Milestone

"If you really want to do something, you’ll find a way.

 If you don’t, you’ll find an excuse."

~ unknown

One year ago I found a treasure of a book at a used book sale. It was called A Small Heaven by Jane Ranney Rzepka, a slim volume filled with short reflections from the author's life. Each story, whether it was about getting locked in the attic with her son or a comment made by a shoe salesman, was a snapshot of an ordinary moment in an ordinary life. And from these snapshots Ranney Rzepka drew insights and made connections that we can all relate to. I loved it. More than that, I was inspired by it. A few days after I got the book this blog, Postcards From Tuesday, was born. And a year later, I am happy to say it is still alive and kicking!

Now if I were a person with a good track record of follow through on my ideas, this milestone would be no big deal. I mean, it's not like I decided to write a book. All I set out to do was write a few paragraphs every week. In terms of scope, it's not even up there with my fourth grade New Year's resolution to read the entire Bible!  

I am not a person with good follow through though. I am that person who joins the gym on January 1, full of promise and resolutions, only to find excuses not to go come February. I don't even think I made it through Genesis in fourth grade (or ever for that matter). So a year of blogging, 44 posts to be exact (there are vacations and the occasional rough week after all), is cause for celebration!

I LOVE writing this blog. It's given me a new lens to view my life through. Everything from a walk with my grandma to the pain of ending my marriage is worthy of reflection. And every story, no matter how small, has something to teach me if I spend a little time with it. That's the gift of reflection. We have this one life full of big stuff and little stuff. The big stuff is hard to miss. But most of our days are not spent graduating from college, getting married, having babies, losing loved ones. Most of our days are spent with the small stuff: going to work, walking the dog, making dinner, sharing a beer with friends, washing dishes, driving our kids around town, driving ourselves to distraction with too much to do and not enough time to be. Writing this blog reminds me to stop and look, to be present for my life.

That's not what keeps me writing though. I could accomplish that with a private journal, which is of course a great place to go with feelings and ideas, with raw, unedited thoughts. What keeps me writing this blog is that people are reading it! YOU are reading it. I'm enough of a diva that I bloom in the presence of an audience. I am addicted to the page hit counter on my blog site. It makes my day that you are taking a few minutes to read this. I am really quite flattered!

But even that is not what inspires me to keep this up week after week. What truly inspires me is when someone tells me that a post helped them not feel so alone in their struggles or gave them a different perspective on something in their life. I write about what I am moved by or struggling with. But I know that my life is not that unique. We are all connected by our shared humanity. I find that connection incredibly rich. So when you tell me that something I wrote moved you, know that I am moved right back at you! We're all on this journey together, my friends. And I am so grateful to have you all to walk with. 

Thank you for keeping me going!

Remember to Look for Whales

“Your true home is in the here and the now.”

~ Thich Nhat Hanh

Several times a week my dog Zeke and I walk on the bluffs by my house. We always take the trail closest to the edge for the best view of the ocean. Okay, I'm the only one who cares about the view really. Zeke is more interested in looking for small rodents in the grass and “trail snacks” left by the horses that walked the trail before us. Dogs are gross. I tell Zeke this all the time, but he is not easily offended. And he makes it clear that he does not plan to change for me. I respect that about him. He says, look. I like to roll around in dead things and eat horse poop. This is who I am. If you're gonna love me you gotta take the whole package. Oh, and I have fleas too.

At this time of year you can see whales passing off shore as they make their annual migration through the channel. Last Spring I was obsessed with looking for whales on my walks. Friends started to tease me about my near daily Facebook posts about whale and dolphin sightings. I walked with my eyes glued to the ocean, not wanting to miss a water spout or a tail rising out of the ocean. I saw a couple. Once I even saw a humpback whale fully breach. I literally gasped. The whole thing was over in a matter of seconds, but it was truly awe inspiring. Zeke missed it of course. He had his nose in a rodent hole at the time.

Earlier this week I was walking along the bluffs and I caught a splash out of the corner of my eye. I looked out at the ocean and saw a dolphin leap out of the water. Of course it was a beautiful sight. What struck me though was not the beauty of the dolphin, but the fact that I had been walking with my head down. I had barely noticed the ocean on my left and the sea of wild mustard on my right. In fact, I couldn't remember the last time I had seen a dolphin or even thought about looking for one. For the past several months my vision has been turned inward.

My husband and I are ending our marriage of seventeen years. It's a hard and painful time, separating the many strands of our lives that have been woven together in marriage and family. Of course we find knots that are difficult to untangle and try our patience. And the challenges we face moving forward are so daunting that some days I just want to stay in bed and pull the blankets over my head. Anxiety, an old unwelcome companion, has returned to walk with me through my days. I keep trying to shove him away, but he has no plans to leave anytime soon. Anxiety is mainly what causes me to walk with my head down and curl inward, trying to protect myself by rolling up like a pill bug.

When I raise my head and take the long view, I am optimistic. My husband and I both want to part as gracefully as possible. We want to remain cooperative parents for our children, and we are even hopeful that we can be friends when the wounds heal. He is a good man, and a good father. I want him to find happiness. We're in the thick of separating our lives right now though and it ain't easy. In this process of untangling the threads I sometimes forget to look up at the beauty that is all around me. I need to be nudged and reminded.

A couple of days ago Zeke and I were walking on the bluffs again. We came upon a young couple looking out at the ocean. “Hey,” the young man said. “Did you see the whales out there? We saw like twelve spouts in the last five minutes.” I thanked him enthusiastically and sat down on the edge of the cliff. The sun was low in the sky so I had to shield my eyes. The water was sparkling. And then I saw it: A spray of water shooting upward like a geyser. And then another. I sat for about fifteen minutes watching the water spouts, occasionally catching a glimpse of a sleek body before it slipped back under the water. Zeke even stopped rustling around in the grass and sat with me. My shoulder muscles relaxed and my breathing slowed. Anxiety walked away down the trail for awhile as I just waited and watched for whales. I remembered that there is a lot of beauty in my life, even now. And that in the winter the Monarch butterflies will return.

Up In the Air

" Everything was rewritten when he was up in the air. 
New things were possible with the human form.
 It went beyond equilibrium.
He felt for a moment uncreated. Another kind of awake."

~ Colum McCann

Let the Great World Spin

The garbage disposal is broken. So is the dishwasher. But I can still get the dishes done. By hand, making sure food doesn't clog the drain. My car needs a new battery too. Twice in the past month I have had to jump start it. But I have learned not to run the air conditioner when I'm parked, and to turn off the radio when I'm waiting to pick up my daughter from high school. And so the car keeps running. 

I'm a little broken too at the moment, but I am still functional. I am in the middle of huge transitions, and I have to be careful not to expect too much of myself right now. It's been hard to write the last few weeks. There's so much to say, but it's too soon to say it. That's the downside of writing and sharing personal essays. Sometimes the things you need to write about are too raw, too close. There has not been enough time to reflect, not enough distance to take the long view. But it is possible to stop for a minute and just see what's there. Right now.

It's a time of change. And I feel like I'm walking a tightrope, putting one foot in front of the other, not looking too far ahead, trying to make each step purposeful. One of the most incredible things I see right now are all the people standing by me, ready to catch me when I slip (and I have slipped!). Every Sunday before the offering in my Unitarian church, we recite an affirmation of gratitude and giving. The last line has been playing over and over in my head like a mantra: "Let us be grateful, even for our needs, so that we may learn from the generosity of others." In every corner of my life I am being met with love and generosity. It takes my breath away.

Another thing I see is that glass, you know, the one with the water that just reaches the halfway mark? It's half full. Even on the scariest, saddest of days I can see that it is half full. This is huge for me, a glass half empty kinda gal for so much of my life. That I am able to find what writer John O'Donohue describes as "a diamond-thought of light" on dark days is an incredible gift. It reminds me that I have all I need to navigate this strange time.

And finally, there's the tightrope walk itself. Some days I can't feel the ground beneath me, and much of the familiar landscape is fading away. What lies ahead, when I dare to take my eyes off the wire for a minute, is possibility. In times of transition, it is tempting to reach for the nearest guidepost and cling to it. But as my friend Ken reminded me the other day, transition is a time of great opportunity if you can sit with the uncertainty for awhile. It's a time to explore and reinvent. When everything is up in the air, there can be incredible moments of feeling "uncreated." What will I create now? 

I'm feeling a little broken, but I'm remembering what Colum McCann writes at the end of his beautiful novel, Let the Great World Spin: "The world spins. We stumble on. It is enough." It IS enough.