hugs

OK this is truly not meant to be a "poor me" post, but I just realized tonight that I have only given/received 2 hugs in the last 2 months. And one was from someone I met thru an online dating service. Is that sad or what? I need to be around people I love enough to hug and who know me well enough to want to hug me when they see me. This is what life boils down to: who you love and how you love them. Forget sunshine versus rain, blue skies vs gray, small towns vs cities, new vs old...for me, the heart is the most important terrain to cultivate. The pros and cons list of where I should live pales in comparison to this overwhelmingly strong fact. I am not really sure why I wanted to complicate my already full life with the layers of moving to a new unfamiliar city with no true friends for miles around. It's something I never thought about. And the blessing of this move is that now I have. And if I return to Santa Barbara, it is with the benefit of having seen it from the grass on the other side.