Recently I took a trip back home to San Diego. A trip I wasn't completely sure I could follow through with. I had been planning to return for several months, things fell into place a few months prior and with that, the excitement of going home begin to outweigh the dread and sadness I thought I may encounter once back in California.
As the days begin to draw closer to my trip my anxiety begin to build, I was so excited to return, yet in the back of my mind I often felt a cloud of sadness begin to surround me. For the past two years it's been easier to be across the country then home. The pain is easier to push away, it's easy for him to be here with me in a place of beauty and happiness, it's easy for him to still be real, it's easy to talk about him in the present, not live in the past surrounded by darkness. He's real to me here, he hasn't left, he's alive and I speak of my Dad often.
I find myself telling my new friends, my patients, even strangers about him, about my love for him, all the fun times and great memories we made, it's never past tense it's always the here and now. It's how I manage to get through the days and how I get a few hours of sleep at night. Most nights I wake up when it's completely quite and lay perfectly still, dreaming we are laughing and talking, asking his advice, still wanting his wisdom on how navigate through life.
California is everything and more I remember from two years ago. As the jet liner began to make its decent into San Diego the anxiety and fearfulness gave way to excitement the moment the sparkling lights of my favorite city came into view. Pure joy filled my soul, exhausted and tired but complete happiness begin to saturate. So many emotions begin to wash over me.
Waking up in Beautiful Sunny San Diego was pure bliss. I was truly happy and peaceful to be surrounded once again by such beauty.
I will leave you with some visual beauty taken while in my beloved city.
" We write for the same reason that we walk, talk, climb mountains or swim the oceans - because we can. We have some impulse within us that makes us want to explain ourselves to other human beings. That's why we paint. That's why we Dare to Love Someone - because we have that impulse to explains who we are." Maya Angelou
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