giving away my small possessions.

In Berkeley, people like to leave things on the street for their neighbors to pick up. They put out a jacket or a blanket or an old cookbook and they prop a neat "FREE" sign on top of it. When I walk to work in the morning, I see these kinds of mini monuments in front of at least one house per block. By the time I walk back at 5:30, all of the objects are gone. Sometimes a sign remains, but usually it is in a recycling bin near the driveway. There is something beautiful in this reciprocity between strangers. It amazes me every day to see all of the things that are left out on the street. To me, it is a gesture of openness and a testament to how much emotional and physical garbage you can rid yourself of if you only share your love, your memories, and all the rest of your broken and not-so-broken crap with others. In that way, things are circular. They may not make sense in your lifetime, but certainly someone else can make sense of them.

I bought a ticket to New Zealand last night. I bought a ticket out of here. It is time for me to clean up some of my messes and make clean, sharp breaks with my past. Pieces of it come back to haunt me in dreams on Saturday mornings and in old photographs left in their dusty frames on my desk. These things have remained 4 years too many. I have thought of putting my personal objects on the street too (or at least some sort of a metaphorical street). I think sometimes that's all you can really do to rid yourself of all the baggage you carry. I'm ready to be weightless, floating in still water, or maybe even carried through the ocean with dolphins swimming alongside me. If I believed prayer had ever made a difference in my life, I'd say a prayer for my future home.