2019

Tis’ the time of year again, to reflect on moments past and a year, a big ol’ year full of memories, learnings and adventures. This year, feels like a blur of my last semester of university, a summer exploring and the start of a new stage of life as a full time adult and the many many learnings and challenges that came with that.

2017 and 2018 were big years for me. They involved me spending more time hugging trees than not and space, so much space for exploration, in who I was and what I wanted out of a future career and my life. I graduated this May feeling grounded and ready, like I had a direction and a goal or at least an idea and a feeling of what I wanted from my future. But let me tell you adulthood just blows all your ideas and thoughts out of the water. Life no longer being structured into increments of 4 months, allowed more time for me to feel settled (what a weird feeling), which scared the living day lights out me. I didn’t feel the same amount of pressure to make the most of every second. I took how I felt and what my body and mind needed more into account. Which, now that I am thinking about it, is a good thing. I gave myself space to adjust and breathe and try to make sense of what I was doing. But all that space left me a bit stressed. Stressed that I was not doing enough, that I was not pushing myself or exploring enough. That I was settling into an area, a job and a life. I found that friendship in adulthood and connections are challenging and require so much vulnerability and effort. But I also learnt so much about myself, my capability for creativity and care, my inability to stay still, my spirituality, my deep connectedness to trees, my wants and needs.

I have learned that what I crave most out of life is feeling. Or really a series of feelings. Feelings of warmth and kindness from places and people, of excitement, of breathless laughter, of heart stopping, breathtaking, chills all over your whole body experiences. I have always thought of my life as a series of chasing adventures, but really what I am chasing is the extreme emotions of joy and exhaustion and excitement that come from those adventures. And perhaps that is why I feel unsettled with being settled because the day-to-day can take away those big feelings. But that doesn’t mean they aren’t still attainable.

So let’s get in to the biggest lessons from 2019. I learned that community and friendships are the greatest gift in the world and building new connections requires a great amount of vulnerability. That connecting to trees any and all chances I get centers me and allows me to feel grounded. That telling the people you love how much they mean to you is one of the best gifts in the world. That my life is mine and I should live it how I want to. That being active clears my head and that I need to listen to my body and mind and travel and explore as much as I can, but also that it’s okay to take a day for myself and to feel settled in a space. I also learned a good amount about not just patience and loneliness but also about joy and strength.

Looking forward to 2020, I am looking forward to giving myself space to feel comfortable and settled in this crazy, wild, big thing we like to call adulthood. To being kind to myself and listening to what my mind, body and soul needs. To getting outdoors and exploring new areas and new countries. To moving more; to music, at yoga, on my bike, on the trail, in any way I can. To making meaningful connections and creating a community and space around myself. To reading more, writing more, and telling the people I care about, how much I care about them more. To diving deeper into my bigger energy field and learning more about my spirituality and letting my intuition guide me. To finding ways to fight for the outdoors and combine my passion for creativity with my passion for the earth. To breathing deeper and being more free to what comes my way. To creating daily things that inspire me and working toward a future I could only begin to dream of but also being okay that I have no idea what that future is.

Here are some of my favorite captures from the past year (musings continued after):

1 graduation, at least 20 pints of ice-cream, 5 new jumpsuits, 2 backpacking trips, 10 Murphy’s Happy Hours, 10 karaoke sessions, 6 trimmed logs, 20 lakes, 1 summer camp design, 6 lodges, 5 Tuk-Tuks, 100 photos of foggy mountains, 1 new job, 50 starry nights, 1 scooter accident, 4 new piercings, 1 peddle wagon, 60 ladders, 5 concerts, 1 trip to Thailand, 200 buoys, 1 cross country road-trip, 1000 wasps, 1 design conference, 4 nights of camping on the beach, 2 new apartments, 10 picnics, 2 tattoos, 10 bags of dehydrated food, 7 new house plants, 2 climate marches, 1 beach pie, 50 rolls of bamboo toilet paper, 1 Colonel Sanders, 73 episode of GOT, 1 pottery class, 1 night of Harry Potter drag, 200 rides on BART and oh my golly so many other moments later, here we are, the end of 2019. Thank you 2019 for giving me more adventures and challenges than I expected. Cheers to a new decade, may it give me many more sappy posts, adventures and beautiful places and people to photograph. Hoorah!

Cheers - keleniak

#heckya

Thoughts & Moments

It has been a few months and a few adventures since I have written or even attempted to put my thoughts into words (aside from the few feverish late night journal scribbles). So here is a brief life update and a summary of those late night scribbles that I will attempt to make into a cohesive post (here we go!).

So far adulthood has been hard and trying but also humbling and inspiring. I have been struggling to feel a sense of community and build friendships and wrap my head around not knowing what comes next. For me, the beauty of University was the abundance of moments and the impatience and fear of having those moments be wasted. It made me feel the need to take in every second and make the absolute most of them. Yet in adulthood I have been having a hard time feeling the depth in moments and seeing the urgency and potential. Perhaps it is because I don’t have a time limit on this portion of life so I don’t feel the same level of stress about letting moments pass me by. And maybe that is a good thing, to just allow myself to live and do whatever my soul needs at that current moment and not worry about what my next step is. But allowing myself that space to just be and let go and settle into a routine, is a big learning curve and something I have been struggling to be okay with.

Overall, I have found it is so easy to focus on what I don’t have (as those feelings of fear or loneliness or failure can consume every cell in my body) and it takes a lot of effort to look at what I do have. But it is so so important to look at both, to reflect and take time to give thanks and access where I am at emotionally, physically and spiritually. By looking past what isn’t going the way I expected, I can pay attention to the people around me and the things that are going right and celebrate and feel joy in where I am and what I have in my life.

For instance, in my mind, these past couple of months I have felt like I haven’t been adventuring as much as I would like to be. Yet I have spent a weekend in Seattle camping and hiking and seeing Bon Iver live, I’ve driven the coast multiple times to hike and eat pie and read by the waves, I went to Arizona to see my family, have done numerous hikes around the Bay area, have been going to sound journey classes and energy healing sessions and have started to search for ways to be more involved in environmental action. Even writing it out now, I am mad at myself for feeling as though I am not doing enough - cause that list is full of so many things that make my heart sing.

Most of it is driven by thoughts. Thoughts of not being good enough or not doing enough compared to others around me or not giving enough to the people in my life. This all stems from internal fear as well as pressure from others and seeing people doing things I could only dream of. But our success is our own and our life is our own and our joy is our own so why aren’t we living it the way we want to be and not comparing every moment to other people’s success? It’s our choice how we want to live this beautiful life and how we want to seek out and find fulfillment, it shouldn’t be based on what others are doing and feeling inadequate in comparison. 

It’s easy to ask myself every day why aren’t you out there living in a van or traveling around New Zealand or learning about cultures in far off places and being immersed in new landscapes? Why aren’t you filling your soul in the corners of far off lands and living off the beauty of the world? Why aren’t you taking 6 months off to hike the PCT, or road-trip around the US or live in Alaska? But with time the adventures I am meant to take will happen (especially if I really want them too) and I need to be okay being present in this period of life I am in now, instead of just constantly thinking of what comes next.

Life is full of choices and chances and moments and opportunities and love and joy and beauty and good gracious sometimes it is hard to see all that. But all of that hope exists, it’s just a question of if you care to see it, if you care to change your outlook and embrace the messiness and the unknown and the pure magic. The truth is none of us really know what is going on or where our lives are leading. But why not be okay in that uncertainty? Why not embrace the unknown and the not knowing? And just connect to the people and places that make us feel most alive. That, that will lead to a life full of so much soul filling beauty and that’s all I could ever ask for.

Pictures from the past couple of months (musings continued after):

1 apple pie, 1 trip to Seattle, 5 tents, 7 hikes, 8 Chai Tea Lattes, 1 cheese making class, 1 broken tree, 5 new plants, 1 new camera, 3 tv commercials, 1 bundle of dried eucalyptus, 1 sound healing class, 1 energy journey session, 4 gems shops, 3 beaches, 2 books, 1 large earthquake, 1 trip to Arizona, 80 FaceTime calls with Meg, 4 road-trip life chat sessions and so many other moments I am completely forgetting. We are here. Adulthood. She is trying and hard but full of so much potential and opportunity. Here’s to making the most of it and learning to let go and just experience.

Cheers - keleniak

#heckya

Lassen Volcanic & Other Things

Life has been moving and grooving, and somehow I have already been living in California for over a month (wut?). It has been a period full of lots of exciting and scary feelings and emotions that I don’t even know how to begin to understand. There has been a lot of processing and shifting and learning and growing and lots of thinking about new goals and redefining what I want out of my life and out of my time here in California.

Packing up all my things and driving across the country with my parents (& Meg for a few days) was a thing of beauty (like a Rascal Flats song where your heart breaks but you are happy at the same time). It reminded me of road trips as a kid, full of rest stop picnics, gas station chocolate stops and Dixie Chicks on repeat. It was the perfect celebratory send off, and felt like the end of an era (sobbing thinking about it). Having them here to move me into my apartment and help me settle into a new place and area is something I will forever be grateful for. But watching them get in the car to drive back to Kentucky was one of the hardest things I have ever done. Knowing that our lives will not exist the same as they have for the past 22+ years, where I lived in close proximity and could go home for a dinner or some cookies whenever I needed is so strange and hard to wrap my head around (thank g for facetime).

I am no stranger to San Francisco, but living in Oakland feels very new, which is exciting but also nerve-wracking. It is a completely new area with new corners, cafes and so so many new people to meet (hi, be my friend?). The BART (train) ride in to work is hot and stuffed with so many humans (like how are there actually that many people in SF). Work has changed a bit but the same beautiful people exist and make each day worth it and the days so enjoyable. My apartment feels like home, but it is my first time living alone and it weird coming home and not having another human to talk to about my day or watch a movie with. Overall, I am happy with where I am but struggling to get into a groove and get used to the amount of humans that surround me everyday in a big city (which is why I have been trying to find my way into nature every weekend to hug some trees and feel at peace with the earth and this time in my life).

I think the biggest learning curve has been trying to wrap my head around the fact that my life no longer sectioned into four month increments of school and internships. As a planner, I like to know what is coming next or what to plan for, yet being in the “real world” there is no set time limit on anything. No set period of time before I am moving to a new place or starting something new and that is WEIRD. It was a comfort to have the constant change and feeling of short periods of time to experience a new place and take advantage of it. But I think this is a huge opportunity to grow roots and really make connections and feel settled in a place which is something I don’t know if I have ever felt.

Overall I am doing okay, I am figuring it out as I go and I have faith that everything will work out as it supposed to and that if I practice kindness and keep pursing my passions things will fall into place. Before I know it, a year will have gone by and all the emotions I feel now will feel so distant. But for now I am letting myself sit in them and giving myself the space to process, reflect and learn from these feelings.

Here are some pics from the past couple of months. From the move out with the rents (bless their souls for being such amazing humans and parents and driving me across the country), to visits from Leslie (you sweet soul) and my sister (you are the greatest, thank you for putting up with me), to this past weekend with friends in a beautiful National Park (y’all rock). I really hope these Labor Day camping weekends become a tradition, because they fill my heart with so much joy and love (musings continued after):

1 new apartment, 2 visits from friends, 1 cross country road-trip, 1 work offsite, 3 campfire meals, 2 starry nights, 3 volcanoes, 5 appearances of Ol’ Smokey Eye, 1 local shop milkshake, 10000 wasps, 3 farmers market visits, 4 state parks, 1 new job, 60 rides on BART, 3 bottles of bubbly, 2 tattoos, 5+ cry sessions, 4 thermal pools, 6 lakes and so many thoughts and feelings later, here we are in adulthood. Cheers to making it a crazy, big, beautiful adventure and knowing that it’s gonna be a hell of a ride.

Cheers - keleniak

#heckya

Canadian Rockies

Growing up, I spent weekends skiing and exploring the rockies in Canada. Living in Calgary, the mountains were close and irresistible in the winter and in the summer. However when we moved to Kentucky, mountains were switched for rolling hills and mild winters. Every time I have gone to the mountains since, it feels like going home. I am constantly drawn to the mountains because they are wild, untouched, and unkept. They don’t live in structured squares or plots or acres, they belong to no one. Yet we are lucky enough to get to experience their greatness. Mountains make me feel small, remind me of the beauty of the world and clear my head unlike anything else.

As I have grown up and started to explore places and hike on my own, I always come back to my dad and tell him about my hikes and adventures. Every single time my dads responds with, man oh man, I need to take you back to where you grew up, the Canadian Rockies. And guess what folks - my dad and I finally made it happen (thank goodness for a summer off). We spent 3 days, 2 nights backpacking the Skyline Trail in Jasper National Park, 1 day driving the Icefields Parkway, 1 day in Lake Louise (where the best ski hill is), and one day in Banff National Park. It was an amazing 6 days full of so many insane views and endless mountains. Jasper and Banff felt like 60 national parks in 1, ridiculous!! And guess what dad - you were right!! I needed to come back to where I grew up. And 12 year old me was a lucky son of a beech to live so close.

My favorite part of the trip though was definitely backpacking the Skyline Trail. I love backpacking because it provides an escape from the typical touristy hikes, especially in an area as popular as Jasper National Park. It gives you the space to really appreciate mountain ranges and views as you have hours to explore every peak and to immense yourself and really feel a place. And the Skyline Trail did not disappoint - filled with breathtaking mountain ridges, gorgeous valleys, snowy peaks, hidden campsites and glacier streams. I felt like I was walking in a complete dream for 3 days. We only stumbled across 6 other people throughout the 3 days and my dad and I had so much time to talk and walk and enjoy each others company and the beauty of the mountains. What we thought was going to be a very rainy, cold trek turned into a sunny, only slightly rainy trek (thank you mother nature for proving the rain dudes wrong!!).

Here are some of my favorite pictures from the trip, that honestly do it no justice (musings continued after):

5 blue lakes, 2 campsites, 30 miles, 100 piles of bear scat, 5 mice eaten bags of chips, 6 lodges, 3 “not recommended” trails, 2 breweries, 1 insane drive, 1 bear in a tree, 6 friendly marmots, 2 pairs of hiking poles, 2 rainbows, 3 glaciers, 50 road side stops, 1 billion tourists, 3 near selfie poles to the face, 1 “small world” run in, 4 biscuits, 2 grilled cheese, 2 of the largest beers I have ever seen, 10 piles of snow, 2 rain storms, 3 snow to ass falls, 1 can of bear spray, 2 bags of camp cheesies and 6 magical days in Banff and Jasper with my Dad later - I am filled to the brim with love for the Canadian Rockies. Getting to spend a week with my Dad in the place where I grew up was so insanely special to me and I am so grateful to him and Canada. I can’t wait to go back and explore more hikes and mountains in the Rockies.

Cheers - keleniak

#heckya

West Coast Trail

The outdoors have always been a big part of my life. Whether it was spending weekends in the Rockies skiing as a kid or being outside from sunrise to sunset at my grandparents farm, my childhood was full of playing in the dirt and appreciating the earth. Yet it wasn’t until University that I truly had the freedom to learn and grow by myself in the outdoors. Thanks to UC’s Mountaineering Club, I got intros into rock-climbing and backpacking and met an amazing group of people that showed me how much there truly is to love and do in the outdoors. With them I went on my first backpacking trip and climbing trip, I learnt LNT (Leave No Trace) principles, how to respect nature, how to stay safe in the backcountry, how to use gear and how to take advantage of all the wild space around me. Thanks to them, I had the confidence to go on hikes and camp on co-ops out in California which led to some of my favorite memories from University.

After 5 years of being in class or on co-op nonstop, finally having a summer off before starting work in August allowed me time to go on trips that I had been talking about for years (which of course needed to include some backpacking and hiking). My bad ass outdoorsy Aunt and I had been talking about doing a backpacking trip together for a couple of years, so we figured this was the perfect time to do it. She had done The West Coast Trail in Canada 20 years ago, so we figured why the heck not, let’s do it again! So with Mike, my aunt and my cousin Jack, we made it happen!

The 74 km trail on the West Coast of Canada started as a lifesaving trail for shipwreck victims, but today hiking the trail is about exploring Vancouver Island’s temperate rainforest and wild coastlines and appreciating the beauty of territories that First national people call home. We hiked the trail in 6 days and 5 nights, camping along the way at Camper Bay, Walbran, Cribbs, Tsusiat Falls and Michigan. It was physically and emotionally challenging at points but it reminded me why I love the outdoors and being surrounded by nature. It gave me space to think and process the period of my life I am in right now with the end of University and the beginning of full-time work and moving across the country. It allowed me to disconnect from social media and focus on relaxing and recentering. It left me sore, dirty, and tired but it also left me so so so happy and relaxed. There is nothing in the world better than exploring places you can only get to by walking, and sitting around a campfire with pals after a long day of hiking.

Here are some of my favorite moments from the trail (musings continued after):

6 days, 5 nights, 74 km, 1 motel, 1 sexy white van rental car, 4 bags of beef jerky, 2 maps, 3 rocky beaches, 1 baby bear, 10 dehydrated meals, 6 cliff bars, 5 ocean shelfs, 1 bald eagle, 80 mud pits, 5 billion roots, 6 falls, 10 streams, 2 tents, 1 jet-boil, 1 broken water filter, 1 blister, 2 rainstorms, 1 waterfall, 2 ferry rides, 1 puffy wrist, 10 bars of chocolate, 5 ocean tooth-brush runs, 1 bumpy bus, 60 ladders, 5 pairs of darn-tough socks, 3 foggy mornings, 2 cable cars, 1 stream crossing, 3 hot chocolates, 1 failed game of cribb, 20 liters of filtered water, 1 lighthouse, 50 whales, and 200 buoys later I am covered in dirt and sweat, stinky and so so happy. Nothing like 6 days without showering to clear your head, recharge your soul and get you moving and grooving.

Huge shout-out to Auntie Tine, Jack & Mike for being the best backpacking companions and always offering me a piece of your chocolate bars.

Cheers - keleniak

#heckya

Thailand

These past 3 weeks I got to spend in Thailand with my sister (Meghan) and cousin (Marina). We hiked through jungles, slept on rivers, rode scooters and took every possible form of transportation (tut-tuks, trains, planes, taxis, buses, smaller buses, ferries, you name it - we took it). I am so grateful to these two ladies for going through the last three weeks with me, they made everyday an adventure and full of so much laughter, exactly what I needed after graduating.

For me it was three weeks of traveling but also three weeks of trying to contemplate the fact that I actually graduated and am moving to SF. I thought that as I walked across the stage at graduation, I would feel a sense of completion, and know that this was the end of my life being split into 4 month increments. Yet as I said goodbye to people it felt as if I was saying goodbye to go away for another 4 month internship, not indefinitely.

I knew I would process slowly but it has taken over a month for it to actually sink in and to put it short, I am deeply emotional about leaving UC and the familiar sense of life being split up into 4 month increments. These past 5 years have changed my life. And I know everyone says that about college but man oh man do I mean it. Coming into University I had little to no self-confidence. I was unsure of who I was, what I wanted out of life and where I was going. I remember people telling me in my first year of school that they thought I had amazing confidence and I remember being so dumb-founded, wondering how in the hell they saw that when I felt the complete opposite inside. It took me the better part of 5 years to realize that I love who I am, that I love the bump in my nose and the softness in my curves and the way my laugh vibrates through a whole room. I love that there was so much to me that I didn’t know or didn’t quite understand yet (there still is), so many passions and dreams and loves that 5 years would help me discover. I learned that the outdoors are a safe place for me to explore who I am and discover the beauty of the natural world. That I find safety, excitement, and inspiration on the top of a mountain. That living new places every four months allowed me to trust myself and my intuition and gave me confidence as a creative and as a friend. That 5 years can bring so many late night chats, friendships, concerts, adventures, beer runs, hikes, GOT marathons, road trips, camping weekends, coast drives, internships and endless beautiful memories.

I read a quote yesterday that I think works perfectly with how the past 5 years have taught me to think about life. “If you obsess over whether or not you are making the right decision, you are basically assuming that the universe will reward you for one thing and punish you for another. The universive has no fixed agenda. Once you make any decision, it works around that decision. There is no right or wrong, only a series of possibilities that shift with each thought feeling, and action that you experience.” UGH SUCH A GOOD QUOTE. Through University I always struggled with making the “right” decision, whether it came to internships or classes or friendships. But in truth every decision whether it has ended beautifully or awkwardly has taught me so much about myself and what I want. I think life gives us exactly what we need at the time we need it, whether it be a friend to teach us something, or an adventure or obstacle to overcome, they all continue to make us who we are and help us evolve and change to become a better us.

As I have said goodbye to friends as we all move different places around the country it has hit me how much these people have done for me. How much their love and support has inspired me and driven me. How them loving me for every bit of me has given me so much confidence and made me feel infinite. Their friendship created an atmosphere and a period of life where I was so unafraid to figure out who I am and what I love and just go for it and be completely myself. Whenever I was on co-op or study abroad, I always knew that I could come back to Cincinnati 4 months later and they would be there. Knowing we are all moving different places breaks my heart, but I know that knowing them for the past 5 years has changed me for the next 150. These humans taught me so much about true friendship, about laughter, and spontaneity, about adventure and about love. I owe them the world and my heart and can’t wait for reunions with them all over the country.

This next stage is the exiting of the 4 month life-style, of classes, of football games, of friends being a minute away and cheap beer. It is scary to think about making new friends and learning new streets, but I am so excited to start my job at Thumbtack and learn and grow as a creative and human. I can’t wait to explore new areas and parks, feel settled in a city, build new relationships, live in the accepting, beautiful place that is San Francisco, have more time to bike and hike and truly see who I am as a professional, working lady. I can’t wait to look back in 5 years and say wow you really had nothing to worry about. Life is a beautiful, messy, crazy journey and I am so excited for this next stage.

Here are some of my favorite moments from Thailand (musings continued after):

5 tuk tuks, 7 mango smoothies, 6 airplanes, 2 Thai massages, 3 long tail boats, 1 moldy pair of Birks, 10 mosquito bites, 30 malaria pills, 10 plates of friend rice, 1 cooking class, 2 national parks, 10 Thai iced teas, 100 temples, 3 huge spiders (like HUGE), 4 monkey spottings, 1 curvy ass mountain road, 6 hostels, 3 kayaks, 2 jungle hotels, 3 scooters, 1 scooter fall, 5 dumplings, 1 overnight bus, 3 new Thai instagram followers, 1 new Thai BFF and so many laughs and talks about the burgers we would eat once we got home home later. I am so thankful for my two comrades for going and exploring Thailand with me. Family is the best gift and these gals made the trip so much dang fun and our talks helped me process the end of an era and the beginning of something new. To Meg & Marina - I love you both so much.

Cheers - keleniak

#heckya