so this is christmas

christmas eve finds me in the airport.  i remember my trip home a few years ago found me frantically trying to finish homemade-heartfelt christmas letters and gifts for everyone.  i'm not that girl anymore.  last year all i wanted to do was take pictures.  this year, my camera is here, but stowed away.  no compulsive urge.  this year, i don't really know who i am or what i'm about.

the airport begs for us to make snapshot judgments of others.  encounters are fleeting but revealing.  in a single visual or audio instant, i can whittle down a person's existence to a single word or defining feature.  

WEALTHY.  JET-SETTER.  GAY.  MOTHER.  CHRISTIAN.  BOHEMIAN.  SOUTHERN.  BOYFRIEND.   TECHIE.  STUDENT.  

the thing is, the observation game quickly kicks back and make me wonder about my own word- my own boiled down identity.  this year, i find myself lacking.  i'm a thirty something sitting cross legged on the airport floor.  i am a woman, but not overly feminine.  i am not a mother or a wife.  i am a white middle class existence wearing the same target cardigan as a million+ other white middle class women.  i am wearing tall boots and jeggings and i am no one at all.

and here usually begins the existential crisis that surrounds visits to michigan. 

but this year- what if i just don't?  what if i just don't bother about it.  what if i stop caring to define or understand myself.  instead of seeking that warm place on the border of some identifying word, what if i just allow myself to exist in between.  uncomfortable, but unanchored.  undefined.  

somewhere in the sky- in between fitful sleep- with thoughts fixed on nothing- moving freely

that's where i'll be.