mostly a dreamer: the places where my feet have been.

About two months ago, I started a project for myself as a way to both commemorate my final days of JVC and to remind myself to be present in every moment. Basically, I started taking pictures of my feet and posting them to Instagram. Why my feet?

Two reasons:

Almost two years ago, as part of CLC Coordinator training at SLU, I took part in a reflection that focused on the places where our feet had been, as a way to look at the places/people/events in our lives that have been formative. That image - of the places where my feet have been - is one that has stuck with me ever since.

Over the past few years, my feet have been a lot of places, from SLU to Rome to Boston. Just over this year, my feet have been all over the streets of Boston, the fields of Blue Ridge, the rocky coast of Maine, New York City, and even a sticky basement floor (here's looking at you, JVC parties). I think I just needed another way to remember to cherish my memories from this year, the moments both big and small that had an impact on me.

As I began this project, I was wrestling with a big dilemma about what to do at the end of JVC - the classic question of "should I stay or should I go?" (Stay = Boston, Go = Missouri) I had a lot of questions about where my feet would take me next, and those questions were frequently overwhelming. Enter reason #2 for the feet pictures. On our Silent Retreat back in May, someone threw out this simple phrase, and it summed up exactly what I wanted for the next few months: "Be where your feet are." So often, I get caught up in what's ahead of me or memories of what happened before. I wanted to dedicate myself to continuing to just be present in the moment.

The end is almost here, so here is wrap up of the pictures I took, as well as the approximate location/occasion. To say that I had a lot of fun doing this would be an understatement, but it also ended up being more meaningful than I had originally imagined.