On entering a coffee shop this morning, I was immediately flooded with the unmistakable voice of Neko Case. There are a handful of voices that have a direct link to my tear ducts, and hers is one. I was caught immediately between a sob, a desire to flee, and a desire to stay and listen forever.

The truth is, I am tired. I’ve been tired for a long time. Not to say that there haven’t been moments of joy, a day or two, maybe. And definitely, tiredness and joy can and do exist on the same plane.

But overall. I read the news, enough to keep myself as informed as I can. Not enough to saturate me so much that I can’t continue to pull back my covers in the morning. Still enough to know that I am not doing enough, that I am standing by, that I am helpless and complicit and hope may still be there, somewhere, but my fingertips keep missing it.

My heart aches.

I usually love this time of year and look forward to it with expectation. It’s Solstice, Pride season, my birth month. This year, it’s my master’s graduation. Yet this year I am wary, and I definitely feel I have not learned enough.

I know that I will be ok. I always am, if not happy, then ok. I worry for the world.

I am someone who relishes reinvention, who looks forward to opportunities for change. For that, I’m thankful for the Solstice, because a seasonal time of change is very symbolic to me. I’m grateful that this particular time of learning is about to end. I’m curious about what I will do next. (I have lots of ideas.) Sometimes, transitions bring me the most comfort. If not happiness, if not joy, then comfort. I have a feeling my real work is just beginning.

Meanwhile, I’ll stay and listen to Neko. And try not to cry too much.

I’ve spent the last few years thinking about home: what makes it, who makes it, where mine is. I have spent A LOT of time on this, people. You would think, having spent so much time on it, I would have some answers.
I don’t, really. I’m in this quest for the long haul. There are certain things that make me feel home: a warm house, the smell of coffee or bubbling soup or baking bread, sitting at a table and leaning in to flickering candlelight enough so I can see it. The weight of my puppy lying on my bare feet. The sound of cars passing on rain-drenched streets. The sound of crickets.
There are certain people, too, who make me feel home.
I have yet to put all these together in any kind of cohesive way.
Now, I’m about to move into my new Seattle apartment, at the most dreary time of year here, and I’m thinking about ways to make it home as much as I can. It’s bittersweet. I want so much to feel settled for a while, to dig in, and I have no idea what being in this new place will bring. But I have my candles and my soup pot ready.
I want to close with a quote from the introduction of The New Laurel’s Kitchen, a hippie cookbook from the 70’s. The recipes are so-so, though they were influential to me as a twenty-year-old vegetarian cook. Though their influence didn’t last, (hello, I will never use low-fat cottage chees), this idea did: “Time was—and not long ago—if you wanted to live in such a way as to be warmly connected with other people, the world supported your efforts.
Today that really is not true. If you want community in any form, or family, or home, you just about have to invent it. Your version will be unique with you.
But the first and all-important step is to dig inn where you are and “make a place.”
May we all hold space for making those places, wherever we are.

Gratitude is an interesting thing. In an Oprah-ish way, we are told to practice gratitude, especially when life is being particularly shitty and rather than sitting with those feelings, we are encouraged to focus on the good things we have. Which is not an entirely bad idea, but everything in moderation, including looking on the bright side, eh?

Gratitude is something that I wrestle with in my own life in particular ways regarding having a disability. In my last job, I was heavily pushed to profess my gratitude that the company I was working for was taking on web and software accessibility. I was interviewed multiple times for the company newsletter and ended up, through not-so-subtle prompting, repeating several statements about how grateful I was to the company for taking up the cause. And, to be fair, I was grateful ish. At the same time, it seemed to me that perhaps it wasn’t necessarily my job to pat them on the back or massage their ego with constant thankfulness. Sometimes, I simply wanted to say, “Hey guys, just do the work, alright? Know that you’re doing something good in the lives of many, and stop pushing us to constantly tell you about how wonderful you are. Just trust your work.”

Truthfully, I resent the idea that I should automatically be grateful. I try to do the right thing by people, which means treating people with respect and equity, and I don’t expect a bunch of gratitude from those who are marginalized in society just because I might be kind to them or do something to remotely level the playing field. As a developer said on a podcast I heard the other day, “Blind people shouldn’t have to pay to access the world.” I believe that for all marginalized people, and I don’t just mean monetarily. I don’t believe people should have to pay by sacrificing the energy it takes to constantly be grateful, either.

A few nights ago, I was walking home late without Kiva and crossed an intersection a bit crookedly. A woman on the sidewalk started directing me when I got to the middle of the street. I normally hate this. It’s really disorienting to be yelled at (however helpfully) while you’re in the middle of the street trying to avoid getting run over. I knew I needed the direction, though, so I tried not to be too irritated and instead to accept the assistance with humility. When I got to the curb, I thanked her. She called after me, “Thank you for letting me help you.”

I marveled at her gratitude. I often wonder if people who try to help me do it because they are desperate to feel useful, to feel like they made a difference to someone. To be thanked for this seems to corroborate my theory. It made me think of all the times I’ve felt so cheered to help someone, to level that playing field. Sometimes, letting yourself be helped is just as much for the other person as it is for you. I am grateful for that opportunity, at least.

It’s not even early morning, but I still want it. The minute my butt hits the thin-padded, plasticy airport seat, I’m itching to pop back up again and start prowling. The temptation that began as a wisp of an itch while I struggled out of my boots in the security line has bloomed into a siren call screeching through the most primitive fold of my brain: need coffee. Go get coffee.

Easier said than done, because I had just been deposited in this seat by an airline employee who had intercepted me while I was waiting for my boarding pass.

“You need help,” he said, close enough that I could feel the warmth of his arm against my shoulder. Too close. “I saw you, and I could tell.”

This is why I need coffee.

And this, also, after another employee had offered assistance before I boarded the tram, and when I accepted: “thank you”, he said, “I’ll give you my uninjured arm. Ha ha, I don’t know about this, I have an injury and you’re …” Here he trailed off, and I declined to fill the silence. Let him keep inserting his foot, we were stuck with each other. “… blind,” he finally said, then rushed ahead, “I’m not sure we can make it to the ticket counter.” Chortle chortle.

“I think we can,” I said dryly. “I have confidence in us.”

We did make it, but still, that is why I need coffee.

I should mention that the guy who could tell how much I needed his help tried what I can only assume was empathy. “I know what it’s like,” he said. I should also mention he spoke with a stutter. Blindness and stuttering aren’t the same, but I took his point.

After escorting me to my gate, he stood behind me, too close, again, breathing on the small hairs at the back of my neck. So, like, how long does he plan on staying? I wondered, as my itchy coffee-deprived brain started working through the possibilities. Could I ask him to go with me to a Starbucks? Could I endure more “empathy”, even for caffeine? No, there are some things I just can’t endure, even for my most beloved elixir.

“So, thanks a lot!” I said finally, too loud, too cheerful. “I think I’m good!”

“You’re in seat 24 F,” he reminded me, again, for the 17th time.

“Yes,” I said.

“I’ll come back in an hour to help you preboard.”

“Really that’s not necessary. The airline folks usually do that.”

“I’ll save them the hassle.”

I decided to say nothing, least of all how annoyed I was to hear the word “hassle” from his mouth, a word I have long wrestled with and worried over. That, and “burden.” “Hassle” and “burden” are two words I know well and worry over like a fingernail bitten to the quick.

As soon as he finally, finally, shuffles away, I slam the door definitively on “burden” and once again open the hopeful floodgates of “coffee.” Can I do it alone? Can I, by wanting it badly enough, make my way to an americano?

As usually happens, once I stand up and begin to move, my timidity and uncertainty become exhilaration. A cup of coffee, a perfectly routine task in the itinerary of a sighted person, is a quest for me if I have no idea where to procure one. And while that can be daunting, it’s also a little adventure, if only I choose to accept it as one.

Kiva and I hit the concourse, the traffic of people and carts and suitcases sweeping us along like a current. I prick my nose and ears into the dense, noisy air, just like Kiva on the first warm day of spring, hoping for a roasty hit from a nearby cafe or the sound of a steamer wand in hot milk. I pass bathrooms, (thank you, loud flushing toilets), a water fountain grumbling with fatigue, gates full of the agitated energy of boarding. No food court. No coffee.

I reverse direction, scootching into the other lane to flow with my foot traffic river. It amazes me how, in an airport, everyone is always moving. No stopping to check a text message or take pictures or chat obliviously in the middle of the concourse. Air travel forces us to give up a semblance of control over getting to our destination. Possibly, like me, others who could (or should) take the opportunity to relax and let go instead must keep moving, so we can pretend we have some say in getting from here to there.

Kiva weaves me through a maze of chairs, up a carpeted ramp, away from the narrow coffeeless aisle we’ve been cruising. I’m in a constant state of mentally marking our trajectory: here’s where the tile becomes carpet, here’s where the wall opens up to the right, remember this for the way back, Lauren. I hear the hopeful sound of someone stacking plates, the rush of water from a sink. I smell grease and a tickling waft of rewarmed pastry. Pastries, even lackluster ones, are a good sign.

As if linked by our barely-contained need, a woman materializes at my side like I’ve conjured her. “Are you looking for Starbucks?” she asks. Her voice is soft, probably in reverence.

“Yes!” By contrast, my excitement explodes out of me and echoes off the food court ceiling. I don’t bother asking how she knows, we are clearly kindred spirits.

“If you walk forward a few more steps and turn left, you’ll be in line.”

I thank her and follow her directions, emerging 5 minutes later with a paper cup of bitter holiness with just the right lash of cream. I begin making my way back to the concourse, checking off my landmarks: open to the left, carpet leading to tile. I’m grateful for my independence, and also for my recognition that I can’t do it all on my own.
That interdependence is where we truly begin to achieve our goals.

I don’t want to write.
I want coziness and conversations that matter.
I want touch and cuddles and kisses.
I want coffee and tea and warm bread with butter.
I want sun on my face.
I want litheness in my body.
I want connection and figuring shit out together.
I don’t want to write.
I don’t want days of solitude
hunched in a chair, computer staring back.
I don’t want companions of just my thoughts and my demons.
I don’t want silence
Moving words around just feels like throwing myself in the same river.
I’m pretty sure you can step in twice.
We’ve all been telling ourselves our creativity matters.
This is the time for our voices.
We can’t rest now.
I don’t want to rest, but I don’t want to write.
I want to engage
I want to feel
I want to listen
to all the voices that are not mine.

When I was 17, I sat on a blanket in my backyard, surrounded by my dearest high school friends, and told everyone I was a lesbian. It was my birthday party. The tradition was to stay up as late as we possibly could, outside, until the birds chirped to life and the sun gave us the morning. In the middle of the night, coming out felt so safe and so freeing. I’m not sure anyone was particularly surprised. The cliche exists for a reason: it felt like a tremendous weight had been lifted from me, just by saying aloud, “I’m different. And this is how, and this is who I am.”

This was the start of my “coming outs.” I came out to my mother, my grandparents, my host families in Spain and Ecuador, friends and acquaintances. I stopped getting bent out of shape when someone else came out on my behalf. This was who I was.

Until it wasn’t. Until, in my twenties, I started dating men and had to tell all my lesbian friends that haha! just kidding! I’m not straight, but I’m definitely not “100 percent gold star gay” either.

And still I wasn’t done. I’m not sure when I first discovered that open relationships were possible, that there was this thing called polyamory where you could be in love with multiple people and everyone was ok with it, embraced it even. After learning about polyamory, however I did, I thought about it in my subsequent relationships, but never brought it up much. It was something I wanted, but felt strange and guilty for wanting.

When I was 26, I had the opportunity to date someone who was polyamorous and who lived with his girlfriend. She liked me, at least initially. And I got to experience a relationship model that seemed to fit me in a way that monogamy had failed to do. And that was just the beginning.

So now, I’m coming out again, publicly, loudly, as polyamorous. Many of my close friends and family know, and now all of you know, too. I have a network of people who are, in one way or another, my partners, my dearest loves, my chosen family. They are the people I want with me for big life occasions, for small life occasions, for birthdays and snow days and days where there’s nothing going on at all. These are the people I will probably introduce you to, if you and I see each other often, and they are the people who will hold my hand, possibly one right after the other, or at the same time, and it will be normal to us. Normal because we’ve actively, intentionally decided to bypass normal relationship ideals and trajectories and create our own models, which are living, not static, and changing and growing as we change and grow.

I am not writing this to convince anyone that polyamory is “better.” You shouldn’t try this at home if it doesn’t sound good to you. What I’m writing this for is to ask for your acceptance and your respect. I’m writing this so that, in the future forever, I can talk and write openly about my poly family without shame and without holding back the particular love I feel for multiple people. And, ultimately, I’m writing this to open a dialogue about relationships, about the infinite ways we humans can stretch and live and love, and to be a resource for anyone who feels like the conventional model, for whatever reason, just isn’t for them. Talk to me. I am open and I am here.

And, I’ve learned one sure thing in all this uncertainty: I’ll probably never stop coming out. What a gift and a privilege that is.