goodbye to all this.

Here it really is. Goodbye.

I've collectively spent over two months at this mysterious, magical homestead in the hills.

In an adobe school, a room of bunk beds, an attic space. Weeding walking wood saloons. Documentaries, swimming, shaman ceremonies, peanuts, a pizza party. I lost myself, I found myself, with still so much searching left to do.

This time, unlike the last, I feel very at peace with my departure. I'm genuinely excited and curious for all that will come next, stronger for all I have learned here, for all the peace I was able to internalize and for the openness and optimism I currently feel. Of course it's in many ways just too difficult to imagine that I won't be here any longer, that David and I won't have our endless prattle, that I won't eat when the bell rings, that Ishtar and I won't be spending hours of our day walking through the forest. The mandala, the terrace, the yoga studio, the temple. It all feels so deeply ingrained in my day to day and my soul now, it will take some time to fully let it settle and become part of the past.

I've been thinking a lot about when arrived here back in May in the pitch black, waking up to a tiny window overlooking the amphitheater, not having a clue what I'd gotten myself into, too burnt out to give it a deeper thought, only capable of just saying yes to all and doing my best. And here I was. Soon learning routines, learning about myself. Who I was then, who I am now. Who I can or will be wherever I land next.

It's actually still way too fresh and too present to go too deep into the gratitude I feel for all that this place brought me. And that of course generally goes for Portugal too. I still have another week plus to enjoy this fine country, starting tomorrow a little further north again for what will be a week of I don't even know what centering around a festival that could, as I have been told, possibly change my life. No matter what I have reason to believe I will be fully off grid again so we will just have to see what I saw when I get back.

Until then, wish me luck as another chapter closes and another one begins.

For now: grateful, happy, at peace, and excited. What more could I possibly ask for?