I did it! I survived my first year in teaching. It was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done and I am still in a daze. It was also incredibly fun and I miss my students a lot.
Now, I’m off on my summer travels tomorrow!
The purpose of this trip is to see my family and friends in the UK and America that I haven’t seen in a long time for numerous reasons. If I am near you, I would love to see you!
I am going to try to write once a week while going about the places. I am also trying to finish my poetry collection/thingy called You Can Suck My Clit this summer. But mostly I’m just gonna be present and grateful and not try to plan so much.
My friend Alex married her best friend this past weekend, and it was beautiful and so moving! Mazel tov! At the wedding ceremony at the synagogue, the Rabbi started a discussion about the necessity of relationships.
One woman in the audience said very confidently, “Well, we need each other, we need relationships to be whole.”
And the Rabbi said, “Well, actually I disagree with you.” It started a whole back and forth with people who live alone weighing in, people with pets, and people with a deep relationship with God.
This needing each other, this critical role that relationships play in our life is something I have been thinking a lot about, especially the idea that we don’t need each other. This discussion at the synagogue while my friends Alex and Ryan were signing their marriage contracts and promising to make two into one was the perfect beginning to my summer adventure.
As you may or may not know, I have been dating a lot. I also have been making a whole bunch of new relationships in Los Angeles. It is because of these new relationships that I feel like myself again, that I feel strong enough to take off for six weeks after three years of healing. I think we need each other.
It’s been sad to say good bye, although for Los Angeles peeps, it is definitely a ‘See You Soon"‘ - I will be back in the classroom August 15th and hopefully starting my Masters for the next two years in LA.
After overthinking this whole process of building a home and making roots and should I live in London or LA or somewhere else altogether, I have decided to be in LA for the next two years, but probably longer.
LA is my home, and even though I think London and Berlin and Cerro Bueno and Tunis and Istanbul, and so many other places are magical and amazing and fantastic, I think the point of traveling is not to go find a better city than yours and go live there, but to go learn about how other people live and then make your home better.
That is what I am trying to do, and yet the UK will always have my heart. I lived there for seven years, I have a passport, and yet I still feel American when I am there. This trip is to become whole with the other side of my heart and make peace with the fact that my future is centered in Los Angeles (for at least two more years!).
Questions for Reflection:
What do you think the purpose of travel is?
Do you think we need relationships and others to be whole?
What are you doing this summer?
Sending lots of love to wherever you are,
Sammy