Because it's semi-private..

There are about two people who will even realize that I have updated this space, but I have something to say and I have no other appropriate venue, so here goes.

I am going to India.

I can't even tell you how many people (and on some occasions, multiple times from the SAME people) have said, "Why India?" and I have responded with some lame one-size answer about religion, midwifery, Doctors Without Borders, why not? and the like. And while I thought for a while that I wasn't exactly sure why, the truth is I know precisely why, but I'm scared to say it. Now, though, with three weeks to go, exactly, I have to say it out loud. To myself, mostly, but also to the universe or to my ladyfriends or whatever.

I am going to India to grieve.

I am going in order to take the time, as far away as I can get before I'm on the way back on the other side, to mourn the loss of my beloved career. To mourn the fact that I can't have everything I want in life, and that I have to change what I'm doing to get where I want to go. I have to grieve the fact that I am not going to have children. I have to accept it. I have to acknowledge that, although still possible, it is very unlikely and should it come to pass that there are no children of my own, that will be a regret on my deathbed. And I have to be okay with that for the next 35-55 years. I am grieving the finality of my youth, the aging of my parents, the growing hardness in my heart. I am grieving the pain of all these changes, the harshness of my reality, and the things I have let slip past me unnoticed until it was too late.

I am going to India to celebrate.

I am celebrating the strength that continues to surprise me in it's unending supply. I am celebrating the fact that a girl who grew up with nothing is seeing the world in time to enjoy it and tell her parents about what she saw. I am celebrating a different philosphy on everything. I am celebrating a wide open future and the courage to tackle anything, even if I have to do it alone. I am celebrating the fearlessness of my soul, which has always been my favorite thing about me. I am celebrating the friends who are sending me off, the friends I hope to meet, and the fact that I have realized that I must be a better friend to myself.

I am going to India to change.

I don't know how, why, when, or how much, but I know I will be different, and I trust that I will come back changed for the better. At least I will be changed for good. (Pardon the Wicked reference, it just seemed to fit.) I hope to know the answers to all of my questions. I hope to be fixed of my addictions and in a comfortable spiritual place. I hope to write and photograph and live and breathe and sleep and touch everything I can, and to feel the electricity of it come up through my feet.

I am going to India for one other reason.

I laid in bed one night and imagined with all my being that I was on my deathbed and about to kick it. I looked back at the life I imagined I'd had and thought, honestly, about what I would regret not having done. There were five things I could come up with, and I wrote them down. Two are done already, one is unlikely to ever happen but COULD, and one is up to someone/thing that I can do nothing about. The last is to see India. And I told myself that if, on my deathbed, there are no children or grandchildren to see me off, knowing I went to India, did everything I wanted to do, sucked every last bit of marrow from my life and left the world better than I found it will be enough consolation that I could pass with an easy heart. I don't plan on dying anytime soon, but just in case, three of five is pretty good. I don't ever want to regret anything, and I would definitely regret not finishing that list while I could.

Now I just have to figure out how to have a beer with Dave Matthews.