This ping pong life style…

Ping!

We are at home in Vermont, preparing our nest for travel.

Carefully packing the essential fragments of our lives that we think we will need for the year ahead.

Pong!

We are in Trinidad.

Taking note, for one solid year, every new smell, sight, and sound.

Realizing so many of those carefully packed fragments we didn’t even touch.

Ping!

We are back in Vermont again, immersing ourselves right into the comfortable green palette.

Nothing new at all in Brattleboro, which is exciting in and of itself.

Pong!

Now we are back in Trinidad again, nestling ourselves into the fact that we are no longer new comers here, but we are almost, kinda-sorta at home.

But not really.

We still need lots of guidance to ride this horse called Trinidad.

Guidance that seems to point us in the direction of keeping the best of both worlds that make up our ping-pongy lives

safely in our hearts and deep within the soles of our feet.

While we launch back into the Trinidadian side of the table, we will hold onto our little corner of Vermont,

the place where hope and hemptation can intersect in one amazing kale and arugula patch,

and carrots and beets can bring on smiles that twinkle

almost as brightly as a summer evening whisper.

.

In Vermont, the light is softer,

as are the colors and lines that make up the landscape.

The faces are more familiar,

on the street

and in your face.

Some familiar faces have taken on new twists during our Vermont stay,

along with some new convictions.

Going back and forth between cultures can feel like trying on a new hat that takes some maneuvering before it fits.

Sometimes the new hat, no matter how pretty and exotic, can weigh you down.

The hope is that, with time and practice, we eventually wear all of our hats with ease and joy.

Ping-ponging between cultures can feel like staring at a blank canvas.

(What the heck are we doing here?)

One way or another, the canvas will take on a life of its own.

Whatever life we choose to give it.

At first the image may be sketchy.

With time, more life emerges,

And before you know it, your new reality comes into a clearer focus, and there you are,

bathing in the banana flower petal’s morning dew.

If that doesn’t work, wearing new shades may help to see things more clearly.

(just borrow them from your local puppeteer who happens to run a dog shelter in her spare time)

In any case, we gather up the strength we have in any given moment,

and we take whatever assistance might come our way.

We wear our proudest armor,

we take all the advice we’re given,

and soon the finish line will be right there, for the taking.

But it is never

.

It is always

the beginning

of the

 journey.

(p.s.  During our whirlwind visit, we did not get to visit half of the Vermont/Massachusetts people we wanted to!  I can’t wait to see everyone we missed, as well as those we saw, next summer!  xo)