It’s hard to lose things when you have so little. Before I traveled the country for a year, I would lose things constantly. I had too many of them, and kept none of them in the right places. Now, it’s hard for me to lose things at all – and the ones I did lose are very clear to me.

Ashland: my apartment, my starbase, my location, my illusions of immortality.
San Francisco: Eight hundred dollars, when I drove my friend’s car, with the bike rack still on it, into the roof of a parking garage.
Los Angeles: My heart. I thought I had lost my watch, but I found it again. (I found my heart later, somewhere between Indy and Portland.)
Denver: a Christmas postcard of the Miner family standing in the rain at Lucy’s soccer game.
Indianapolis: my glasses, which I bought in Ashland. My illusions of my invincibility as a director.
Portland: a yoga mat, a Loteria card from Denver with the inscription “La Muerte” on it that Juliette gave me, and a birthday card my brother sent me with a picture of a little girl trying to roll a boulder up a hill.
Ithaca: The airlines lost my guitar, but they found it again.
New York: my illusions of the East Coast.
Hawaii: my delusions about the nature of work and happiness.
WCX: my illusions of eternity.

What I have gained on this trip would take ten full blogs to recount. And I have lost very little. It was definitely worth it.