A year ago my life was a black hole of lexapro withdrawal and domestic abuse and isolation and I could cry with gratitude for what it is now. I laugh until my belly hurts most days and I spend my time in beautiful places across this continent and I get the opportunity to do work im woefully under qualified for but rise to the occasion, and I do it with some of my best friends. I feel very well loved. So well loved I can’t believe how lucky I am and don’t know what I did to deserve to have so many rich beautiful friendships with the best people in the world. I have my freedom. My life is my own and I’m taking that so seriously. God.

Leaving j tree and heading up to the Sequoias today, meeting Rae up there and spending the weekend next to the kern river. Love to arrive and hate to leave.

Kristoff explaining the system he has for the gardens and the animals “disturb, rest, grow”

If you boil purple sweet potatoes and mash them with silken tofu then add them to a pot with maple syrup cooked brown rice pepitas dried apples cinnamon and a bit of sea salt then top it with whole milk yogurt and fresh cold fruit you will have the beautiful magenta porridge that I’ve been making for breakfast every day in the desert and that Phi says is magical

It was also good to be in the mountains the week before sleeping in Clair and Sam’s bedroom and going out to the bear claw and running into people I know and interviewing them for this project and feeling like part of a community. I want to be in so many places.

I love j tree I feel like myself every time I come back. And Shy and everyone who lives in this community with her have been great to us. Concert for the solstice on the first night and they set us up in this big beautiful building they normally host ceremony in. Just been cooking beautiful food for phi and I and working and sleeping on mattresses strewn across the floor, hiking up goat mountain at sunset, showering outside, chasing the little girl that lives here around and taking care of her, rigged my silks in the tree playing in those, long chats with shy and the owner of the land laying around in the shade in the hottest parts of the day, family dinners. Phi might end up building his darkness retreat center on the land and it’s nice to see him thinking about landing somewhere after we’ve both been full time traveling all year since our lives parallel collapsed. Hugest full moon over the ridge last night him and I went hiking and he asked if I see home here for both of us. I said I could. Shy offered to have me park the van here. Who knows what’s next. No need to make a decision until the end of the year anyway, since I’ve got all my travel planned. It feels good to be in California and be around people, sleep next to someone warm who loves me. Who knows. Sophie has a vision where phi and I get married but I told her I need a break from hearing about her visions bc they’re often emotionally correct but the details are unexpected and I’ve felt burned by them before bc I project my own desires and get very attached.

Whenever anyone we meet asks phi and I where we’re from or where we live we make eye contact and burst into laughter because we know each of us is trying to figure out how on earth to answer those questions

“I don’t invite it but I welcome it”