in the moment

It really does baffle people when I insist on living in the now.
They can't...quite...wrap their lil brains around that.

How can you not think about retirement? Plan for it?
How can you not think about plans for the summer, or whether you're going to renew your lease next winter?
How can you just drift through life like that? Where's your stability?
Where's your roots? Where will you be in a year? Five? Ten?
How can you NOT KNOW?

I get harassed about this a lot. People have this pre-conceived notion that I'm a drifter, that I'm shady or something because I have no ten year plan.

No, I don't think about retirement. That requires me thinking about being old, and I'm just not down with that yet. I'll see when I get there. If I get there. I didn't expect to live to see 20, everything from there on in has been total icing on the cake for me.

Summer, leases, next winter, same thing. I might not make it until tomorrow, nevermind the summer, so no I make so solid plans. I have things I'd like to do; I want to skateboard a lot this summer. I'd like to get outside as much as possible. Get into the mountains. But I won't plan for it, because I might not be around. Those aspirations can follow me no matter where I go, not dependant on me living here, or having this job, or this apartment, or in this country for that matter.

Where's my stability. What kind of stability are we talking about? Stability, as society sees it, is an illusion. Life is not a stable thing. It's always changing, always shifting. What's true today will not be true tomorrow, or a week from now, or a year from now. Perspective shifts. Lessons learned. You are not who you were a year ago, 5 years ago, 10 years ago. You don't have the same job, likely in this economy, you don't have the same house, also likely in this era. Who really HAS stability anymore. I just chose to embrace it and live it.

I don't drift, entirely. I love Boulder. Can't say how long I'll be here, but I'll love it until the time comes to go. Then I'll hopefully end up somewhere else I'll love. That's the aim, anyway. To end up somewhere I love being. I don't have any roots, ok this is true. I have no family. I have no ties to any one particular place, I have nothing to hold me somewhere I might not wanna be. This is so liberating, so freeing. I can live anywhere I want to. No family fights, no "why don't you come visit", no obligations except to myself. Yes, I eat out and I see big families at tables and it makes me sad that I'll never have that, but ah well. I'll never have the drama of it either.

My job is great, for however long it lasts. I make no long term plans based on having this job. Cause the way the economy is, I could lose it next week.

When you live in the right now, things like this don't haunt you. They don't keep you up nights worrying if you'll have enough money in your retirement fund to cover your wrinkly ass, or if your job will be there next year, or how you're gonna pay your mortgage IF you lose this job - worrying that ultimately gives you ulcers, or heart conditions, or high blood pressure, which is of course more shit to worry about.
All that is lifted.
When you live in the right now, you see how brightly the sun is shining outside, and you can't wait to get out there. You wonder what's for lunch, you wonder where the afternoon is going to take you. Life is an adventure. I could work this afternoon, or I could end up in the mountains playing with the dogs, or I could be in the valley shooting a shotgun. I'm not sure yet. I do know that tonight I get to do computer stuff on a mac. Least I think I will. We'll see, that could change too.

When you live in the right now, everything is a surprise, everything is an adventure. And if you can accept it, it's awesome. Like a roller coaster ride, without all that wind in your hair and the nausea. I love it. It makes me so deliriously happy. I don't miss a moment, I don't pass a rosebush or a flowering tree in early April without inhaling deeply and loving that that flower is there. Smiling at the sound of a child's giggle...because honestly some of them have the absolute best giggle on earth...and having my heart completely unburdened by anything other than where my feet are taking me.

People don't get this. In fact I get the feeling they resent it. Maybe because they can't do it, or aren't sure how. Easy, I tell them. And this is the only secret to no stress.
Just
Let
Go.

Nothing, honestly, matters. If you have this job in a year, does it matter? If you move next week, I mean really, will you die? Will the world end? No. Life just changes. So what if your marriage ends. You try and if it doesn't work, let it go. Stressing about it isn't going to make it better.
Just let it go.

I'm likely going to get deported in 2 months. Back to Canada, suffer that 5 or 10 year stint of not being able to come back into the states when one gets tossed out of a country. I could stress about that, I could freak out and cry and beg my husband not to punish me, as he so rightly thinks I should be; I could think about it so much that I nightmare about it. That I develop ulcers, that I can't eat or sleep or work properly about it. It could consume me. In essence, I'm losing my home, my life, the town I love being in.

I started looking for places I might like to live in Canada again. Whistler, hands down the best snowboarding anywhere, is looking good. Rent is pretty cheap, jobs not bad even out of season there, and come winter, snowboarding that owns. There are hostels there too, in case I don't have enough cash stored up by the time 2 months comes around, so I'll have a place to stay.
The cat will need a home, I highly doubt I can take her along. Husband might take her. If not, I'll see about someone else. Not a huge deal. I love my cat endlessly, don't get me wrong, but when we're talking survival, when the chips fall and it's an apt or her, she goes. Being homeless taught me that.

And wherever I end up, it'll be an adventure all over again.
But right now, I'm in today. Tomorrow doesn't concern me other than a passing thought, that knowledge that everything really will be ok whether I stress or not, so I chose not to stress.
And today, I work for the lawyer this afternoon. Likely not all afternoon, but it's hours. I'll go walk in the sunshine a while at lunch. I have no food, nor any money for food, but the boss is letting me have leftovers from some big luncheon downstairs, so I'll be fed. Tonight, I'll possibly do the computer stuff. But in a moment, everything could change.
I can't wait.