I’m writing every day. Something. It might not be an actual book, every time (although, who knows, go with the flow), but something is still something. When I don’t, something different is taking place. I love different just as much as I love indifferent, these days, hallelujah. The universe is always listening. Paying attention. Showing us things. Lots of things. Lots, as Leo says lots of nowadaze. Or looots. This was, however, a note of its own on my phone. Open all the time. Just in case. For days that turn into months in a row. Who knows, remember? The title of this changed lots. The idea of this hasn’t though. It’s home. And someone in here has been showing up lots. Lots in here and lots on my lips. Lots happening mixed with lots not happening at all. Lots intertwined with nothing. A deliberate nothing that feels like everything. Yum. Nothing intertwined with lots all of a sudden. Barely scratching the surface and, swoosh, so, so deep. I could have started with what had already been written bellow, but no. Why though, why? I saw a double rainbow the other day from the couch at home. And two deers in the field close to the cabin in the mountains one very early morning before the other day. Yes, hello.

I’m heeere. 

What a life! Life is funny even when not funny sometimes. Some times. Creating under fire is a funny thing. Dancing through fire is another one. Same with water. Inhale. Exhale. Air. We’re on earth now. Or are we? Sleeping in the playing room at my brother’s feels electric when surrounded by the creative toys we’d been playing with on and off, music and impeccable sound. A certain feeling is infiltrated throughout, it kinda goes round and round, it swiftly and softly takes you on a ride. Amongst the stars, obviously. Venus and Mars.

With Paris, it’s all one, it’s in the name. So. It’s home because I love it so much. There’s just something about Paris, there’s something that feels like home about other places on earth, in the sky, the universe, as well, the home that’s written in the stars. Of course there are people that don’t love Paris and that’s okay, I’m sure they have their home somewhere else in this world and that’s fabulous. To me, home is a space where I both feel safe and can go wild at the same time, in whatever way feels natural in the moment, someone I both feel safe with and can go wild with at the same time, in whatever way feels natural in the moment. Completely let go. Of everything I know, have learned, become and just be. Dance. 

I didn’t even think about it when I was in it. Paris. See? You don’t think and that’s rare when deep thoughts feel just as natural as the flow. Many things were roaming around inside my heart, but when the heart’s in sync with the brain, busted, it’s the synergy that’s everywhere. Somehow, the visible reveals funny things from inside the invisible and a zygote comes to mind. It rained just as much as the sun was out and when you’re at your best, rain and sun feel the same. Yeah, right. No, seriously, think about it. When you’re with someone who brings out the best in you, you love everything, forget everything and remember everything, oui, oui. 

My philosophy is why being in the cold when you can be in a bikini, I heard Mariah saying in an interview once, I loved it and, boom, a note was born. See what I mean, Inga, baby girl? Inga is writing a book, as we speak, and I die. I love Mariah, I love a bikini, but it’s this feeling Whitney is singing about in All The Man That I Need (Live at HBO’s Welcome Home Heroes, 1991) that takes me out of this world, home, in any given moment, no matter the weather. 

My goodness, I can not believe I didn’t think about taking a picture of the moment I was living with my brother’s three year old son while swinging him in a park close to their house even though I had my phone with me. There was no one else in the park with us. For a couple of minutes. For a couple of minutes, it was the two of us and the park. Leo loves to go the park. Paaark. It was on a bright spring sunny day, the nature was blooming and the jazz was jazzing. We were facing the same painting as we were living the moment naturally. The sky seemed so majestic, so high, hiiigher. This is the highest we can go. Nooo, higheeer! Leo, do you want to fly straight into the sky, say hi to the stars? We were both facing the sun, Leo from the swing, me from the ground, just behind Leo, never stopping from pushing the swing, of course. Nooo! A nooo! so full of purity it shot me straight into the Milky Way. The sun was literally smiling in the Pets2 sort of way that you never end up actually watching head to toe, and by you I mean I, because a kid to unglue from a movie like Pets2 they’ve watched for no one knows how many times before is not impossible unless you put them in the right vehicle and drive them real fast. Faaast. A basket from the laundry room will do. And adequate floors. When it’s just the two of you, at home, on a Monday morning no human being could have predicted. Agaaain pops up – emphasis on the third a, enthusiasm level 1000 and an irresistible smile. 

Taking Ubers when it’s raining in Paris instead of going on walks that feel too much for a coat when not in the company of an umbrella and even when in the company of an umbrella is romantic. Just as romantic as an umbrella is. It glues you to the one that brings out the best in you, click. The beeping – beep, beep, beeeep, beeeeeep – of the seatbelts eagerly urging us to put them on, in the backseats, too, oui, was a constant. I’m not used to wearing a seatbelt in the back of the car, but, this time around, it felt pretty special, and now I know why. I don’t know if it’s a theme in Paris or not, and I don’t care about what is being said, ever, anyway, because I know what all the Uber drivers we met were all about. On the ride. Safety and… Fun. Plus, all the cars just looked fine and, by the way, have you noticed the colours of the cars in Paris? Almost all of them kinda match the architecture of the city. Pas mal. I’m not the talkative kind of passenger, but I know enough from a word, a look, a gesture or two.

A word, a look, a gesture or two reveal the people that try to bring the worst in you, as well, we’re all so different, thank goodness. You’ve gotten so good at being aware of what you’re feeling that you anticipate any kind of thrill, you can’t pretend that you don’t, what to do, you have a laugh inside of you, because, unfortunately, you can’t share the laugh with people who try to bring the worst in you. And even if you can’t hold the laugh, it’s not the laugh that makes you forget everything and remember everything, for a second or two. For an entire evening. Morning. Mornings. Life. You know who you are, they’re just trying, and you don’t give a f*ck anymore. You just are. You love all of you, the good, the bad, you love a storm. You’ve always loved storms and now you know why.

Fear is one thing and knowing when you’re in the company of someone you can’t be vulnerable with is another. 

You accept everything and everyone for what everything and who everyone is and let go and, usually, this confuses the s*it out of people. And so, people continue to people, believe that you don’t see their bulls*it and even say it to you while saying nothing, basically. Again and again. Hilarious. You look them in the eyes and say What?!. To yourself. Oh, I see you, and it’s you, actually, that I forgave a while ago, a couple of times in a row. And me. So, we’re cool. My kinda cool. To yourself again. Not everyone wants to hear the truth. Not everyone would get everything coming out of you and that’s ok. Or they would, but pretend that they wouldn’t. It’s easier for them to just not see. Choose to not see. Somewhere deep inside of them. That’s ok, too. Or is it a ko, this time around? A checkmate. You’ve always liked to play chess with life. Chess? Nah. Magnets. Attraction looks beautiful. And so does a castle car Leo and I enjoy to build from magnetic tiles, a delightful game for kids, fyi. You love to see. With your heart. Awm. Everyone has their own original destiny and you like that. You like how the universe works. It’s mystifying. Just like free will is in every moment of our lives here – a blessing and blessing, what did you think? Vroom-vroom. Just like family is – strength and weakness. Determination. No one can choose it for you, you are born into one. Family. Country. Society. Or has free will been floating around, since the beginning of time, mystically summoning out, in perpetuity, particles of dust to be transformed into stars?

I knew I wouldn’t let a thing like location stop me. Wait, it’s not that I knew, I mean I did on a cellular level, but I didn’t think about it, or nationality, or language. I didn’t think about any of that. I just did my thing. Always. Followed my interest. I must’ve been born with the belief that anyone can do anything anywhere. It was a rhythm that I could sense, as a child. Without realising, I was creating my own universe that I could always not only come back to, but get inspired in, by. Without realising, I was pursuing inspiration. Without realising, I let myself fly as high as I wanted to, detach from whatever was going on around me and, swoosh, dream. Daydream. Of course I bumped into people and situations that told me I couldn’t fly, this and that, but somehow, their disbelief only made me believe more in what interested me for real, for real. Then, as I was growing up, I was kinda forced by some mysterious force, to stay in a place that I never actually felt at home. I had to see what it feels like to feel safe no matter where I was in this world or who I was with. It’s the kind of safety that scares the s*it out of people, what a life, but people are people, group hug. Then, I landed in an apartment I adored, yay, home, but then the same mysterious force surrounded it with people who just didn’t like to wear a seatbelt. 

I am currently without country, as Meg Ryan says in French Kiss, what can I say. Without planet. Never give up, child, you’re home. 

It’s funny how the universe you create speaks to you in a language no one can teach you, it’s between the stars and you. A tiny master Yoda figurine you don’t even know where you got from, or when, has been smiling at you, ever since you moved in alone, from on top of a jar you see daily in your kitchen, and a day comes, you watch Star Wars, and you say to yourself Oh. It’s his signature Mona Lisa smile that I had kinda smiled back at all the time. Without realising.  

A conversation struck up between my brother and I, in the middle of Inception that we just stumbled upon, playing on cable, from on top of the couch in the cinema room, once the kids were off to sleep. We had about twenty minutes, off we went. You know how there are people who are just so guarded you can feel that there’s no way for you to interact, but the fun fact is that you’d only figured it out once you’d already gone so deep that finding the way back to the surface is funny af. The storm is taking place inside of you, your every cell has a blast and your eyes get an Oscar for best presence. It was one nationality in particular that we were talking about, but immediately concluded by saying that who’s a peachy human being is a peachy human being regardless of literally anything. George Michael instantly came to mind. Told you there’s no time to waste. Borders are for nothing, I’ve always known that. Boundaries, however, are sacred when they are sacred. When they are not, f*ck that. Peachy is whatever is peachy to you.

The way a baby feels like when your hearts completely melt in a hug… It’s what all the hugs are supposed to feel like on planet earth, in the entire galaxy, we’re all made of stardust. Pure connection. We are not our age, we are our energy, and magical kids know that. Energy doesn’t lie. The way a three year old kid kneels down next to you just after you kneeled down next to him so that he could see the Uber on your phone coming to get you two from a place neither of you have ever been before, and take you home where it is going to be just the two of you, and it’s a first for you to be alone with this baby boy you adore in a house you’d never slept in before without the baby boy’s parents, and it’s a first for this baby boy you adore to be with anyone but his parents for so long, for so long that implied a whole night as well, feels out of this world. The baby boy’s kneeling down, as a response to my kneeling down was one of the sweetest moments of my life. Grace is timeless, too. M! People were passing by and so were cars, but we felt like we were the entire universe in that very little spot we were occupying, in that peculiar moment in time, as we were both kneeling down while watching the Uber approaching on the phone, on a sunny Sunday afternoon that called for us to focus and do our best at, suddenly, being the adults life called on us both to be. I’m saying adults, but it’s focus that’s worth emphasising here. Mastery of attention. What’s truly real. The truth. Just being. And being great at it. Have fun with it and, boy, we did. With calm, a constant sparkle from the heart, with patience when it was time to go to bed and baby clothes started to be part of this game called Catch on the stairs, with responsibility when it came to brushing our teeth, aaah, oooh, with bedtime stories, with playing, agaaain, even after the bedtime stories, yes, with awe when fireworks – an hour into the baby boy you adore falling sleep – started to do their thing right next to the nook we were peacefully being held by the stars in. I couldn’t believe it and neither could my brother who told me, the next day, that it’s never happened before. Fireworks.

Everything felt surreally real. It’s the surreally real that feels natural to me. To us. It must have, since it was the baby boy you adore’s first ever twelve hour sleep. I feel you, baby boy. It was interrupted by his waking up for a second or two, a couple of times during the night, but as soon as, this one time, he called out my name (Cristina, in his unique way), I felt just as safe as he did when I knew that he knew I was next to him. What everyone expected to be a hardcore night turned out to be not only one of the most beautiful nights of my life, but also one of the softest feelings in the whole wide world, through the uncomfortable level divine and into unapologetic relaxation, a complete reset of the nervous system. No one saw a night like this coming, but sometimes the things that happen out of the blue make one believe in magnetism even more so. From inside the shoes of the adult everyone expects you to be.

You’ve finally found your home, it’s been inside you all along, whew. Gradually, patiently, diligently, you’ve been reading the words written up there. The unfolding of your destiny. The universe knows what’s the best city for you to be born in, move to, in order for you to find your home. And when the Uber driver – that takes you home from the airport you flew in from Paris, at midnight – is shocked by the fact that you intend on wearing the seatbelt – in the front seat! – you know the universe is about to send you to space, basically. 

I almost never sit in the front of an Uber, but this time I sort of had to, we know by now that nothing is for nothing. I sat in the front of the Uber, as well, on the way to the airport to fly home from Paris, it sort of happened again, we know by now that nothing is for nothing, oui, oui. Especially when the trés funny driver looked straight into my eyes, as I got in, and asked me to put a song I liked, you see what I mean? Imagine the rainbows in my brain. I told him I was happy to listen to the music he was listening to, but by the time we were getting to the destination, I couldn’t help myself and I accepted the invitation, I typed the song on the almost ipad cars started to make in the dashboard and, from the backseat, mom immediately told me to behave. Even dad laughed. It had been playing in the back of mind, it’s the song I started my first book with, it’s La Vie En Rose by Grace Jones. The sun was still pretty high in the sky that was continuously painting itself all around us. So.

It was dark on the way home, however. Literally and metaphorically, since we’re here. I started to look for the seatbelt as soon as I got in the car, but couldn’t find it. I’d been teasing dad for not finding the anchor to plug in his seatbelt in Paris and found it so funny. Not finding the seatbelt minutes into riding in the night was not that funny, though. The driver was in shock. And, usually, I’m such a relaxed passenger. The seatbelt had been underneath me the whole time. Already plugged in. I’m asking the driver, without waiting for an answer, if I can actually wear it. It took me a couple of more minutes to take it out of the anchor and then over me and back into the anchor. He looks at me, bewildered, bless his heart. What? Are you actually wearing it? I never wear a seatbelt! I look at him, bewildered, bless my heart. His seatbelt was underneath him. No beeping in this car. Aren’t you from around here?, he asks. Relatively, I reply. Haven’t you looked closely?, he continues. How many drivers have you seen wearing a seatbelt? Whooh! I’ve always been wearing mine and I love to drive. It might’ve been my car that’s gotten me used to it, it beeps like crazy until I put my seatbelt on. Which is instantly, I don’t even get to hear the beep, beep, beep, beep. I feel so encaged by the seatbelt, I can’t stand it, he replied and that was the conversation. I hope he’s changed his mind. 

And I love rollercoaster rides. Life is one, after all.

They say that it’s the leaving people behind when you leave a community, a city, a country or a place in your mind that’s heartbreaking, but what do you call it when it’s the people that are falling off of your path because you’ve had the audacity, ever since you can remember yourself, to follow your heart, in all the aspects on planet earth and beyond it, in life? I know I didn’t think about any of the attributes that sound and are lovely, it just felt like the natural thing for me to do and I’m heeere a.k.a. listen to this burrrrning desire to, toooo ssssomething! I used to be a social butterfly, I’ve always been so in love with love, with life, and when they’re also playing good music, they don’t call a butterfly a butterfly for nothing. Such a social butterfly that friends (who are no longer heeere) would find it fascinating, I was always notified about the cool thing happening next and all the hum surrounding it. To me, it just came effortlessly, just as effortlessly as counting heartaches of all kinds. People peopling became the norm and when your perspective is to see potential amongst obstacles, you become so liquid your eyes run dry. People that I gave my heart unapologetically to?! Wait. I stopped for a second. And then, I stopped for a second many, many times. Retrospectively even. Oh God, no, no, no, no, no, I thought. The heart came back where it belonged, home, and home started to be my safe place. I never wanted to leave home ever again. Fortunately, the cage is awesome, but a cage is still a cage, my friend. As with everything, however, here comes the B part. When we stop running from fear and instead turn toward it with curiosity, roar, the cage transforms into a path. An apartment in the centre of Bucharest, a city formerly known as The Little Paris, go figure, that I am now thanking. It’s been a ride and I will not forget you, you have a soul and I wish that people start to feel it more, that people find their home. Stop feeling guilty for being happy. Uh-oh, we did it again, the sun is out.

You can’t even be angry with people. Weak minds can be carried anywhere by anyone and that’s the thing – if you’re not paying attention to your intention, it’s very possible that you’re not paying attention to people’s intentions either and that can take you to places you have never fancied to go. Those who want power will do anything to get it from those who have real power. It’s ok, though, you might have needed to. It’s essential, nonetheless, for you to see everything you need to see there and, next time, find the courage to say no, completely let go, and begin again, no matter what, because you are strong and if it feels so good to the child in you. Take a leap of faith every day. Why not? We all have different missions in this life and that baby wants to see what that is for sure! Curiosity is a gift everyone is gifted with when everyone is born, isn’t that a trip? Isn’t life magnificent? Oh là là. 

And then, people get triggered. People get triggered you’re not triggered and, so, the bulls*it that’s meant to hurt you goes off the charts. It’s in that moment that you look them in the eyes and see everything you need to see. It’s the crack in people’s eyes that the joker found a way to infiltrate through and won the battle, obviously, on the spot, since people are peopling right before your eyes while forgetting completely about their hearts. What you also see is that it’s you that the joker wants to get to, but when it’s the chemistry off the charts that you’re giving all of your attention to and it’s Heath Ledger that made you fall in love with Joker too, there’s really nothing else for any kind of an actor to do. M! Except for Jack Nicholson, of course, and, since we’re here, did you know that the songs in the 1989 Batman were written and performed by Prince? Ooh. So then, you find the strength inside of you – because it’s not only about love anymore, it’s about strength, too – to hold space for their vulnerability and they might not understand much, at first, but they feel this thing… You’re here for the revolution. Can you feel the hug? And that triggers the s*it out of people, too. All they ever wanted was a reaction, who are you?! You chose a different route a long time ago, you chose indifferent. Oh là là.

People who choose to accept themselves only through the lens of someone else’s perception of them, see their worth only after someone else sees it first, or wait for an apology in oder to be able to forgive someone else are going to people instead of transforming into butterflies. It’s totally in their power and their power alone, as the story of Oz taught us when we were kids. It’s the people who try to convince people that power is somewhere else outside of us, while forgetting that they are themselves caterpillars. Think of a child you adore being around, no matter the hour or circumstances. Being yourself is the only thing you can be around them and that is the most powerful thing to be. A snowflake… I remember thinking when watching High & Low: John Galliano, as soon as it aired. 

I recently told someone I love deeply and trusted with my whole heart my whole life You don’t know me. It slipped out of my mouth with such ease even I was surprised. But then it struck me, in a moment my mind was completely somewhere else: I know that you do, you know that you do, so does that mean that you deliberately chose to hurt me? My mind aligned with my heart. Wait. Or is it precisely that you know me so well that you wanted to hurt me? Ooh. I don’t know which one hurts more. None, I figured in another moment my mind was completely somewhere else while sending me messages. This time, I know exactly what’s going on, and we’re cool, I know we’re cool, and you do, too, but you also know exactly what I mean, you always do, even when all the signs say that you don’t. I love your heart. Always have. Always will. And I know you love mine. Cool. It didn’t backfire. The conversation started and ended with You don’t know me. Silence was sent from above.

People look into your eyes, say one thing, you look into their eyes and see that it’s something else that they actually think instead. Without even looking, sometimes, you can sense something cringy in your stomach. What of what you’re telling me is real and what is not? Uh, maaan, I know what’s what, I’m deconstructing what you’re saying and not saying while saying nothing, basically, but that’s exhausting and a waste of time. Everything is saying everything all the time, but it’s when your brain has to work overtime that you feel robbed. Robbed of your attention that could otherwise move mountains, your attention is meant to anchor you into presence. Delicious.

Why all of this bulls*it when realness is inside of you at all times, desiring for you to see it and let it out? Might have I taken the until everyone is free no one is free too seriously? Leo would get so annoyed when I’d ask him something, he’d say yes or no, and I’d ask Are you sure?, he’d reply Mhm, and I’d ask Are you sure? one more time. To him, it didn’t make sense, he’s three, and when he says something, he means it, he’s not trying to bulls*it you in any way (except for when he says in a minute!, with pure love in his voice and eyes, for minutes in a row, because who cares what a minute means and because he wants to run around the house with you, in pyjamas, instead of going to bed, or play pretend that the entire house is in fact an airport while hanging on to your suitcases, instead of having lunch, but, obviously, that’s just… uhmm… what is that, God? God!), he is the truth and, man, that feels so good. Out of this world for real, for real. It’s here on earth, with adults, that we’ve got accustomed to ask basic questions a million times, adults who would bulls*it you, because they don’t know. What is even sadder is that they don’t want to know, because bulls*it level is where they choose to be, a dangerous thing to choose, but free will is priceless. People might miss a heart that’s always been open for them, seen their core and lit it, but nothing is random. So. 

A reminder of what’s real in life is a conversation – I ate on bread and butter – between Patti Smith and a homeless person she befriended in Just Kids:

“Hey, sister. What’s your situation?”
“On earth or in the universe?”, she answered.
He laughed and said, “All right!”.

You accept the fact that not everyone sees you, you chose presence over performance in a time where you didn’t know what you were doing, but you somehow did. You’ve been like this since you remember yourself, a threat no one can ever put a finger on when all you have ever focused on was love. Fun, no?Now you know why people did everything they did, you’re free, and you hope that people know that everything they do is creating their destiny.

Vulnerable keeps on cruisin’ on the tip of my tongue. M!

Leo’s I’m heeere lives in my head. And heart. It’s what he would say whenever he would hide and, as soon as he did, he would start to shout in such a sweet I’m heeere way that I would just float towards him and when our eyes met, some worlds absolutely collided somewhere in the cosmos.