like desert rain.

my forth of july in nevada was much needed and well worth all the extra traveling. sometimes you just need to go home to clear your head and catch your breath. the only thing was, i really missed that husband of mine. so the next afternoon (the fifth) i headed to reno in megan's car to meet up with logan (her fiance). logan had come down for his grandma's funeral and so we decided we would drive back to canada together.

one thing about growing up in rural nevada is that you learn to adapt to having to drive a really long way to go... basically anywhere. the closest walmart is like, three hours away. just sayin'. so being that i am such a great adapter (*cough*), i now love driving. but i don't just love driving in general, i love driving in nevada. there is nothing like coming out of a mountain pass, down into a valley and seeing the whole big, wide open landscape in front of you. i love all the trees and green in canada. but i missed those views. the endless sky that makes it seem like you can see on and on forever and the way the road just lays straight out in front of you for miles until in the distance you can see it start to curve up into the next pass. it's perfect.

it was amazingly comforting and oddly therapeutic--my drive across that big desert. there is such a huge part of me on that lonely highway 50. sometimes--especially early in the morning--it literally feels like you're the only person left in the world. just you and all that sky. i've made that drive more times than i can count, and it seems that each time i have, i haven't been the same keisha. there is no place that i can think better than on that road. and i can't explain it. i'm trying... but i'm not saying it right. and maybe no one will ever know how it feels or what i am talking about, and that's ok. because i do. 

but this particular drive was different. because i had never been more different than those other keishas. for heaven's sake my name wasn't even the same. it was more than that, though. it was the fact that i was going back to a place where i changed so much. and it was weird. really, it was. the only thing more perfect than those views on that drive was when a small miracle happened. right on my windshield. i know, i was honored. it was the tick, tick, tick sound of little rain drops falling from the sky. and for the first time since april the desert was getting some rain. next thing i knew there was a rainbow on my right, and a rainbow on my left, and my windows were down--in the rain. i rode like that for a long, long time, and just thought. like i always do.

the air was heavy with the scent of sagebrush and wet dust (if you live in nevada you know what i mean). there is nothing like it. it's different than rain in washington, or in canada where i had just come from. there, it rains all the time. sometimes too much... but out here? it's something special. and it was extra special to me that day. there was something inside of me that needed to be there for that. i can't really understand why, maybe i never will. but if i could try....i'd say that the desert was like something inside of me. something that had been sitting there for months and maybe even years, thirsting and dying from the lack of something (not particularly rain, but...). all these other parts of me were well watered. they were cared for and nourished, but this one patch of dry desert earth was still cracked and dry. and then, before i even knew what was happening i started to feel the healing in that piece of earth. i could almost see it, soaking up that water and those cracks disappearing. and there was wholeness. and it felt so good.

i pulled in to town and all of the familiar sights and sounds and the way the freeway turns there and this exit, and that sign, and remember when, and my mind was just a jumbled mess. i had a life there. in reno. but it wasn't my life anymore. but it was still a little part of my life. and it was weird. i was so far away from all of that, but just being there pulled me into a pool of memories. there wasn't closure there, in reno. there was closure with the people that i left behind, and there was closure with the university i un-enrolled from. but not with this city. i left hastily. one day, after my last final, i was packed up and gone. and i knew deep down i wasn't ever coming back, and nothing would ever be the same, but i didn't let myself really know it.

and then now that i was back i didn't know how to feel about it. until that night when i was trying to fall asleep; restless, and anxious to go to the temple the next day. i lay there and those feelings from the desert rain came flooding over me. and i felt that again, that wholeness. and i knew it was okay to close that chapter. and i knew that all those other well-watered plots inside of me were the right ones. and i felt that healing in the dry, cracked plot of earth deep down in there, somewhere. and i knew that i had made the right choices. and a little voice whispered, "it's okay to feel this way, and it's okay to let go, too." and then i slept.

and the next day, i was finally here. in the most wonderful place. and there was only... p e a c e.