San Diego Saturday.

I never cease to wonder at the ease with which you can wake up into a new life, the old slipped off like a silk robe in a pile on the bathroom tile. I woke up in San Diego this morning on an almost-stranger's couch, face buried into the stale cushions, smiling. I keep reminding myself it's only for a week, and this is just some temporary dreamland I'll flit through, but it's hard when the new places feel more like home than the old. That's a leftover symptom of the traveling months: being alone and unfettered in a town I've never seen before makes me feel more like myself than anything else. And when I feel most like myself, I feel at home.

When I told my mom I was heading to California she said, "Take lots of pictures! And promise me you'll get on your return flight!" When I rolled a too-heavy-to-carry suitcase out the apartment door, Dan said the same thing. I smiled and said, "No promises." It was a joke, but I wonder what would happen if I rolled out my blankets on a San Francisco floor and let the fallout hit quick and quiet.

It won't happen. I'll get on the flight. I'll be in every place I've promised to be. But thinking it doesn't cost something steep is naive. It costs a lot. Some wild animal within curls tight and yelps. I do what I'm expected to do and wither, like a sunflower turned away from its source.

I lived without consequences for such a long time, it's hard to believe they exist. But I know they wait for me - licking their lips like all the girls in college who looked for every opportunity to say I told you so. I'm tired of suffering for my inability to play the long game, so I'm trying to stay tethered to my life for a little longer.

This morning we walked through the rain to the farmer's market and bought a crate of strawberries from Coronado. I wore the Celine sunglasses with a leather coat and got seeds stuck in my teeth. When we left, I dragged my feet, smiling at the farmer, wondering whether to cast in my lot with his or to wait for someone more like me.