promised land.

My youth pastor would have called this a crisis of belief. It’s the unexpected fork in the road that wasn’t indicated on your map. It knocks violently upon the door of your comfortable home of thoughtful truths, truths that have been yours, unapologetically, for sometime.

I have found myself in the midst of the unfamiliar. I am in the care of caring people, but the environment is foreign. And an interesting thing has happened.

Because I came to a place where I am not known, there’s no solid reflection of who I am. My family is genuinely good, but I had been exposed to them for a mere four days two years ago before deciding to move here. We’re still getting to know each other.

Had I come to a blank canvas, I think the need for a reflection may not have been as necessary. I didn’t come into an empty space, but rather a full space that’s been lived in and created from the sort of life I cannot relate to, and as much as they want me to be comfortable in their home, it’s still their home.

So follows the interesting part...That a fairly self assure woman of twenty seven with thoughts and ideas and beliefs, and a life of soul defining experiences can somehow, after leaving her reflecting pool, start to forget what it is she looks like.

Four months prior to my exit, I had begun training for a marathon. I ran ten miles in the snow, fifteen in eccentric heat, twenty with a continuous bee sting sort of cramp in the back of my knee, and nearly every day in between. I was working toward a goal and an accomplishment that meant something to the fairly self assure woman I mentioned earlier. And a few days before I made it to where I am, I accomplished this goal, valiantly. This was defining, and extremely lonely.

I accomplished the goal by myself, with none of those reflectors I mentioned before to share it with. Not only was the accomplishment lonely, but what followed. I was done. I had finished. This thing, this running animal inside of me, no longer held a necessary place in my day to day.

I am writing this on my way out. Realizing the need for reflectors reminds me that they don't have to come in human form, though a conversation with someone who knows me is exceptionally helpful, as is making someone at work who doesn't know me very well laugh. Yesterday Angela laughed at something I did, and seeing her demeanor reminded me of my own humor.

My work is more than a walking distance from my house, and so I have been walking some blocks to the metro, and taking it the rest of the way. I have been aware of a more effeceint route to work, a bus called the circulator, for some time, but haven't had the wherewithal to actually figure it out. Yesterday was the day, and around two-thirty, I took a seat and hoped it would take me where I wanted to go. I arrived at work on time, feeling like I had accomplished something, and strolled into the restaurant with a little more confidence than the day before. After a frustrating shift, with a mess-up on my part and a computer glitch on the restaurants, I left work worn down, it was hot, and I wasn't sure where to catch my bus back. It was also later on in the evening, and I felt less safe walking the necessary blocks to the metro, which had been my previous habit. After working myself out of my head long enough to see a bus up the road, I said goodnight to Angela, and made off in a run to catch it. After a few moments in the blue plastic chair, I realized I had gotten on the wrong bus.

Shit.

I jumped off at the next stop, walked back the direction I had came, and then noticed the bus I had been looking for...about to drive through the intersection. I ran once again, saw the driver stop for me, and jumped on just in time.

And then, I met my Moses. Well, he wasn't mine. But his name was Moses, and he was one of the kindest that I've encountered, not just in DC, but anywhere. He could interpret the forelorn look on my face. I asked him if this bus was headed for Woodley Park, and he pointed across the street, letting me that's where I catch the bus that's going my direction, "unless I just wanted to take a seat and ride the route through with him." I said I did. The bus was cool, Moses was kind, and that bus taking the long way around was exactly where I wanted to be.

I pulled out my book on Napa, and, at moments, chuckled aloud. Moses looked for me a map, stopping at one point to ask another driver if he had any on his bus. He let me know where we were when we stopped, the details of bus etiquette and procedure, asked me if I was from California (I told him the story of getting on the wrong bus and he thought the way I said "shit" sounded like someone from The Golden State), and he commented that my book must be good, as he could hear me laughing.

A couple of well-to-dos from San Fransisco in the sixties sold their stuff and bought a dilapidated vineyard and winery that was, at that point in time, out in the middle of no-where Napa. They did because of their ideals, with a belief that there was more to life thing than what they had were they were. People scoffed, the parents worried, and their employers pleaded, "don't do it".

I was explaining the book to Moses, the part that made me laugh, and told him how I appreciate the idea that life circumstances are something we can change, and that it's possible to make life look different than it does right now. He shook his head in an exaggerated motion, and let me know he liked that perspective.

Saying it aloud to someone else, someone like Moses, was another of those reflectors I was needing. I was really really thankful to have chosen the long way home.