The last month has been so packed with feels I am a little numb. We had our re-wedding with our closest favorites gathered, reminding us that we don’t see enough of any of them. We got to hang out, laugh, dance, sing, cook and talk talk talk – but then we had to say goodbye and whoosh… just a lot of feels.

Then we started the slow descent into the land of goodbyes. We live in Costa Rica, much of our community is expatriate. We are transient. We are intense. We leave and our hearts break and then we meet one another again at some magical place in the world and it is beautiful. This choice of life invites the heartbreak. This choice of love invites the intense creation of a bond and the knowledge that it may be brief.

Some people don’t invest deeply in relationships with those only passing through, but I do.
I do and I love them.

Those passing through are my people.

My gypsy hearts who like to wonder a bit, addicted to the thrill of a new beginning and a world about to unfold. Those passing through are those navigating the world for the thrill of it, for all the thrills of it. Traveling for the purposes of mining each new place of its golden experiences. Those who are just passing through have often left me the most changed. The life of a traveler is so rich and layered – but oh, the goodbyes.

The goodbyes will kill you.

And this round of goodbyes was gutting. Our people. Our “Can you jumpstart our car? Yes! On our way!” people. Our “Please take me to the hospital” in the middle of the night, people. Our “Can you take my kids for a week?” people. Our base just up and left at the same time and we are over here like…

I was talking with my friend Lisa about the goodbye. The gutting, lonely, heart-wrenching goodbye. Lisa and I may both have Gypsy hearts, but we lay deep, deep roots and we love hard. So why do we still let ourselves wander rather than stay put and reduce the risk of the painful goodbye? Because we embrace the hope of new connections more than we fear the heartbreak of losing our favorites (temporarily). We take the risk again and again because we must.

Because we have deep roots and gypsy hearts.

So we take the chance each and every time we spot a wild and open heart and we let them in and we cry when we say goodbye, forever changed.

And so it goes.

September will bring new families to the area, more wild and radiant hearts. I will see them and welcome them and love them and then they will go. Or they will stay and we will have longer, more time, perhaps forever. But either way, I will love freely.

I will love as if my heart had never been broken by goodbye.

This is the only way to expat. Driven by hope and not fear. Embracing the ever-changing tide. Immersing in the refreshment of new faces. Well-aware your time is short and treating it like the precious commodity it is. When time is running out with close friends, every last thing has more intense meaning.

And, participating in the painful goodbyes. That is part of it. I am planning a trip to the grand canyon now with some families we had to say goodbye to. The plans are healing.

When you love hard, you leave hard, but you keep them all with you forever.

Our gypsy hearts know this to be true.

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