A few years ago I switched careers and became a Realtor. Besides loving architecture and giving advice, I wanted to be able to leave in the winter for a month, and travel. Seven years later, I have begun.
Two days ago I left my home on a cliffside in the Fingerlakes of NY, and am now on a cliffside in Oakland Califonia, in a 5000 sq. ft. contemporary overlooking the bay. What does that even mean? It means that instead of waking up in my proportioned Arts and Crafts home with warm woodwork and colors on every wall, I now wake up to space and white. Instead of oncoming winter bitter cold, I am greeted with fog when I awake, in a fog of my own. I am a traveller but still there are those moments at the beginning of a long trip by myself when I wonder "why am I doing this again?"I am disoriented and displaced by my own hand.
I wander out of bed and through the cavernous living and dining rooms with windows for walls, and gaze upon murmurs of cypress and dim outlines of houses hinting that there is life in that blanket of mist. I love the Spanish word for fog - "neblina". It sounds like the name of a lover, maybe one that left or one to come; pretty, just around the corner or behind some veil of memory. "Neblina"; it is a word to whisper, to add your whispers to the thousands that swirl within its sound.
I gaze out the window and decide I need to ground myself, find my rythm for this month. I do not have the ease of knowing who I am because of my surroundings - work , home, duties. I must find myself in a completely new context; know who I am from an inner base, no matter what surrounds me. Ahhh yes, now I remember why I came here. I finish breakfast and sip my coffee, contemplating what I will make of this day.
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