And I don’t have anywhere I need to be. Not yet.
There is no reason to jump out of bed. No one is waiting for me. Nothing needs to be packed or answered or handled.
So I stay there for another minute.
Eventually I make coffee and take it outside. The morning air is cooler than I expected, so I wrap a blanket around my shoulders and settle into a chair.
The red rocks are catching the first light.
I can hear the other women beginning to stir inside, but no one is rushing. No one is asking what time we need to leave.
I drink my coffee while it’s still hot.
I can’t remember the last time I did that.
Later, we gather for breakfast. Someone is still in pajamas. Someone else has already been outside taking pictures. We talk about the day ahead, but there isn’t a long list of things we’re supposed to accomplish.
Eventually we pull on our hiking shoes and head into the red rocks.
The trail isn’t about getting somewhere.
We walk. We talk. Sometimes we don’t talk at all.
We stop when something is beautiful, which happens a lot here.
The smell of juniper. The enormous blue sky. The warmth of the sun on my face. The sound of my shoes against the earth.
For once, I’m not thinking three steps ahead.
I’m just here.
Afterward we come back hungry. We eat, and we linger at the table longer than I normally would because there is nowhere that I need to rush off to.
And then something almost uncomfortable happens.
There is nothing scheduled for a while.
At first, I don’t know what to do with that.
I’m so used to filling empty spaces. Checking something. Cleaning something. Answering someone. Doing one more thing while I have a minute.
But here, I have permission to leave the space empty.
So, I take my book outside.
I read three pages.
And then I fall asleep.
Apparently, my body had other plans.
The afternoon is quieter.
Later, we gather again. I lie down beneath a blanket and close my eyes, and the first sound of the singing bowl fills the room.
Then another.
And another.
I can feel the vibration through the floor beneath me.
For a while my mind does what it always does.
It makes lists. It remembers things. It solves problems nobody asked it to solve.
And then, somewhere along the way, it gets quieter.
I don’t know if I fall asleep. I don’t know how much time passes. I just know that when I open my eyes, I feel different.
Softer somehow.
There is no rush to get up.
So, I don’t.
By evening, something has shifted.
The sun begins to drop and the red rocks change color again. We gather for dinner, and nobody is looking at the clock.
The conversation moves from funny to serious and back again. We tell stories. We laugh. We learn things about each other that probably wouldn’t come up in ordinary conversation.
Later, we sit outside.
Maybe there’s a fire. Someone has a blanket wrapped around her. Someone is laughing so hard she can barely finish her story.
And then I look up.
Stars.
So many that for a minute I forget what we were talking about.
I lean back and stare at the sky, and I realize I haven’t thought about my to-do list in hours.
I haven’t wondered what everyone at home is doing.
I haven’t been planning tomorrow.
I haven’t been trying to make sure everyone else is okay.
I’ve just been here.
Walking through the red rocks.
Eating when I’m hungry.
Resting when I’m tired.
Laughing.
Listening.
Breathing.
Being taken care of.
And maybe that’s why this feels different from a vacation.
I’m not trying to see everything. I’m not rushing from one reservation to the next. I’m not coming home at the end of the day exhausted from having such a “relaxing” trip.
There is room here.
Room for beautiful things, and room for nothing at all.
Tonight, when I finally crawl into bed, my body is tired.
But my mind isn’t.
It’s quiet.
And just before I fall asleep, I have this strange little thought.
Oh. There I am.
Maybe I didn’t need to find myself after all.
Maybe I just needed enough space to hear myself again.
