She'll come round soon

I remember when Prince William turned twenty-one, had his face put on a stamp so that the rest of the world could lick his behind and stick him on the corner of an envelope.

He was dishy, back then. And Harry was busy smoking pot.

But he's older now, they both are.

And our prince is sorta balding.

Rebecca, one of my favourite writers (alongside Neil Gaiman, Pink and Sara Bareilles), has been writing about change recently.

How nothing's permanent, even tattoos. Her tattoos. Which she loves, and which, imperfect as they are, have found themselves meaning as they grew with her.

In this space of time I'm in right now, I love that idea.

My entire life's been pretty transient.

I've never held on to things, because I've always been in transit.

Always.

I hopped off a train around my birthday almost seventeen years back, and I got lost at that train station. I left some part of myself behind that day, and no one's gone back to look for her. Not even me.

Don't remember my flight into Singapore, or realizing that we'd be here a while. I've still been at that train station, waiting to take the train heading in the opposite direction.

I've still been waiting to go back home.

It's changed though. Home's changed. For sure it has.

Edinburgh might still have a house with a blue door, but it's changed. As has The Nooks in Mottingham. As has London.

As have I.

I've lived all my life with two suitcases by the door. Moving in but never unpacking, apprehensive about everything and anything that might tie me down for more than a year. There's always so much that's supposed to happen in the year, it's laughable.

I've always been in transit-

waiting, looking, taking off and coming back just to quell that insatiable need to move and be moving.

Somewhere between doing groceries by myself and half-skipping along reservoirs with Jafacakes for dinner, something inside me's shifted.

There's a lot for me here, where I'm at. Not San Gabriel specifically but, LA.

Family and the most picturesque dreams and plans that have been years in the making. Years.

But almost seventeen years in this train station's made me realize that, there's a whole load that I haven't seen coming and there's a whole lot more that I won't be able to see just yet. This doesn't mean that I'm daunted.

It just means that there's a whole stretch of train tracks that I can walk along, on my own, until the distant call of the train engine asks me to hop off the tracks to let it pass, or to let me hop on.

I've spent too long waiting on this platform.

I've spent too long watching people in long coats and brown leather briefcases stride past me, completely sure of where they're going, while I've traced circles in the marble floor with the toe of my shiny black shoes.

I outgrew those shoes years ago and didn't even realize it. My dress shrank and my hair grew out and got bleached by the sun.

I'm a wee bit taller than 90cm now, and it looks like I'll need my own ticket.

Can't keep going 25% in four different directions. Can't stand here and wait for the line that will let you go 100% in one direction.

When you decide, you do. And then you go for it.

And you trust yourself, to trust yourself.

Wait for me?

December 14th 2010, Tuesday

11:59pm