The map room

Satu and I have an unusual home. It's unusual because both she and I are unusual people and we magnify each other rather than cast shadows. We shine our strange lights into each other's corners and discover what hidden worlds dwell there. I think that curious people always love maps and the artifacts of work that is beyond their own personal knowledge. I am pretty sure that is why we have a map room.

Most people who live in a two bedroom apartment would prefer a guest room, or an office, but we prefer worlds in our world.

The room is like us. It's happy. There are a lot of things that don't seem to belong, but actually do belong. Old tools. A doll that lives in a box, oars and artifacts.

With Satu, nothing ever seems out of place. There is no corner that she won't shine light into and look un-blinking with curiosity, amazement and openness. I think if I am completely honest, Satu's curiosity was the first thing that drew me to her. She didn't fit a mold of all of the parts you expect in a person. She didn't have simple taste in music, books, or interests that fit what you think of when you try to label someone as an artist, or lesbian or intellectual. She is all of the things that fit her and then worlds and worlds more.

Satu is just as likely to be drawn to an interesting bug as she is to a piece of fine jewelry and this is the complexity that keeps me surprised and happy with her. She is not some thing that I think she is or that the world thinks that she is, she is an infinite world of unique beauty and imagination. She is the only one of her kind. Though I know she will never be fully domesticated and could not thrive in captivity, we nest happily together. I can no longer imagine my own world without her in it, whistling and crouching in the doorways as this strange little animal does.