The Space Between

I sit in candlelight and watch smoke curling from the glowing tip of a joint. It dances in the air, every direction at once, gathering and spreading and contracting in white drifts. As I watch the ember I watch my mind. Ever moving, ever grasping. Never stopping.

The only addiction I've ever had is to weed. They say it is the only classified drug not to be physically addictive, but the mental addiction can be crippling. I used to smoke every day, when the routine and caffeine of my life formed walls and wide-open pits in which to wallow. But I like to think I left that habit in London.

These days, I rarely explore that hole. I prefer to live my life in clarity. But as with any vice, it can still get out of hand. The spiral into that blurry other dimension happens quickly, and usually signals the need for reform.


I have been stoned for two weeks. For whatever reason, I know profoundly that that little farm over the lake is no longer my home, and yet I cannot leave; not yet, for I have made a commitment to hold space here for the next month at least.


To feel something so deeply and yet not act on it throws me sideways. I almost cannot bear the lie.


And so I retreat as always, away, away, back to my zone, where I try to sift through the swirls of emotion currently de-rooting me, read patterns in the drifts in the air.


Before I even go back there, I begin to say goodbye.

I spend a lot of time staring. Mainly at the lake's surface, swept into white peaks by an incessant gale that completely cleans the skies, pushing November's cold deep inside. In my head the loop is playing. "It's time. It's time. It's time." I hold on to things, tightly, to keep myself from being blown away.

The smoke and the wind blur the edges. They slow things down, spread them out, until I can see the spaces between. I push myself into the cracks and wait it out.

In mid-November I return from a El Salvador, leaving friends and my sister behind. A course has descended on the farm and I have to pull myself out of my stupor. The girls fill every space with their laughter and self-exploration. I alternate between getting drunk on their raw spirit and hiding away in my kitchen, putting all my energy into their meals. But for the first time ever, my heart isn't in it.


I visit my man in Santa Cruz. His face is so familiar and yet somehow so far away. Our connection strings through lifetimes, but I fear that in this life, our current paths are too erratic.


I sit on his bed, with its wide-open view, and close my eyes to the blustery day. "The wind is blowing too hard," I say, without really understanding my words.


In my head the sentence continues. Too hard to be grounded here by such a tiny little thread. When I walk out that day I feel like I'm walking out forever. But I do not doubt I will see him again.


At the end of November Nico, last member of my farm family, leaves. With his departure my roots finally retract.


I begin to get my belongings in order.