Written just before setting off on my roadtrip. But photo from my first main stop, in San Francisco, hiking the Lands End Trail.

Life sure has a way with timing, revealing to us new layers of love only as we’re about to part from them. I’ve written deeply here about leaving Chicago and the somehow surprise I felt that doing so would cast such new, bright light on many of the relationships and circumstances I’d previously taken for granted. Chicago had been, in my mind, a concrete box of sorts and the source of widespread unrest that defined my 20s. But in my last weeks before moving, it transformed into the single place in the world where I was most cared for. A guitar friend said to me at one of my last classes “Hannah, you’re just going to have to deal with the fact that you are loved.”

And though we wouldn’t think so, love actually can feel like something to deal with. Somehow, for me at least, it’s easier to exist in fierce independence and assume I’m on my own path through all of this. This accused separateness being a constant and convenient scapegoat for anything I’m unhappy about. It’s harder to learn the truth that love exists infinitely and the only thing stopping it from supporting us in every way is ourselves.

In a few days I’m bound for magical California, sunshine, and healing. I’ve been manifesting this 3 month road trip since before I even moved to Wyoming. And yet although I’m unbelievably excited about this experience and all that it holds for me, something has been creeping up the past few weeks that feels a lot like– having to deal with the fact that I am loved. Just like Chicago wasn’t a concrete box, Wyoming isn’t just the 6 month snow drift I often make it out to be.

It’s also friendships that, forged by the wild unknown of this place, now feel more like family. It’s the yoga studio where I get to go, and belong, most days. It’s the myriad of other tiny niceties which laced together do foster a very unique existence. Not one I’d like to blanket label as “perfect” or “a dream life”, although I’m often told this on Instagram. I would never use those words to describe a place which has given me all my greatest traumas and challenges. But I would agree that the fate of being here continues to be an unparalleled opportunity.

There’s a moment of pause then, in driving away from it all for a few months. But I’m remembering the deep call inside myself to do this trip. It feels the kind of important so as to not even be optional. As long as I remember that the pursuit isn’t about escape. The pursuit is about finally doing better than just dealing with the fact that I am loved. But instead going after love with a kind of radical acceptance. Love for the place I’m leaving and the places I’m going to. For old friends and new friends. For freedom and opportunity. For myself. So if you’re looking for a New Years resolution this new decade, feel quite welcome to share mine.

Moment of Gratitude:  I resolve to let in more love.