Ahoy and Aquestion

My sailor friends have landed back in town for a quick refresh week before they plan to head north from Ft. Lauderdale, up to Charleston and over to Bermuda. Then, in mid-May, they will make their Atlantic Crossing towards the Azores, an island chain off the coast of Portugal.

With them back in Chicago after being on the water since September, casually seated in my living room with beers in hand, it felt like nothing had changed. No time had passed, and our conversations and laughter flowed as normal. So did the beer, incidentally.

As we talked about how good it felt for them to come "home" (neither actually grew up here in Chicago, but have lived much of their adult life in the city) and how they appreciate what they had that much more—it got me thinking.

Can you actually have both roots and wings?

Can you still be "from somewhere" but move on to experience something new, and call a new place "home," without sacrificing the old?

People ask me all the time, "Will you ever move back to Atlanta?" These are likely the people that stood at my going away party in September of 2000 when I promised, loudly and assertively, that I was only moving to Chicago for two years to "get it out of my system." I vowed to come back before their lives had even blinked, much less changed that much.

In the 7 1/2 years that I have been gone, the "roots" of my soul, the deep connections that have made me who I am today, the people have changed, grown, morphed and twisted far more than I could have imagined. All moving in positive, healthy, lifelong directions, but yes, there was much change.

Quite the turn of events:

graduates turned into professionals...
jobs turned into careers...
apartments turned into houses...
boyfriends turned into husbands...
hobbies turned into profits...
twinkly-eyes turned into babies...
infants turned into children...
twenty-somethings turned into adults...(sortof)
and plans turned into reality.

All this turning and growing and changing makes me wonder about the events of my own life. Do you give up the strength of your past to explore the freedom of something new?

Can you have roots and wings at the same time, or are they mutually exclusive characteristics? Does a desire to have a "sense of place" preclude you from enjoying both the foundation from which you came AND the future toward which you're heading?

Either way, I suppose I am comfortable knowing where I'm from, and enjoying where I am now, despite the fact that I can't be sure where my wings will have me soaring next.

Or if the roots will take hold again. Y'all.

Number Two

This story puts a whole new spin on commuting.

My dear friends Tracy and Vytas have quit their jobs, sold their home, and are traveling on their cruising sailboat. They're seeing amazing sights, experiencing cultures and worlds beyond their own, and they're milking their youth instead of waiting until retirement to truly live life.

With Christmas this week, they flew home from The Bahamas to spend some quality time with friends and family. I had the privilege of hosting them for a few days, and we had a wonderful time. Caught up on sailing tales, saw their photos, exhanged sagas of the ups and downs of our respective lives, and talked and talked and talked.

Then, at a happy hour specifically in their honor last night, they were barraged with questions like, "Where have you been?" and "What's it like to live on a boat?" They kindly, and proudly, answered each one with gusto, to laughs and sighs all around (the laughs are in appreciation, the sighs are in envy).

My favorite answer had to be in response this one:

"So, what is the one thing that you're not enjoying?"

Tracy laughed, thought for about a millisecond, and told a funny tale involving the head (aka, the bathroom). When your boat is 350 square feet of interior space, the head is a omnipresent part of your life. It is at the foot of their bed for crying out loud. You get to know each other very quickly, and very well.

The gist is, without getting too gross or technical, that on the ocean, a sailboat basically carries the waste underneath, in the hull, and disposes of it overboard at some point when it is full (yes, it is gross, but yes, it is legal). Said waste hold is, pleasantly, located beneath the bed.

With a smile, and a tilt of the head, she said to the inquiring party, "So, basically, we travel with our poo."

That requires no more commentary. Just a repeat.

We travel with our poo.