the truth about sea turtles

and love, and love, and love

the night i drove to your house in september, the glare on the roads were extra eminent. when i tried to focus on what was ahead of me, everything simply blurred together: the lines, the sky, the dark clouds. i thought, perhaps, it was just that night, the fog throughout the horizon. but it felt more prominent than that. like something was different, something was changing.

my sister and i grabbed redbulls and a note to put at your doorstep, and i got myself ready to see you again with childlike wonder hovering inside, overwhelming my whole body. i loved you- it sat in my bones. i was ready to say it again to your face for the first time in about a week, yet for some reason, it felt overpowering. sometimes, perhaps, it felt as though it had been a secret i had swallowed for decades, not as if i had been saying it to you consistently for a full month prior.

the truth is, if you didn’t come down that elevator that night, i might have exploded entirely. i couldn’t explain it then. i can’t explain it now- the desperation of needing to see you, for even a second. my desire to hold you. the ache to simply be in your city, to be closer to you. to tell you, again, that being around you was like breathing, and that night, i needed fresh air more than anything.

we came to the city that specific day, because going to the gym consistently heals parts of you, but not all of you. yes, the routine of waking up early, eating breakfast and working out is amazing. yes, i know it’s a good habit to take your vitamins. but, i needed more. i needed adventure and endless leaps. i needed the cotton of your shirt against my face. i needed the curve of your collar on my mouth. i need my prayers to come alive

actually, i needed to see the skyscrapers to remember how small we all are. so, we made the two hour drive at 1 in the morning. the reminder was then smacked right in my face, as i drove through downtown, feeling like a little bug.

hours later, sitting in my car after convincing you to come down so late in the night, i couldn’t stop looking your way. your smile was lightning. your laugh sweet and expanding like a meadow. your scruffy face was wilder than usual, in a way that made me pull you even closer. instead, i kissed your cheek, and stroked the back of your neck from my own seat. i wanted so horribly to tell you a secret. not what i had told you before, but something new. i wanted to tell you how different i was feeling. no, not a bad different. never a bad different with you. but, how wild the feeling in my heart was getting. how wide it was growing. i wanted to tell you, i was getting more afraid as time passed by. that looking at you made me feel at home, and having a home meant having something to lose. having a home meant having everything to lose.

i was afraid of love, yet there i was, sitting in the hands of it.

the thing about sea turtles is that they have a natural gps built into them. when they get lost, they are always able to find their way back to the beach they were born at. the magnetic signature of “their” beach gets imprinted into their brain, forever. stamped, sealed. so, no matter how far they travel, how far they swim, they will always know where to come back to. so, in a way, sea turtles are never lost. they are just exploring, waiting for the moment they want to return home, and each of them? each of them has a home the moment they enter the world.

i read this all, recently, on instagram. how cute. how silly. i giggled, at first, but when i thought about it more and more throughout the week, i found myself searching for my beach, my home, the little village where my two feet could land. i thought of whether i’d be able to naturally find it again. i thought of how, for humans, we are never handed it at birth, but rather find it, in a way, on our own terms.

i thought of you.

the night i drove to your house in september, i couldn’t see anything ahead of me, but i could think of one thing to calm you: you were there, waiting at the very end of it all. i crossed the lanes with ease, not knowing what was to come. i surpassed my horrible night vision and found that i knew my way out of downtown pretty easily. i passed cars and headed through fog, and maybe, in some way, swam oceans and fought insects, until i found you at the end. i knew where to go. i knew how to get there.

and when i finally saw you, i told you that i loved you. i loved you. i felt it in my hands as i steered the wheel. i felt it in my blood.

the night i drove to your house in september, i was going home. i was never lost. i was simply roaming until my memories remembered where i belonged. they remembered you.