love of sunny, yellow kitchens.
Lovers, I finally sucked it up and contacted them.
They called me back this morning, bright and early. I didn't answer, because I was still asleep, but they assured me they would call back and if I had specific questions in the meantime to email them.
This was another reason I walked for such a long time this morning. I needed to process.
I'm committing, lovers. Next September, the 16th, in fact, is my first day of culinary school.
I'm not at the stage in my life where I can plan out the next 5-6 years. Some people are. I don't know how to possibly understand where in life I will be when I'm 24, or who I will have in my life. I know who I want to be there, desperately, but how do I know for sure? Some people are lucky in the way they can do that, some people seem to have it all figured it out...
But I can only foresee about a year into my future right now, and even that seems like forever and a day away.
I remembered that I committed to Bible School a year in advance, though, while I was walking, and that put a lot of things into perspective, because I remembered that year going by insanely fast and this one is bound to go by even faster. When I start to get overwhelmed just thinking about that, I remember that living at home again is simply about taking one day at a time.
But God is full of blessings, because I realized yesterday as I was falling back in love, He is answering my dreams. 2 years ago, I dreamed of living somewhere on the coast of Ireland, writing and cooking and basking.
So where does He send me, three years down the road from then?
He sends me to a place called Ballymaloe Cookery School, located in the county of Cork, minutes away from the eastern coastline of Ireland. A place where I will cook with fresh ingredients grown, fed, and harvested there on the grounds. A place where I can learn how to milk a Jersey cow, and churn my own butter. (Which if you have learned nothing else about me from following this blog for the past few years, you should have picked up on at least one aspect of my character: this sort of thing appeals to me. Wildly.)
A place where I can roam, and explore and be touched by a race and a culture of people that I have always admired and longed for passionately.
A gentle, safe, encouraging place where I can learn and soar and expand my knowledge tenfold.
A place with roaring waves, towering cliffsides, thunderous caverns, rolling hills, green and purple and hazel and golden fields, quaint cottages, ancient history and country lanes- all of which inspire my writing to no end.
A place where I can wear wool sweaters and rainboots and scarves every single day and never get tired of them.
A place full of moments where life as I have always known it, ends, and something new begins.
So this morning I walked, and I walked, and I walked, and I thought, and I thought, and I thought.
In some ways, I'm still thinking and my spirit is still outside, walking on endlessly.
The leaves on the trees are red, and yellow, and so many shades of autumn that mirror the reflection of my golden soul.
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