A story about recollection

I was talking to a friend about writing this last post, this conclusion to all the stories I told of our travels over the past month. I explained how it was important for me to collect my thoughts together in this moment: between the return home and still being in that sweet, still-in-a-vacation mindset, but with one foot now in the real world, offering me a sort of removed clarity to look back on my adventures and appreciate them for what they are, and still not in the bitterness of a full-on back to work mindset. I pulled out my journal, in which I had been scribbling the thoughts and memories of 26 days, collected the receipts and thoughts and wrote out my list of souvenirs. For the first time since Mario and I have been travelling together, I did not do this on the plane, but really, there was no need, as we had bought so little to bring back with us, save our allowance of rhum agricole. This trip was not about souvenirs, about checking big experiences off a list like we often do when travelling to new locations. This trip was about just being away, but somewhere familiar. It was about leaving behind the stress of the last year, the cold, the pressures of everyday, and living a different everyday. And it certainly opened conversations and posed questions on the possibly of that everyday becoming OUR everyday - someday. Guadeloupe has slowly become a place where I could see myself enjoying life on a regular basis. It was waking up slow and enjoying the sun over a morning coffee. It was walking down the road into town to pick up our daily baguette. It was a trip to the grocery store ever day rather than a restaurant, doing laundry and hanging things out to to dry. It was greeting the neighbours - but for the time being, it is merely more daydreams on the beach while I watch the waves roll in, a cup of coco sorbet in my hand. And when I have a moment of stress that threatens to overwhelm me in the coming weeks and months, I hope that I can hold on to that moment, pause, and feel the warmth of the sun on my face, the grit of the sand on my legs, the cool of the waves on my feet, and the cold of the sorbet in my hand. And until that time when it's not only a thought, but a reality, I'll just have to keep chanting that same mantra to myself: 

Someday, Guadeloupe. 

Someday soon.

Flying out of Guadeloupe

Passing over the North of Grande-Terre

Until then, I look out the window of the airplane and watch as the countryside we criss-crossed so frequently fades from view, and say goodbye. For now.

Until next time.