Ever since I got back from the west coast, I’ve felt a little untethered, a little detached and uncertain. I was standing in Trader Joe’s the other day, picking out some oven roasted turkey, when I felt like I was outside my body, watching this mostly blonde girl do something to which my consciousness had absolutely no relation.

Being back in Walla Walla stirred up a whole mess of emotions that I wasn’t prepared to deal with and have been throwing to the rear of the psychic closet for some time. But with any trip to the past, it made me switch on the light and dig to the back. The visit made me think about the place I live and where I want to live eventually. How there will come a time when Philadelphia is no longer the best place for me to be. The unsatisfying nature of the work I do here in Philly, and how deeply I want to be putting my energy into something of my own creation. How I would really like to find a partner who is ready and willing to build something (a life, a business, a child) with me.

The fears I had about the reunion were basically unfounded. I was worried that my classmates would see me, judge me and conclude that somehow I was lacking. That didn’t happen. But in preparation for the onslaught of judgement that I thought would be coming, I did some evaluation of my own, which was the trigger for a lot of these feelings.

I don’t know much right now, but what I do know is that change is coming, and it is going to be big and right and scary and more wonderful than I ever thought possible.

About a week ago I learned that a friend from my freshman year of college recently published a book of short stories. I looked it up on Amazon, and made a plan to run to the bookstore to pick up a copy of “This Life She’s Chosen” (I can’t bring myself to pay shipping and handling when I live two blocks from Barnes and Noble). I didn’t get to it before my trip, but they had copies on display at the Whitman Bookstore this weekend, so I grabbed a copy Saturday morning while making my obligatory college paraphernalia purchase.

I packed the book in my carry-on, finished it with two hours left in the flight and sat until we landed in a state of awe at the piece of art that a girl I ate dinner with every night eight years ago has produced. The ten stories that make up the book are awash with glimpses of longing, joy, discomfort, compromise and love. These moments are so true, so perfect that I had a hard time remembering that their creator was the one with whom I got drunk for the first time in my life, before Winter Break in 1997.

I am floored by the depths of Kirsten’s gift, that precious ability to get the story out of her head and into ours.

At the party/reception Saturday night, after having circled the room about seven times, chatting with everyone I knew and some who I never had known during college, I turned to Andrea and said, “There are a couple people I really wish were here. One is Aerlyn, I wonder where she is these days.” After having that thought I was quickly distracted again by the parade of familiar yet foreign faces that was the weekend and moved on to another topic.

I got to spend some time Saturday night reconnecting with Brendan, a guy who had lived in my freshman hall, and had been in my core class that same year. He is living in Portland these days, working hard to create a successful musical career (while delivering cookie baskets in order to pay his bills). His band, The Bee Sighed, was scheduled to play a show Sunday night at Mississippi Pizza, a venue my sister has played at many times, and when he told me, I knew I needed to make a point of going. When Andrea and I got back to Portland Sunday night, we grabbed my sister and my dad and headed over there for pizza and music. We struggled a bit finding a place to sit, but eventually were situated with pizza and beverages, just before the guys started their first set. I was standing, talking to a friend of my sister’s that we had run into when I heard Andrea calling my name and saying in an excited voice, “look who’s here!” Turning around, Aerlyn was standing right in front of me. The universe heard me say I’d like to see her and delivered her to our table. Saying it was good to see her doesn’t really convey what a delight it was to have her appear there in that moment. It was the perfect ending to an intense, slightly trippy, joyful, sometimes awkward, but truly worthwhile weekend.

My dad dropped me off at the airport this morning at 10:15 am. Walking away from his car was harder this time than I remember from other recent leave-takings. The terminal was surprisingly deserted and I was checked in and through security in less than ten minutes. I needed a sandwich to take with me, meals on airplanes being a thing of the past.

I went to Marsee Baking, a chain of bakery/sandwich/coffee shops that dot Portland. There was a location two blocks from the house my family lived in during my high school years, and many mornings I would stop in for coffee and a bagel on my way to catch the bus. As I walked up to the counter of the outlet in the airport, turkey on wheat in my hand, I was thrown back in time. The man working the counter was Luis, the same guy who sold me my breakfast each morning when I was a teenager. He remains vivid in my memory because he was the only “adult” who worked behind the counter, the rest of the morning employees at the 23rd Ave. store were closer to my age.

As I handed him the $6.25 for the sandwich I asked, “Didn’t you used to work at the 23rd Ave. Marsee?’’ He look stunned for a moment and then started to laugh and smile, and answered, “I was there for 13 years!” He was surprised and delighted that I remembered him, and said that I also looked familiar. There was extra warmth in his tone as he handed me my bagged sandwich and wished me a safe flight.

Only in Portland.

It’s funny to me that America West believes that a stopover in Phoenix is on the way to Philly, but the ticket was cheap, so I don’t argue.

I’ve had an amazing weekend, I still have much to write and share, but right now I have to get in the shower so I can run to Safeway to buy a sandwich so I have something to eat on the plane today.

Last night I went to latihan at the Subud house, after which there was a little memorial for Hamid Hamilton Camp. A long time Subud member and folkie from way back who played in a group called Gibson and Camp as well as the Skymonters. He was an actor and frequently pops up in late night tv reruns. It was a touching evening to have witnessed. Hamid, you will be missed.

I’ve now experienced a whole slew of emotions in relation to this reunion. I started out at anxious, followed by skeptical and uncertain. Then came mildly intrigued, pleasantly surprised and reservedly enthusiastic. Today I’ve traveled through relative enjoyment, total nostalgia, hilarity, complete joy and utter fantastic-ness (that was after three and half glasses of free riesling, most of a plate of free cheese and piece of dark chocolate).

I’m having a terrific time. This morning we got up, showered and went for breakfast at John Wheatlands Bakery (spruced up on the outside, completely the same on the inside). After a large cup of coffee and a huckleberry scone, we headed for the Sociology majors meet and greet (I wasn’t a soc major, but there was a professor I wanted to see there, unfortunately she couldn’t make it). I left Andrea there and hit a couple of the town thriftstores. The Country Store hadn’t changed, it was the same down to the smell and the woman behind the cash register. We chatted as she rang up my purchases (big spender that I am, a whole $4.89 on a couple old jars, three plates and a cookie cutter). I told her I was in town for the reunion and that I was so glad that they were still open. She said, “We aren’t going anywhere any time soon.” I said I hoped to see her in six years, when I was next in town for a reunion and she grinned and waved me out.

Lunch was supposed to be a picnic on Ankeny (the big field in the middle of campus, my mother always called in “the quad.” She was the only one) but it’s been raining in Walla Walla, so instead we were in the dining hall. That was a fucking trip, let me tell you. It felt like we really had traveled back in time, standing in line with our trays, being served food by surly townies, queuing up for milk and juice from large dispensers. As we walked in, I just stood there, looking around, needing to take it in and process for a minute.

We gathered by Memorial Hall for the class pictures and stood grouped on the steps, just like the pictures of Whitties I’ve seen in the alumni magazine for all these years. I’m now one of the them. That part is a little unreal still.

This afternoon Andrea and I went over to the politics department wine and cheese event at one of the new tasting rooms on 2nd Street. The wine flowed and the talk bubbled. I talked with the professors who made up the bulk of my academic career (at least thus far) and found them to be even more fun and interesting than I had remembered. Part of that is that it was an opportunity to relate as adults, all of us working our ways through the world, without the pressures of impression, performance and grades. The amount of wine we all consumed was the other part, amazing social lubrication, that stuff.

I talked to people who had been my classmates, who I had never really connected with in college and found them to be kindred to me. I started to feel sad that they hadn’t been a vital part of my experience at Whitman, but someone pointed out that there is only time for so many people in your life at any one time. It was a joy to connect with them now, even if it was only for an afternoon.

Now is time to get ready for the main event, the Saturday night reception in the Reid Campus Center. Word on the street is that some long lost folks who transferred after our sophomore year will be there. Bring ’em on!

Last night, in the moments before my exhaustion took me down into sleep, I felt like I was surrounded by faces. I had seen so many that night, people who had been my world and my community for years and my brain chose to process them montage-style in the seconds before sleep. When I was in college I would go back to Portland on breaks and feel like I was seeing people I recognized on the street, only to then realize that they were actually strangers. Here, it works in the opposite. I see someone I think I recognize, and they actually are that person.

My dreams were fueled by the reunion. I dreamt that I was walking up and down paths, looking for someone who was supposed to be there. I was talking to someone when I realized he had been the object of a crush, at which point I could no longer talk. Except, with the weirdness of dreams, he was actually someone I had never met at all.

Andrea just rolled over and said that she dreamt that I had decided to go back to Portland today and leave her here by herself. She said that she woke up a little annoyed at me until she could process and remember that it was just a dream.

Yesterday morning, despite the fact that I hadn’t yet finished paying my sleep debt, I woke up early because of my east coast tuned body clock. I lay quietly in bed, listening to the rain fall, the cat crunch kibble and the garbage truck roar down the narrow street on which sits my parents house. After ten minutes, I crawled out of the quilt covered bed and lightly walked downstairs to pee. I didn’t close the bathroom door all the way, and so I was followed in by a very happy dog. She stood in front of me, her wildly wagging tail banging the cabinet under the sink and she wriggled and danced excitedly. Her missing pack member had returned.

I tip-toed back upstairs and went and crawled into bed with my mom. The cat was curled up at the bottom of the bed, and the windows were open, making the room cool and airy. We snuggled and talked sleepily for an hour, enjoying the rarity of being in the other’s physical presence. Every fifteen minutes or so she would say, “Are you sure you can’t go back to sleep? I’m going to worry about your driving out to Walla Walla on so little sleep.” I would assure her that I’d be fine (which I was) and we continue our rambling conversation.

Restless, I went back downstairs. My sister was breathing steadily and deeply in her bed, and I climbed in next to her sprawled body. Under her mountainous down comforters, I fell back asleep for about fifteen minutes, in the bed that was mine during high school.

It was good to be home.

I got to Portland last night at 2 am (5 am east coast time) after an uneventful plane ride. On the Philly to Las Vegas leg, in the three seats across the aisle from me were three adults, a baby and a dog in a carry on-bag. Two very large wedding parties also added energy to the very full plane. I don’t remember much from the Las Vegas to Portland trip, being that I was passed out from exhaustion at that point. My dad picked me up, and my dog cried when I walked in the front door. It’s always nice to know that she remembers me. The cat never does.

Andrea and I hit the road this morning about an hour later than we had intended to (isn’t that always the way). I-84 to I-82 to 730 to 12 and we were in Walla Walla. 200 miles into our drive the downpour had stopped but it was both sunny and sprinkling, and I made a comment that it was perfect rainbow conditions. Minutes later the rainbow appeared, a dazzling quarter arch, with a vibrant purple streak. It stayed with us for a good twenty minutes. I declared it an auspicious beginning to the reunion weekend.

As we drove into Walla Walla (the gas tank on empty) I kept jumping and wiggling around in my seat and repeating the phrase “holy shit.” It seemed appropriate. I hadn’t been back to town since the day I graduated, three days after my 22nd birthday. It is amazing how many things are new and shiny and different. We pulled up in front of the new Student Center, for which they broke ground the day after our graduation. The Student Union Center (SUB) that I had spent many hours in had become a parking lot. I knew that that’s what had happened, but it was still totally jarring because my mental map of campus that had been built throughout my four years of college was rendered obsolete in an instant. I left Andrea for my 4 pm appointment with the Director of the Career Center (worked in the center my senior year and Susan became a good friend in that time) to which I was fifteen minutes late. She didn’t hold it against me. It was really fun to chat, catch up and get a little advice from her, as well as hear about all the changes that have occurred on campus since I left.

After that I went down to use the bathroom, thinking that once I emptied my bladder I’d give Andrea a call and try to figure out where to meet up with her. Turns out she was in the stall next to me, which made meeting up very easy. Good thing I always wear Dankso clogs, they make my feet highly recognizable.

We stopped in at the President’s Reception and began the very surreal experience that is attending a reunion. It just got weirder as the evening progressed. There was a gathering at the Mill Creek Brew Pub tonight for the classes of ’99, ’00, ’01. I ran into the woman who was my lunch host the day I visited the campus for a first time, when I was still a senior in high school. I saw friends that I had missed and some people I never missed. Many of the same social boundaries that kept us in place as undergrads still managed to corral people into cliques tonight, although as the booze flowed, some people crossed over. I started to get tired of having the same superficial conversation over and over again, so at one point, fueled by sleep deprivation and three Penitentiary Porters, asked someone I didn’t really know well how he felt about having the same, very surface conversation 12 times in one evening. He laughed, but a little uncomfortably so. It was at that point that I realized that the peanut shell-covered floor under the bar was starting to look like an appealing option to take a rest, and we headed back to Andrea’s cousin Lindsay’s apartment for the night.

Tomorrow afternoon I attend my department reception. That should be interesting.

This morning my boss asked me to walk and pick up ten large size Fedex boxes at the nearby copy and shipping place for a mailing we are putting together. Being the helpful and accomodating employee that I am, a little while later I set out, into the questionable weather, to obtain said boxes. It drizzled a little as I walked over, but the Oregonian in me is immune to the frustrations of rain, and I kept on. My troubles didn’t begin until I had the boxes and was walking back to my office. Because all of the sudden the wind kicked up, and I went from carrying 10 light weight cardboard boxes, to being attached to a very large, wind-catching sail. I’m relatively certain that I was the funniest site on Market Street today, as I attempted (and failed ) to walk in a straight line down the sidewalk and still hold on to the boxes.

I did manage to get back to my office, albeit with some seriously sore biceps and some freakishly tousled hair.