Denver is such a home for me. I could drive these streets blindfolded. When I come back here, I miss it, when I am away, sometimes I forget about it. I lived here for almost 9 years. This city was the gateway to the world for me, I feel I owe it so much.

However I look back in my time here and I see the same pattern played over and over again. That pattern that ended in sadness. I know all the best dance clubs, where to get the cheapest drinks, and which long term care facilities not to check your grandparents in to. I never comes a fourteener our white water rafted. After the first year I never went skiing or mountain biking. I became this city girl who worked her ass off and partied. Don’t get me wrong, I had a ton of fun. I dated and had friends, and felt ever so glamorous compared to the Iowa girl I had been. I gained confidence, I kicked ass as a reservist, I felt like I took on the world and was winning.

It’s funny now looking back, on how I wasn’t winning, and I wasn’t exploring, and I wasn’t really getting far. I was lost. Some people graduated high school, go to college, and just make it to where they want to be. I never knew where I was going when I went to college. My parents left that door of possibilities too open for me. I wonder if they saw how lost I was when I ran as far as comfortable from those Iowa cornfields.

I was successful at the jobs I worked, in the navy, I even had boyfriend after boyfriend. My scale of what I considered “making it” was pretty narrow. Something was missing, in fact I would breakdown over the fact I couldn’t save the world, I couldn’t help other people. That whole time, by other people, I meant me.

So I went to war to find myself… FYI… That is not the way to do it. Instead of making my own adventure at discovering life I thought the military would do it for me. However, they expected me to already have the thick skin necessary to put up with people being horrible to one another, and not just enemy to enemy. There us more to that story, some I’ve told before, some I’ll tell at another time.

Moral is when I returned the first time, Denver was it, I rebuilt life and it looked slightly different than before. It was more lonely. I threw myself in to an awesome career, and that just consumed me. I loved the job as an EMT, I excelled at it. I was making a difference for people, that was my mission. However it was a stepping stone and I wasn’t dealing with myself. After my second tour Denver was foreign to me in a way. I want compensating and I needed help, but I felt trapped and unable to help myself. At the time I was just still lost, now I recognize I wasn’t able to help myself and despite others trying if a person can’t help themselves a little then others trying is like speaking to a wall. They kept trying though. I’m thankful for that.

At the point I really lost it, I finally left. Now when I go back I search for how to make things different than before. Not many of the old friends are left, mostly my family. They ask me when I’m coming back, and I honestly don’t know… If… When. This city has a piece of my heart for eternity, but if I return, will I be able to keep making my life more than it was before? This wandering is making me learn how to do life differently, and I’m cautious of settling in to a place where I continue to disregard self-care.

I love you Denver, but I don’t know if we are made for each other still. I do love visiting you, and I’m learning to remember the good by being here, and not just the bad.

Signing off Denver, CO