The Long Way Home

If I move at a fast enough pace, it only takes about 45 minutes to get home from school. 

Though sometimes, the time passes by much slowly if I feel like I'm carrying the weight of the world on my shoulders (literally, too, if I have my world history textbook with me). Since then, I've gotten into the habit of packing light because I enjoy spending an hour wandering through my neighborhood. It beats sitting in a bus, seeing everything pass by as a featureless blur through a window. There exists an element of confinement when you're trapped with fifty other people in an old vehicle that may or may not flip over at any given moment and, well...walking allows me the time I crave for myself.

You take the time to appreciate the desert you spent three years of your life hating. It's 2:30 in the afternoon, and while the sun may be beating down on your face relentlessly, when the wind picks up intermittently to counter the heat, it feels good. Good enough to make you feel like Pocahontas – that is, if Pocahontas wasn't Indian or Disney-fied or had a John Smith to stand with her at the edge of a cliff while she sung "Colors of the Wind."

My neighborhood is a relatively new one, barely a decade old - they're still building houses and apartment complexes to fill up land that used to be just bare dirt and shrubs, even now. Especially now. 

So I take the time to enjoy the way it feels to wander through rows of clay houses, following the curves of the streets, occasionally being lead to dead ends that force me to turn around and hike back the way I arrived. Then, by the time we get to my house, the roads end abruptly; we've reached the end of the suburbs. Beyond, there's the local community college 10 minutes away - I've walked there before - and beyond that, shrubs. Millions of them, I swear. They appear to be place markers for where the dirt hills roll and where they remain flat. 

There have been countless moments during which I've contemplated continuing further until I couldn't even tell which way I came from. But it's dangerous out there. And who knows what creeps in the untouched desolation. 

Yet beyond even that, you can still see for miles further. I think the furthest objects visible without having to squint your eyes are the mountains 65 miles away. From this distance, they're small enough to hide behind a horizontally raised finger, but you can still take comfort in knowing they'll always be there.

And I love it. I love walking through the suburbs when I'm feeling particularly melancholic or nostalgic. I've been doing it a lot these past months, and it's the best way to understand the different pathways that seem to appear out of nowhere, like the random ones between two houses or cutting through backyards. 

Shortcuts like those can be valuable when in need of an escape from life.

When I look around, everything is so pristine and fresh compared to the parts of the city closer to the mountains. There, the buildings are older, more antique in appearance. They emit a 70's vibe which I'm still debating whether I like or not. The roads are narrower and the drivers are ruthless, making the task of getting from Point A to B an experience akin to having a nervous breakdown. And above all, it's too far away to walk to, so I've never really been an explorer of those far-flung regions.

But I love this place. I didn't grow up here, so I can't claim to be a native, but picking up on the smaller details of life has taught me to be more observant of the noteworthy beauty around me. Like the way the sky is never the same color twice when the sun sets. Or how the clouds are perfectly assembled above the horizon in the afternoons. It's just...I fucking love it.

It's not only about how keen I am to embrace nature. It also has to do with the people I would hate to leave behind if I ever moved away; through first-hand experience, I've learned that it takes time and patience to build a relationship with a place. I hate sounding like I know these sorts of things, but there is wisdom hidden in these words. All the small joys of living and all the poignant moments that occur in between, they all stack on top of each other until you realize that you no longer feel like an outsider or a stranger anymore. And what do you know? 

Maybe it's finally possible to call this place home.