c’est la vie

It's almost Christmas.

We are a bit older now. I am a bit older now. Today I am at the Shanghai airport, headed to a very cold place, sipping coffee, listening to Miles Davis and thinking of my life with Jon. I am in a future I don't recognize. Just last month I moved back, and NAIA became my home airport again, after three years in Cambodia. I have changed because I see airports differently - three or four or five years back I marveled at being in airports, and I would cry during takeoffs, in disbelief that I could travel. I have new memories in airports now - of being held in the detention room in Israel with Jon and a room full of men, trying not to fall apart at the sight of a gun, of crying on the way to the Phnom Penh airport as Thomas drove me on his bike so I could go home for my grandmother's funeral. Long hugs to say goodbye to Jon, as I left for work. A lot of growing up in airports, and in the places in between them. 

The year has been an overwhelming one, and long flights have always given me space to make sense of everything. This is my last long flight on my own this year, and I am thinking about the things I have witnessed and experienced. I am not the same anymore, and that often confuses me. Coming back to Manila has been strange, but in a warm way, like speaking with an old friend who doesn't quite know you anymore, but still loves you. 

I suppose I write this because I've been in a state of confusion over the last year, trying to find the balance they so often speak of in great teachings. I would really love to have that, or a semblance of it. But perhaps not this year. 

(Hit publish after this was in my drafts for 2 years. Just because)