tonight I went through my entire music collection. I picked everything I thought was the best of all times. I listened to so many memories. each song significantly reminding me of a time passed.

for a few years now, I have been dumping all my photos into one folder and having that folder serve as my screen saver. I’ve been taken away by these collages for a while. ever time I pause to look at my screen saver, I think, holy shit, what an amazing, experience rich, life I lead. overtime, I’ve accumulated a plethora of fantastic voyages.

the music makes me feel the same way. the places I’ve been and the things I’ve seen. If I ever die, I would like to share my photo album with all my loved ones. my screen is frequently filled with adventures with the people I love.

I am rich.

Brittnea was here. she met me in Big Sky for Turnpike Troubadours. I took her rafting with me on friday. Partied in the boat yard. Partied in Ennis. Went paddle boarding down the madison. Drove to Red Ants Pants. Lucinda Williams. weird. Paddle boarded with her on the reservoir up there in sunday. good time spending with my sis. we have had so many adventures. I stuck around for Mandolin Moon. Today is monday. I spent the afternoon paddle boarding from town into the lake with Linda. Good times.

somedays I can’t believe I’ve met someone who is just like me. we understand each other in a way I’ve never had with someone. at times, we communicate just by looking at each other. he says a lot just by looking at me. we understand the small nuances of each other. I know what he’s thinking. most of the time.

it’s taken me a lot to let go of fears past and trust that somewhere out there, he’s mine. he wants to be mine. as I am astounded by our connection and trust, he is equally surprised. andrew can’t believe it either. somedays he tells me he’s surprised I haven’t left him yet.

I’ve waited for him my whole life. from the day we saw each other, it was clear as day for both of us. it just happened and neither of us did anything to slow it down. when I said we can’t honeymoon all the time, when I came back the next day he told me he wants us to honeymoon more, not less.

it will be a few months until I get to see him again. he’s back in australia working. I’m flying back to the land of the free on thursday to do my summer guiding thing. I’m turning a new page on how my life has been arranged for past 5 years and I welcome this change openly.

he came to stay with me in Finland. I held him hostage on the island for ten days. we barely left the island. we didn’t want to.

putting things into perspective

after dropping him off at the airport, I couldn’t face the void of going home and moping around. I drove to missoula instead to ski and party with Britt and to see other old friends. does the heart good. on the drive there, I had to remind myself that my life is amazing and I have a lot of fantastic friends. and I am surrounded by love. it’s an odd feeling tho, when previously the things you loved and enjoyed so much, all of a sudden feel like a poor substitute. because your whole being aches from the void.

I made it home just in time on saturday to chop some fire wood and dress up for the dirt bag ball. probably had the most fun yet. I know so many people now in the crowd that it’s just a lot of fun when all your friends are tripping and partying. especially when you’re wearing the swiss miss outfit with cowboy boots and american tights.

there are days when it’s easier. then there are times when my heart aches so much I feel sick. random times when I start crying and say out loud to myself “I miss you so much”. Skiing around without him is a painful experience. it’s all fine and dandy when I’ve got my friends around me and we’re skiing big lines. but as soon as I am back to skiing alone, it hits me.

yesterday I took a minute after skiing three forks. standing on top of whitetail, stopped to look down to the empty basin below. hoping, with every fiber of my being, that I would see him. welling up thinking about having him around me. behind me. with me. present. always there.

until suddenly he is gone and there’s a massive void all of a sudden. a space you didn’t know existed, but everything in your life expanded to create that space, that now when it’s empty you feel like you can’t breathe.

it’s remarkable. to be filled with two such conflicting feelings. overwhelming love for another human being. and with deep sadness of loss and impossibilities. the kind of love that makes you want to spend every waking moment with him. and startlingly, knowing how much he wants the same. he wants to watch you, touch you, cook dinner with you, sleep with you, hold you and take care of you. he wants you. every inch of you.

it’s good to come up for air. distance gives you the startling realization that you actually fell completely in love this winter. in a way you didn’t think was possible anymore. in a way that makes you go, holy shit, he’s the person I’ve always been looking for. he’s the real deal. he’s my skiing partner. the guy I am proud to stand next to in the tram line. one I will happily and publicly call my boyfriend. and the guy, that I could care less what my family thought of him, or his dirt bag redneck appearance. because to me it really doesn’t matter. he makes me happy and I am quite in love with his handlebar mustache. I love everything about him. we’ve had a lot of good times together.

for nearly two months we have been attached at the hip. haven’t done this sorta thing with anyone since I turned 32. haven’t felt this close to anyone.

if people only knew the kind of connection we have and how much fun we have together. we think alike and we are the same. life is easy with him. sometimes he keeps me in bed in the morning for extra hours for sex and cuddling. I don’t fight back much.

he leaves tomorrow. our honeymoon is over. and it’s ok. it will be good to come up for air. and it will be good to miss him and see this thing from a dictance.

he said yesterday morning while we were laying in bed that I will leave a big void. somehow that’s probably one of the nicest things I’ve heard in a while.

I could say all the cliches there are about what it’s like when you recognize your counter part in another.

see what I did there?

wish I could talk about what it feels like to have him in my life. a guy to whom recognition of a level ski partner is a commitment of greater significance than a title like girlfriend. I happen to be both. he is both. he’s the real thing. the partner I’ve always looked for.

he watches over me. he always watches me ski. he helps me on the traverses and high ridge lines. I’ve been on my own for so long, it’s a startling feeling to be with someone who respects you as a mountaineering partner and whom I allow to take care of me. whom I allow to watch over me and whom I look back to see behind me. where ever I ski, he’s behind me, covering my tracks. closing my turns. we’re usually on the same wave length about what to ski and when. if we’re not, we still keep an eye out on each other.

like the other day when I ate a mushroom in the parking lot over dirt bag underground breakfast, bailed on our headwaters agenda and watched him ski Hellroaring. I like watching him ski. so hot.

I spent my birthdays with him skiing a epic storm in the Wasatch over a week. my own personal powder week. so much snow. for the night of my birthday he booked us a room with a private hot tub on the balcony over looking the resort. we woke up to avy bombs rattling the hotel windows in the morning.

we are good in water.

I don’t write nearly as often as I used to. maybe that’s been deliberate. or maybe it’s just because I am happy and content. and the things I tend to write about are usually about love, life, loss or heartbreak.

today I am writing about love. again. because I want to remember this fleeting moment. I want to remember how this happens. I met Andrew.

I looked back riding on Challenger last week. saw him in the chair behind me. and my heart skipped a beat. I don’t know why. I saw him later in the tram line, I had left my poles down the line and had to walk back to get them. he was standing right next to my poles. stared at me as I marched up grabbed them, looked at him and marched off without saying a word. I panicked. I saw him again the next night at scissor bills. we were both drunk, as soon as we saw each other, “you!”

Few days later I ran into him at the triple and he asked if I’d ski with him. Proceeded to have a great day of skiing with him all day. He asked me over for dinner. Somehow, the connection is instant and mutual. I went over for dinner the next night and stayed. some point of the evening I heard him mutter something along the lines that him and I are the same person. oddly I feel the same way.

I know that this will only last for another month. He goes back to Australia, or where ever the fuck he goes. I go back to Finland and on with my life. I am trying to keep it easy and keep in mind that this is temporary. But what I want to take away from this, is that the lack of a steady partner in my life has everything to do with not meeting anyone I really wanted to hold onto. I let people orbit. I am guessing Andrew will orbit too. and I am ok with that. I don’t really have a choice. and maybe this is the relationship I have always wanted. I don’t need to see him all the time. like with other men I met last year, I think of them fondly and stay in touch. but let it run it’s course. I don’t pine over anyone, I don’t call or try to make anything happen. it’s good that way. I’m learning. I have settled into the fact that I am old enough to know that people really don’t go anywhere, they don’t go away and I can patiently wait until next time we see each other, and it’ll be just like it was. and old enough to appreciate my own life, freedom and space. I am old enough to understand that I shouldn’t try to make anything happen, if it’s going to happen, it just does. we’d run into each other again if we were meant to hang out.

Andrew immediately wants to spend time with me, travel with me. It’s like we’re already a couple even though we barely know each other. He wants me to stay with him. He likes sleeping together. even if it is fitful sleep because we can’t get enough of each other. I have butterflies and I can’t sleep. He kisses me all over, rubs me, cuddles me, wants to touch me. He didn’t even try to have sex with me the first night, instead massaged me and spent a long time making me feel good. The next day tho, we had sex 5 times between breakfast skiing and afternoon nap. Last night we had sex at night, then we woke up around 4am and had sex again until he had to leave early for a backcountry mission. He wants to come to Ennis, he wants to take me out to dinner, he wants to go to Cook city with me. he’s perfect. everything about him is exactly what I have always wanted in a man. he’s a bad ass skier. he lives on two continents. he’s got two passports. his lips feel good on me. I took my nipple rings out.

the attraction is mutual. 100% into each other. It’s incredible to discover someone you are so compatible with. I have been content being single and I have my own life going on, a life I am thrilled with. I haven’t really been yearning a partner, but I sorta knew that when it happens, it happens all of a sudden and it’s right from the get go. like I’ve said before, I have loved so much (and been loved) in my life that I have felt like I am ok with taking a break from it for a while. so, it’s startling when you meet someone that just fits. he asked me why I noticed him that day on Challenger. I lied and told him he looked like someone I know. which is sorta not true. but he made me do a double take. three takes.

drawn to each other before even speaking to one another.

I’ve been thinking about this. there are things I need to have in the house that I am going to build for myself.

I need bay windows to sit in and read a book and drink coffee. let me refrase that. I need a bay window to sit in, drink in the view and enjoy my coffee.

I need an elevated section of my house. in addition to the loft to have two step elevated floor. like a viewing platform. maybe to my bay window.

It shall have loft. that’s open on both ends.

it shall have a deck to walk out on, out of french doors that open outside. not inside. _given the wind in ennis tho, it will probably be a sliding door, really.

I will need a mud room.

after years of practice, I have the capacity to control my mind. to control my fear. it will always be ok. no matter what is lost or how things change. this too shall pass.

I have a worry over my mom’s worry.

I take moments of tranquility to sit on the island and watch the water on the lake. I take evening sauna’s in the light of a storm lantern. how life is. I changed my airfare to go back to the US on Jan 9th. it doesn’t bother me at all the way it used to. I have found a way to cope with the darkness. and I am hardly as depressed as I once was. finland sucks the life out of you, but knowing that me staying makes sucha  huge difference in making these key changes, it’s something I give freely. this mountain I started climbing couple years ago is looking better. I only hope that we are not a year too late.

I love nothing more than the silence of the island. calm or stormy lake. the house sits silent.

I had a tremendous summer. to good to write about.

the best summer yet guiding. fuck I am good at it now! and I love guiding. because I am good at it. we had the best crew of guides so far this year. camaraderie. I am also good at running water. I finally feel like I am confident enough to grow with my boat. I run the sink straight up multiple times a week, don’t even flinch at the sink and run it blind. run it as a single boat blind. don’t care. and I have been asked a lot lately to guide for privates. to row boats on the madison side.

I didn’t slut. didn’t commit to anyone either. but they were both of note. quality over quantity. there were some firsts. hooked up with a guide after the rodeo. I had sex on top of a six stack. I had sex with a 25-year old. baby steps toward on my cougar-dom. gotta start somewhere to follow my aspirations. had sex on the patio roof of my sauna while the peterson meteor shower was going off. what a way!   ..or whatever it’s called. but you know, there were shooting stars during my moment of glory.

Lucas came back for more. so did they all really. I loved them all, and I asked nothing in return. it was beautiful way to love and be free. love freely.

after guiding season was over. I spent the rest of my summer in the madison valley. I barely left. I didn’t want to. the best place on earth. Nate showed up on my yard and I bought a paddle board. borrowed annis little red truck and drove that thing around with three surf boards in the back getting high fuves and peace signs from people passing by. Nate and I rallied aroind the madison valley. there was a lot of water, lot of ghost town breakfasts. Derby showed up too. I like the company. circle the wagons!

I finished my sauna. did the wiring and sheet rock. it’s ready for winter living. sold my trailer. so many changes. moving along.

true blond hippie with summer time water always on my mind. I am loved. I want this for the rest of my life.

Noona came to visit. she got on my bandwagon. yellowstone park on a rainy day. hiking the sphinx, norris, dinner at the shore’s. bear trap with derby and disco. missoula and britt’s. portland bike tours, breakfasts, mimosas and food. Kenny’s. I am relentless. excellent usa tour of my favorite places. honored to show her around and drag her around! yes!

I’ve been dreaming hard lately. they have been dreams of love, tremendous love. affection and swimming deep in the current. I find it blissful. they are mixed in with steady streams of anxiety over travel. always losing my ticket, inability to figure out which day it was I am flying. missing my flights. not making it to the airport. I am always going to the airport in every dream, but can never seem to get there. it’s akin to running in a dream. this does not cause anxiety tho. what causes anxiety in my dreams if the usual aspect of some sort of dooms day, deliverance, mass destruction of cities. fires burning, sky scrapers falling.

these are my reoccurring themes. the dreams are heavy. they are filled with magic, power, love and hope. they are not dreams of terror. there’s sometimes an aspect of frustration. but there’s a strong theme of overwhelming love and passion. passion takes many forms.

hand delivered. to my psyche.

I am ready. and receptive. to fall again. it probably wouldn’t take a whole lot. someone close enough to walk my way and I’d be all in.

I am already in love. I always have been. the object of my affection changes. I even love finland. tremendously. I like it here.

can’t wait.