I keep looking back on a year ago. A year ago, my youngest graduated from high school. I quit my job. I moved, and not just down the street. I was about to be living a brand new life, feeling like a fraud every single day. And I did. We moved, we took on a business I knew nothing about. I was without my children, my friends, my family, trying to be part of business I really had no business being in. How's that for some truth? I was terrified. And lonely. And feeling like "fake it till you make it" was my new motto. I stood on the foundation of "next year it won't feel like this".
I swore I would write. I would take the time, no matter what. Another lie. Who has time to write, or do anything that matters to one's self when they are part of a business that rarely sleeps? And it's not just me. No one gets that time. This business will take it all if you let it. It will take your time, your mood, your passions, your spunk, your sass... it will take it all and chew you up, and spit you out - if you let it. Anything will - if you let it.
So a year later, does it feel like "this"? Somedays. But mostly no. I have met some incredible people in a year. I have filled parts of my soul with mountain air, lake water, 85 year old market volunteers, laughter, challenge, chickens, the friendship of my life's partner, whispers at night, 4 am warnings not to talk about work, sleep in days, travel, reading, learning, letting go, and love.
Today was a day where I said "if I don't get out (mostly out of my own head), I am going to end up in the news". Today was a day where I needed to stop life from spitting me out on the sidewalk. I needed to write it all down. I needed to remember gratitude when it felt like no one else did. I needed to be alone with words. I needed to remember to take time to write. The overwhelming feeling of needing to run away is subsiding, but as always, leaving it's etch on my soul. Another scratch to try to hide - grateful there are fewer of them than there used to be.
I feel an ever longing need to return to my 365 days of gratitude. Today was like that. Find the gratitude. Write the gratitude. Feel it, look up a spa, dream about running away, don't run away. Call the best person you know, quiet a waterfall, write, be quiet, remember that you feel like less of a fraud that you did last year this time, know that moving here and doing all of this wasn't a gigantic mistake, and be grateful.
It was a full moon yesterday. Tomorrow will be calmer. I will be grateful for that too.
I found these tiny flowers down by the river, and I could hear my friend, Shelly, marvelling at how pretty they were in their tiny simplicity and I smiled. Her beautiful soul always makes me smile and remember gratitude. Tiny, simple colors that made me smile. Grateful.
