I'm going back home.

 I'm going back to Portugal. 

 I'm going back to Portugal. 

 I'm going back to Portugal. 

 I'm going back to Portugal. 

 I'm going back to Portugal. 

 I'm going back to Portugal. 

 I'm going back to Portugal. 

 I'm going back to Portugal. 

After ten long years I am going back. I am moving back home. This time to stay. For good. 

I can't even begin to talk about how all of that feels to me. Because it's actually happening, I'm going. It's here. 

I still cannot wrap my head around the fact that it's actually gonna happen. I am scared that if I keep saying it's gonna happen it's not gonna come true. But I deserve this so hard. I have been working to hard, both to save money and on myself so I can live a fuller happier life. 

But here it goes an attempt to assimilate my feelings. 

I am joyful. 

I feel like a cycle is finally coming to an end, for real this time, and a new one is beginning. I feel that emotionally I have gotten the closure that I needed about living there. I think for the past two years it's been like this. 

If anyone has had time to read what I used to post, in 2014 I went there. Almost a year and a hafl later after my mom had died. And all I felt there was emptiness, dispair and that it did not make sense to stay there and that I had lost everything I had gained while there. It didn't even cross my mind to just stay there and that's it. I could have, I already was a grown up. I could have gotten a job and just stayed there. And I could even have provided for my brothers and given them a better life. But back then I was young and thought my destiny was something  else. So yeah I guess I can forgive the me from back then. The me form back then did not know how things would turn out. She didn't know she's be fine. And even though there was all this suffering the me who chose to come back endured, I wouldn't have lived a different life. Maybe I would have been gentler with myself, and not ignore myself so bad.

So how I feel now about going back is completely different from when I did go back there. When I went I was hoping to find my mom, a home, my best friend. They were all gone. And now I know I am not gonna find here there. But I do know that somehow I will feel closer to her. And I'll have my home again, it's there waiting for me. But I also know that I've made the commitment to build a home for myself. My best friend is there, and now she is my girlfriend. So yeah I think I have come to terms with what that place, what that city, what that country means to me. 

Now about travelling. I am in a middle of a global pandemic and so to travel it is really hard. Every 15 days travelling restrictions change and borders either open or close. I made the decision to buy the plane ticket because I have the money so, what am I waiting for? BUT.... with that... it is a decision that gives me a great deal of anxiety. I am afraid that the boarders will close, that the ticked has to be canceled and that my money will just be wasted. And that's it. I don't even know what I'd do. I mean I do have a back up plan which is to go to my grandma's house. But it would hurt a whole fucking lot. Life would be on pause for me. So there's that fear, and then the one of immigration for some wild reason doesn't let me in. So that fear. The fear that leaves me in a limbo. I wake up everyday with this in the back of my mind, or somedays it's livid in the forefront of my brain, and all I can do is waste away my 'me time' by researching as a way of selfsoothing myself and psyching myself out of that. But I don't even know if that's something good. Give in or ignore it. I don't know which one is gonna affect me more. Will only be at ease when I'm actually there. 

And once I get there... So many stuff to deal with.

Maybe another day I will talk about my fears of when I actually arrive there. For now this is what I can wrap my head around. 

I want time to pass already so that it's less days feeling like this. 5 days until I can move back to my brother's and sort out my stuff I'm gonna donate before I travel. 

The Fish and the Flower

    The day seemed different.
Even though the fish looked around whenever it adventured for a jump outside the water, it could see the same mountains, the same sky above. Those same trees. The water's temperature changed along the day, but even it's pattern was ordinary. Normalcy was all that surrounded it. 

And even then... Something felt different. 

A sound hooked the fish's attention. It dove in and what dropped inside the water was like a beacon. A shiny object that was very slim, but that went down very fast to the bottom of the lake. The only thing the fish could see and focus on, was in that shiny round thing, sinking down to the lake bed. It entranced the fish.

The object reached the lake's floor and settled with the sand after disturbing it's neatness. As the fish came closer to the brilliant object, the water started wavering. And it felt like an earthquake was going on. Forgetting the object, the fish escaped just as a shadow came over the water and cut through the long gone stillness of the liquid. 

Only preocupied in swimming as fast as it could, the fish had no direction. Until finally, it realized everything was still and silent again. Everything was dark.

-Had it gone under a tree's shadow?

Going slowly towards the surface, the fish was very apprehensive. Would it be safe? Coming up above water, the daylight that once shone on the usual landscape was gone. The view was void of mountains, the sky was no longer a light blue, but a threatening dark blue, with dark-grey clouds rolling in. The trees were dry and twisted, their foliage shriveled, the branches  sticking out in all directions, like menacing claws the fish had seen in some animals. 

Panic started to arise, the fish felt like it was alone, lost and hopeless. The fish wanted sunlight, the mountains and the trees. It wanted everything to go back to the way it was. It was easier, less scary.

Like this? - The water was off and even the temperature was strange.

All it knew - all gone.

All that was left - horrific.

A shiny object caught the fish's attention, but this time the fish was more cautious. After all, it had been this kind of distraction that got the fish in trouble in the first place. Looking at the distant faint light, the fish treaded the dark water carefully. Even though at the back of it's mind the fish was afraid something could come from below, the only thing it could hold on to was that glimmer of light. As the fish came closer, the light grew from the size of a seed to the size of an apple. It was hard to see what it truly was, in the oppressing darkness it's eyes were having a hard time adjusting. 

But that light made the fish feel warm. It  certainly gave it a little bit of hope. Drawn to what the light made the fish feel and not what it might represent, the fish kept swimming. Leaving it's fear aside.

Thunder clapped behind it, making the fish swim faster and not look back. There was only darkness, the fish was not going to give into it. It needed to keep going. Breaking through the water and pushing ahead the fish just kept going. It now had an objective, and nothing was going to keep the fish from it.

As the fish came closer to the ever-growing light, a warmth washed over it. Around the light the fish could catch a glimpse of the world that it once knew. And finally when the fish drew close to the light it saw for what it truly was. 

- A beautiful luminescent flower. It shone so bright it had called out the fish. The flower was everything the fish dreamed of. What they thought they could never dare to even dream about. Seeing and feeling the flower, made the fish realize that all these things the flower made the fish feel were what the fish always wanted to have.

Amazed and awed, the fish carefully approached the flower and voiced a careful and caring hello.

-Hi.

The flower, wich seemed to be looking elsewhere and so lost in it's thoughts, turned to the fish, looked at it for a long time and began to sob.

-Why are you crying? - Asked the fish, concerned as it's heart sank.

The flower began to smile sheepishly  through the teras and said:

-You are the fish I have been looking for. For the longest time, I thought I had lost you. And now that you're here... I didn't even know it's you I wanted.

The fish happy but confused asked:

-Me? But I'm just a fish. And I live in the water and you - you are a flower. There's no way you can survive with this much water and I can't live without it.

The flower gave a knowing smile:

-But see, you have never been a fish. 

The flower shook it's bud, with tiny brilliant teas rolling down.

- Look at yourself. You are a flower too.

The flower looked and sighed, feeling the weight of the past.

-I thought I used to be a fish too, you know... And sometimes I even tested the waters, but quickly I turned back into a flower. It always made more sense. The water suffocated and smothered me.a

The fish looked around, and it was no longer in the water. The ground and the earth was surrounding it's lower half, and the fish was no longer a fish.

Looking up in amazement, the flower, who used to be a fish, smiled at the shiny flower and said:

- I never felt truly happy being a fish. This is the first time that not being a fish and becoming a flower makes sense.

The flower laughed halfheartedly and said:

- Oh but you were never a fish, you were just looking for the flower who could hold up the mirror and then you could see yourself. Do you remember that you never looked at your own reflection? Do you remember why you chose the river because the lake waters were too still?

The used-to-be-fish felt sad that it had denied the truth for so long. That being a flower hurt a lot  more than being a fish. People saw flowers as fragile and something that could easily be plucked away. But looking at this flower, the fish's flower... The newly formed flower began understanding that flowers were the most beautiful, resilient and powerful beings in all the world. And this flower in front of them, was the most perfect flower that it had ever come across. It's glow was wonderful and as the flower understood that this is where it belonged, a light glow began emanating from it's roots and stem and the flower felt happy, because it was going to become what the other flower was, and what they had always dreamed to be.