One Year Later

This new year kind of crept up on me. I guess being in Italy and attempting to navigate an unclear friendship/relationship didn’t give me much room to do my normal ‘end of one year, beginning of another year’ reflections.

I still haven’t really given it much thought, except to say this: It feels good to be in 2015.

2014 was an up and down year. The words that come to mind when I think about last January are ‘cold’ and ‘quiet’. I started this blog, and wrote about taking a single step towards… something. My serious relationship had just ended, I didn’t know what direction my life would be taking, and I had no idea what to do to move my life in any direction. So I began to dream about the Camino, and of how alluring it would be to simply follow arrows for a long, long time. Move myself in a physical direction, and determine the figurative one along the way.

The first half of 2014 was filled with preparing for the Camino. Did I do anything else? Maybe, but all I can remember is spending hours on my computer, researching gear and reading blogs. Of walking in endless small circles on an indoor track at the Y, and later walking in loops through a park. Multiple trips to REI, Amazon boxes delivered weekly to my doorstep.

And then the summer came around and I was on the Camino, and I was finally moving. It was beyond what I expected, and I’m still processing that walk, still kindling the flame of energy that it gave me, still working on how to continue “walking” the Camino in my every day life.

In the months since returning from the Camino I’ve been a bit restless. I’m home, I’m back into my routines, but I’m anxious to figure out the next steps in my life. That feeling continued straight up until the end of the year, right up until I left for Italy.

Since returning? I’m sure it’s too soon to tell, but it feels good to have just returned from a trip. It feels good to be in a new year. It feels like I’m ready to start moving again.

This year feels like an open book, like I could take it anywhere I want to. Soon I will start to fill in the images of what this year will look like, but right now the pages are blank. The only thing I see are possibilities, but nothing certain. Will this be the year that I finally start to write the book that I’ve been dreaming about writing? Will it be the year that I switch jobs? Will it be the year that I move out of my apartment? Will it be the year that I walk another Camino? Go back to France for another writer’s retreat? Do a US cross-country road trip? Will it be the year that I go on lots of dates? The year that I meet someone to settle down with? The year that I make a dozen new friends? Where will my travels take me this year? Where will I go?

Last year, as 2013 changed to 2014, I was in my best friend’s apartment. I was in a daze, trying as hard as I could to be happy, but struggling. We watched a marathon of Harry Potter movies and as we toasted the New Year with a glass of champagne, I remember thinking, “In 2014, I want to feel alive.”

And as 2014 changed to 2015, I was in the Piazza San Marco in Venice, with a man at my side, a plastic cup of wine in my hand, thousands of people packed in around me, and fireworks exploding overhead.

Alive.

So here we go, another year, an open book. This blog started as a place to write about my Camino, but I think it was really a place to write about my life. So have no fear, the blogging will continue. Thanks for reading and following along, I hope I can continue to share some good stories with you this year.

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