*I want you forever*

Perhaps the most meaningful sentence of the last few years of tying to hold on.

I will hold on to that. I will try to forget everything else and hold onto that to remember you by. I don’t want to remember how you treated me. I don’t want to remember how I felt less important. so many times. when I felt like someone who could be tossed aside.

I know you have never loved anyone the way you loved me, or the way we connected together. I know you know that we were built in pairs. Something neither of us knew until we met. Like I must have licked you bones clean in previous life. You must have shipwrecked in my ocean and my tide washed you to shore. Every part of me. Every inch of me. When I am with you feel every neuron. felt.

After years of promises I see it’s time to stop being so gullible and think you will ever leave her. I don’t think I am stupid for trying. I will not be embarrassed for trying. When I forgave you the first time, when you came back with promises of a better life, I figured that I have the rest of my life to be right. Yes, I can get hurt again, but I felt like I needed to give it a shot. If I didn’t try, I would regret it for the rest of my life. Try the whole, take-you-back-forgive-believe-promises-of-better-future. You kept saying *I will fix it*. For a minute there I did see you try.

I erased you tonight.

A lot of people have a lot of things to say about Covid19.

There are more holes in me now than there have been in a long while.

I haven’t said a whole lot here. When it all started and when Big Sky Resort shut down for the season, I think I finally accepted it was real. Even before that, Trump seized travel from EU countries even tho Finland was barely affected at that point. Immediate it meant I couldn’t go home. I still can’t 6 months later. Back then I said this isn’t going away. Everyone was convinced it will. I kept asking how could it possibly go away?? But if, and when, it does, we will all be looking at a very different reality. We have been living in utopia. We still are.

My life changed. In every way. I have built my life on living internationally. What does someone do when that comes to a screeching halt? at first, for a few months, bide my time hoping we will get to travel again soon. All the while being incredibly happy and blessed of the lifestyle I chose and where I got stuck when it all started.

I lost the one I was meant to be with. Granted, perhaps I had lost him already, or I never actually had him to begin with.

I spent 3 months sitting on my front porch. Adventuring solo a lot. Me and Moose. I have had the most amazing companion by my side. I got a lot of food delivered to me. I shared a lot of porch beers with my close friends. We were doing just fine. I nailed Andrews skis to my bathroom trim, sat on my roof and gave it a good solid cry. I was disheartened and had a hard time believing I had just experienced one of the most tragic love stories of my life. Even though I actually think this love story had turned tragic from the beginning.

I never thought my dirt bag lifestyle would turn out so well during a pandemic. In some ways anyway. The Finnish embassy contacted me and wanted me to fly out. I didn’t see any point to come and sit in Finland because I knew that I have more ways to earn money here and to live cheaply off my land if things turned worse.

It seems they have turned worse. I am in this weird state of disbelief of the stupidity of the American people. This has really accentuated the.. for the love of god.. can’t even argue with the stupidity… It’s staggering. Mind blowing. I never thought myself smart but this really makes a few people stand out of the crowd. Like people I sorta know that I thought were smart.. they are now saying all kinds of stupid things. I guess I should say I am disappointed more than anything by some people I know. I am sad to discover we are dumber than I thought. I was really rooting for us.

I said in March, that when we come back up for air, I think some of us will be looking at a very different reality… In my case I was not wrong. I feel like I am at the beginning of something new. I am not sure why I feel that way. Perhaps it’s the mixed excitement of actually being stuck here, with the slight terror of what will I do for money. Do I need to find a job? Could I just stay here forever?

I guided again this summer. this is season 7. I made mad cash but somehow felt more hated than loved by my team. And then loved more at the same time. There’s a lot of soul searching on what is happening here. I feel like I am a bad or failed person. All the way around. In life. My person. My being. Who I am. What I have to offer.

I am currently trying to decide what all that means. were we simply over worked and tensions flared? I got yelled at by almost every single person I work with. Yea, I fucked up on the river too, we all did. We were also doing 3 boats a day. all of us. we were tired, angry and hungry. I want to be a better person. I’ve known that for long time. But this has just brought it out. Even if they are not. I still want to be better. I want to be that person that leaves people better than I found them.

Andrew stopped talking to me August 8th. He said *we could talk about all the fun you are having or you could tell me how messed up my life is* This is almost exactly a year since the last time I’ve seen him.

I guess at the end of the day, if you ask me at this moment: I don’t feel great. I feel like I suck and I feel like I have failed. I am a shitty person and the world would be happy to go on without me. Winning. I am at a cross roads. I can feel it. Change always makes me a little excited. I’m embracing what ever it is, and what ever format it comes in.

I got this hunger in me that I have to find a way to calm down and redirect. Currently, I want to catch on fire and I want to douse the flame. I don’t want to burn anymore. Please make me better in the end. I need better right now.

I know that whom ever I meet now will be incomplete. I know Andrew will be my kryptonite for forever. This hunger in me that will always be there. But for what? so he can show up for a week, go back to his wife (um, the one he will actually never leave…) and have me holding out for him. I met my other half in him. We were meant to be together, but never will. I maybe would have walked away from this a long time ago, if he hadn’t kept trying. If he still didn’t keep trying.

see. I’ve got some things to sort out. we all fall off a cliff sometime. I need to go sit on my boat for days now. I am launching on the ystone tuesday. I said I would. No one is holding me to it. But I need it for me. 200 miles on the horizon.

But there is still a few things that make me smile. I put on my straw hat, get in my truck, let the wind blow my hair in the dusty dirt roads and turn up the country songs on my stereo. Moose is sitting shot gun. I am happy. There is absolutely no where else on this planet I would rather be right now. I say that to myself every single day. Right here. Right now. These are the times of our lives.

This is country.