I’m sitting right here with this cup of tea – staring into its perfect circle, the colour of my jumper – this is home – taken as a guest in others’ homes, something to hold onto, in the dark corners of bars, bustling cafés in strange cities, at chai stalls roadside, gas stations, train stations, airports, miles high over the sea – stretches fractal across space and time to other cups of tea and gives me comfort – no matter where I am, I can always enjoy a cup of tea – I can always take even more pause and ceremony than I was brought up to – if necessary – depending on the day – depending on the level of need – sometimes I like my tea a little stronger, a little milker, sometimes I like it licorice or herbs, sometimes I like it builder’s brew – and sometimes I like it lack any airs or graces, just hot homeliness in a cup – and sometimes, hot holiness, like this morning, offering a timely opportunity for ceremony, prayer, pause – a reminder that wherever I go, there I’ll be, with all the things I’m running from, but also with all the grace, gratitude and kind-of-fineness that actually inhabits me, when I inhabit myself, in each moment – my strong limbs, emerging from my body’s winter, washed clean by the salt water and blessed by the sun – my eyes from the pillow finding all the beautiful things they can see – and the feeling finally that I have the ability to stay, or to leave, and that neither would be diversions from my path, nor do I need anyone to join or validate me – I’m sure that I’ve no idea what I’m doing, and I’m sure that I can’t get this one wrong – the morning yawns, space enough to stay in bed a little longer to enjoy each others’ bodies, and no need to make up time by running to the sea – we walk back along the road through plumes of fragrance, under nodding boughs, buds bowing, the surprising warmth of spring in the air that is not the warmth of indoor fires, can’t be compared – and I wonder, truly, have we let ourselves enjoy this enough, have we taken enough pause just to be in love, or have we always had one hand clutching a plane ticket, one foot out the door – I wonder what happens when I let myself be happy – I guess that’s what I become, then, wherever I go, whatever the weather – when something I’ve taken as given is transmuted into hot, pulsing, present holiness – all is transformed – each taste of your skin a sacrament – our sweet nothings, scripture – the movements of bodies, under sheets, down corridors, on the kitchen floor – ceremony.