I love simple directions. I’ve been following them to the best of my ability since I left the School for The Work in October, and they’ve taken me all sorts of interesting places. On Monday morning I was given a very simple direction: go back to Australia within nine days. The customs officer at the Canadian border was very clear about this: he said that if I stayed longer than nine days I’d be overstaying my visa, and that I would need to return to Australia before ever coming back to the States. Very clear, very simple.

So this leg of the journey is as good as over. Next Wednesday afternoon I fly out of LAX, landing in Brisbane Friday morning, and once again Australia becomes my home. For a couple of months, anyway.

It looks as though I have found a new home in Floyd. Deep in the Blue Ridge Mountains there is a woman willing to wait for my return. Here in south-western Virginia is someone I am willing to fly around the world for. And in a couple of months I should have a visa that allows our paths to meet for as long as it takes to know whether they are meant to intertwine or unravel.

So as one journey ends, another adventure begins. Isn’t it always the way? We’re never given more than we can handle, and often given just a bit more than we think we can. This time I’m being given two months to learn to want to be where I am when what I think I want is on the other side of the planet.

I’ve already been given a couple of practice runs: in the short time that E and I have known one another, I’ve already spent two extended periods of time away from her, and both times I suffered. It is so difficult, impossible even, to be centred and grounded when I’m wanting to be somewhere else. And when I’m not centred, naturally I’m unbalanced, and when I’m unbalanced I suffer. It follows.

Ironically, as I’ve been travelling through I’ve been working on becoming more grounded. For me, being grounded is simply being here, wherever that may be. I thought I found grounding in San Miguel and with E here in Floyd, and it’s quite possible I did. The other thing I found, however, was attachment to the idea of what that grounding meant. Consequently, I found myself crossing the Mexican border into Texas wishing I’d never left San Miguel, and therefore feeling lost and confused. Similarly, my recent visit to the wondrous Niagara Falls was not the happiest of outings either. Can you imagine? I was not ‘here’ on either occasion, and both times it was painful.

So now I’m being given two months to try again. It’s been said that nothing happens to us, everything happens for us, and that’s the perspective I’m taking with me on the airplane. Two months to love where I’m at, wherever that may be, whoever I’m with. Two months to free myself of the idea that I want to be thousands of miles away. Two months to come home.

I love simple directions; they give me so much to be grateful for.