My West Coast Moment

So, my moment.

I’m sitting in a coffee shop in Vancouver. I’m surrounded by well dressed people with toques and Macs and stainless steel coffee mugs. We all have wet pant cuffs and shiny faces thanks to the constant rain, and yet all of us are too cool to carry an umbrella. The setting is all too familiar, a staple of my years spent living on the west coast.

To recap, last spring I got rid of most of my belongs, stashed the remaining items I couldn’t bear/bare to part with in my dad’s basement, and hit the road. Four months of meandering through Canada, of driving and camping and bathing in Walmart bathrooms. It was slow and quiet and wonderful. It took me 15,000 km to drive the approximately 6,000 km between coasts. Then there was the three months of what can best be described as chillin’ in Halifax. Of yoga and writing and too many episodes of tv series’ and old friends and new friends and a lot of knitting.

Four days ago I was on a plane, watching the satellite tracking of my flight back to BC. My four month trek east took eight hours to erase.

I feel disoriented, like I just woke from a deep and dream-filled sleep. Did the last seven months happen?

It’s great to be back in the west. Don’t get me wrong. It feels like I never left. But I did leave. I have a thousand photos and a severely depleted savings account to prove it. So I guess I’ll just sit here and feel weird for a while.

And in a month, when I’m back in Halifax, I’ll likely spend some time wandering around the commons, cursing the snow and my lack of warm footwear, wondering where all the trendy coffee shops went.