the footsteps down the hall

There were certain sounds, certain echoes, certain resonance to them.

When dad came to us every three years or so and explained that we'd be moving again.

The military life. People always ask if I liked moving all the time, liked living all over the world. Well, there was nothing to which to compare. I knew no different. And every few years, there he would come. I don't recall my mother telling us. I think she was left to the packing detail, while he often went ahead to establish something -- his work, our lives, a pattern?

It's the same, only different now.

I thought I'd love travelling, moving, carrying my life in a few suitcases and boxes. And, I do. I know very well - as much as my family knows I know, and joke with me that we'll grow annoyed with each other after a couple of months. I'm bred independent. I have no gut instinct for marriage, the house, the picket fence, the 2.5 children, the mortgage, the small city.

But this move. This change. Well, it comes with so much more to it, of course. I wouldn't be packing if my dad weren't sick. But what would I be doing? Who would I be now? We'll never answer this because of how things go now. Destiny? Karma? As it is. And this move, well, it's fucking hard. Hard with a capital H. Am I too old to live on my own without a family to sustain? Am I too tender to be so far?

Tonight, my father encouraged me in applying for certain jobs. All jobs. Anywhere. With travel as it is and internet, why not? But then, why didn't they visit me? Why did they never make it over here? Why did they not come for my graduation? They are building a last house, a house of self-sustaining proportion, of solar and water heat, of environmental friendliness. That could be the reason, although rumor has it that my mother wasn't interested in travelling.

She and I are too alike. We suffer anxiety. We suffer our go-go dancer tendancies. We adore newness but hate making it happen. I am more like my mother than I or she ever intended. I doubt she knows this, but I guess she has hints. After all, we fought like enemies for so long that I think she realized she had been cursed with herself re-born.

So now.

They are my footsteps. My decision to move. My destiny in making.

I don't think I've cried so much as an adult. I almost worry that I have early menopause. I see certain posturing of my parents on Skype and start to stop myself from crying. Yes, I know I'm delayed in development, in growing up, and it's only now, finally, that I realize the importance of family.

But ... well, there is such beauty in freedom, Paris, living.

Ugh. I'm too tired to finish this.

But it's why I find it hard to go outside my apartment. It's too damn beautiful. It's too damn free. And, now, well, now, it's time to be an adult. Grow up. Suck up. Suck it up. Get a pant suit and low heels, go to some big city, and make my payback. And I hate it. I miss my family but I hate the idea of US living. It will crush me. So far as I can see now.

Blah blah. I know this isn't true. I know I'm adaptable, flexible, and in so much love with humanity that I can do anything. But for now, for tonight, I'm crying over a lot of spilled milk that is called lait in French and is beautiful.

[no editing
oh, and a ton of new photos over on Tumblr.]