Lost on purpose

Getting lost on purpose. Can one actually do this? Maybe the List of paradoxes Wiki page presents a similar phenomenon, named after some famous explorer that refused to use a compass. I could look through all the many paradoxes to find one that fits this scenario, but then I’d be reading through Wiki pages instead of writing these thoughts (The Paradox Research Paradox?).

Anyways, I’ve been doing just this. I’m in the midst of a nearly 2 week travel period, much of which I am doing alone, in mostly places I have never visited. Last week I arrived in Montreal and decided that a long, exploratory walk was needed. With airplane mode on and my camera strapped over my shoulder, I got to the corner of where I was staying and studied my surroundings, dropping a mental pin of my location.

For the next few hours I wandered. I turned down alleys. I walked into a museum. I immediately walked out of the museum. I hugged a tree. I ate a kebab at Turkish restaurant in which I didn’t look up the reviews (it was good!). I wove threw parks, up wooden stairs that led me through forested hills. I had the cashier help me count my coins. I asked a guy that looked very cool if I could take his portrait.

Traveling alone always comes with a tinge of melancholy. Nobody to share the moments with, no one to point at things with, to help you make decisions. It will be up to me whether or not I bring the memories I experienced on that walk with me moving forward, as spoken stories, photographs, or simply in my mind. It’s a big responsibility.

But at some point I realized that I was okay with letting things float past me. That worrying about how I packaged a story to deliver later was taking me away from the moment. Suddenly, I wasn’t lonely at all. A yarrow blossom stuck its white umbel out through a fence in the park and Kira was with me. A piece of paper lay on the sidewalk that said “Abby” and she was with me. A sticker of Frida Kahlo clung to a light post and my sister was with me. The trees, the people, although strangers, the two plums I picked up from the corner market were all there with me, patient, and needless of a narrative.

I started listening more too, getting a glimpse of the lives of the people around me. I could sit down and try to write creative dialogue for hours and it wouldn’t come close to what reality has to offer. At my gate at the airport a daughter was apologizing to her mom for doing cocaine and ruining a whole day of their trip, bedridden with a migraine. “I want to stop, but I can’t tell you that I will, because I’ll just let you down when I do it again.” Today, a woman hastily turned the corner and walked passed me with what looked to be a hickey on her neck. “No!” she yelled into her phone, “I literally burned myself with a hair curler.” A few days ago, I watched a woman berate her husband in front of their young kids and his mom as he tried to help her navigate. “You piece of shit, why don’t you fuck off… 30?! I’m 31 you fucking asshole.” (Well she was sure acting like a 30 year old!). That night, I sat alone in the center of a restaurant, six inches from the table next to me, and learned so much about a daughter, mom, and stepdad just from the way they bickered about the logistics of the following day. I get used to how I communicate with the people in my life, and listening to others is like stepping into a Museum of Human Behavior.

Tomorrow Kira will join me in this new place that I have spent a few days in already. Things will be different. I’ll want to take her to spots I’ve already been to, so she can also indulge in the experience that I had. We’ll take photos of each other, share meals together, point out cool shops and architectural details. We’ll split entrees and pass iced matcha back and forth as we walk the town. She’ll chase after me as I spontaneously jaywalk across the street, and maybe we’ll use our phones to navigate to our next destination. We’ll create our own little world, one that she’ll help me carry with us. But traveling alone in a new place has reminded me that everything I experience is carried with me, even with no photograph, evidence, story, or memory. That the many happenings, no matter how seemingly trivial or inconsequential are, in total, what makes up my life.

at home

Old friends, colliding of worlds, lemon pasta, new life, conversations under a sound machine, growing into the expansion, sore cheeks, muggy summer nights with a storm breathing down your neck, walks around the block as the humidity releases its grip, stopping to smell the flower blossoms, nourishing your people, falling asleep in a space so filled with love, long days and nights traveled, choosing each other again and again, freshly grated parmesan and the smell of parsley, the hospitable comfort of a futon when it’s in the home of your friends, eating Bambas and strawberries at the kitchen counter, stepping into the lives we couldn’t have ever imagined for ourselves, and the knowing that any amount of time spent together is a gift to hold for a lifetime.

Little Sister Apothecary

In 2021 Kira enrolled in school to study the Wise Woman Tradition, following a calling to deepen her relationship with the plant world. She held an intuitive feeling that many of our modern problems could be linked to seeing the natural world as other or separate. Also, that our aches, problems, and dis-ease are often viewed as things to be fixed. Instead of patching over our pains, Kira has been exploring what it would  mean it focus on nourishment and flooding our body with all the goodness that it so craves. What if we stopped viewing our pain as brokenness and started seeing it as a helpful message of imbalance? …And so began Little Sister Apothecary.

I know a question Kira get’s a lot from people is “What does that medicine do?” or “What does it address?” And the answer is not simple. Yes, these plants contain herbal actions that target certain symptoms (of which I’ve experienced first hand), but what I’ve found is that it’s the relationship with the plants that acts as the vehicle for healing. 

I’m not an expert on this stuff, but here’s what I have experienced: Taking time out my busy life to start my day with a cup of oat straw infusion (which I did daily for a year), meditating over a cup of infused schissandra berries, or slowly sipping a spicy adaptagenic elixir has put me right back where I need to be—in the moment and in my body. I’ve also noticed my anxiety dip, my hurt murmurs subside, and my energy increase.

Little Sister Apothecary was born out of the mission to help people connect back to themselves and their communities. I’ve seen it help our friends and family. It’s really powerful. The medicine is infused with intention and care, all done in ceremony. To all of our loved ones who have come to our home and shared a cup of tea or a home-cooked meal from Kira, you know her gift. I’m so grateful she now gets to share it even with more people.

www.littlesisterapothecary.com

overwhelmed by the giving

Last night I had a spoonful of local whipped honey and I couldn’t believe how incredibly lucky we are to live at the same time as honey bees and to taste their life’s work. The light, airy ambrosial flavors danced from the tip of my tongue, all the way to the core of my body and I wanted to cry of gratitude. Kira reminded me the other day that a bee makes less than a gram of honey in their lifetime. That’s a drop of honey. And there I was spooning it into my mouth in my kitchen and passing the jar around with Kira and Rebeca. Occasionally I can’t help but trip out over how strange this all is. I’ll get overwhelmed by the beauty and interconnectedness. Simple foods remind me that I’m home and I reminisce on the hands, wings, antennae, seasons, and cycles that delivered the spoonful of honey to me. To remember all of those steps is to bring them back to life. I think of the quote I read a few years ago, “You are eating a little bit of sunlight every time you eat food.”

let's walk

Let’s walk. Let’s cut down an alley I’ve never been down before. I want to show you a house that I’ve loved since I was a kid. And over there, where I used to skate, behind the bookstore when the security guards got off. The courtyard too, an eden in the middle of the city, where I shot my first photography assignment. Everything changed that year, when I was given my grandpa’s camera, the city was rewritten, reborn right before my eyes. So much has changed since I was here, so much has changed since yesterday. But the streets still hold my footprints and I see the faces of people I remember. My old neighbors, tending their front yard, raking their leaves and gently nodding with a smile. It’s good to be back, and I’m grateful to share it with you.