cut your noose

Kinska

When I was 17, I took a two week trip to Costa Rica that was offered through my Spanish class in high school. For the first week, we toured around the county, and we each stayed with a separate host family the second. That trip was the first time I saw the ocean and my first ever plane ride.

I hiked through the rainforest, saw a volcano erupt (I still get bleary-eyed when I think about that moment), zip lined 400 feet in the air over a canopy of trees (that moment too), and swam in the ocean while it rained. Costa Rica is heaven. 

As I was reading through my journal from the trip nearly 11 years later this evening, I couldn’t help but smile… and get a little emotional. Teenage me was absolutely aching to get out, be free, and fully experience life. Costa Rica was my first chance to really let loose and have a great adventure. I wrote over and over again about how “alive” I felt and how life was changed forever and I didn’t know how I was going to go back. I wanted my life to be unpredictable and silly and free.

Well, 17-year-old Kate, you got what you asked for. You dropped out of college and moved around the country a few times with only what you could shove into your car. (Records and clothes and books and maps.) You’ve got some memoir-worthy stories to tell that would make you pass out from disbelief. (You totally make out with several of your favorite musicians in very insane places.) Life is certainly unpredictable and nobody would argue against its silliness. You’ve done good, even though it’s been hard and you wonder sometimes if maybe you just suck. It’s harder to stay free than you think. 

To summarize this nostalgic, self-satisfying ramble, here’s an excerpt from my journal of me being a goddamn teenage poet. This was right after I saw a volcano erupt:

"It’s times like these that put you in your place and force you to slow down and actually live. I’m so alive and aware here. Nature is wonderful. It’s natural. Nothing is forcing it to happen. It just happens and it’s beautiful.

That’s what I think love is, how it works. True love just happens. All the right things are in the right place at the right time. Unforced. Beautiful. Makes you feel alive.

Life is great. I’m done for tonight.

I love rain. It rains a lot here.

Peace, love, life, Kate

6/11/04”

thedailywhat:

“The Gang” by wildparadox.