Arriving in a New Place 3 🏚️

My girlfriend once told me that the sky in this city is remarkable. Before she moved here, she had never seen skies as blue as this.

Monday a week ago was the first day in what feels like forever that the sky showed just how blue blue could get. It felt nice to be out there and soak up some sun. But no matter how bright the sun, no matter how blue the sky, when the wind is blowing you'll be reminded of how relentless winter in this place becomes.

The fog

Thursday morning, 9 o'clock. I get up and make coffee. I pour it in my cup, walk into the living room and take a sip. I look out of the window.

I see fog. Fog, so thick, that you can hardly make out the people walking in the street. I put on my running gear and walk outside. It's everywhere. The fog swallowed the neighbourhood, the district, the city.

I battle through the haze as I go about my run. The people I come across look like they don't belong here. They look trapped inside the impenetrable density of this screen of fog.

I realize that the fog swallowed the people too.

Where am I?

Everything is the way it was. After travelling for a year, I cannot comprehend that it's over. The first weeks back feel like I had just imagined the trip. While I was gone, I became a different person, discovered a new side of me, had wonderful ideas. In the meantime, this place stayed exactly the way it was.

Returning home reminded me of the person I used to be. Also, it got me worried, that I'm still this person and the trip just happened inside my head.

I haven't felt as lost all year.