Thankful.

I am not going to lie - the last few months have been rough, really rough - but these last few days I have finally started to feel the sun shining, my heart beating and my smile returning. My circumstances haven't changed, but how thankful I am - has.  

Choosing to be thankful to my God for the plan he has, the love He gives, and peace He offers - is slowly changing my life. I am so thankful for a God who allows me to fall apart, but will always put me back together again.  

If things seems rough right now - keep going - you are loved, beautiful, held and have a purpose.  I know your sunshine will return, your head will stop spinning and your breath will once again find its place in your chest. I am so thankful for this truth, for you, and for our God. 

Tuesday

Tuesday reminded me how difficult effective communication is.
Tuesday hurt.
Tuesday made me cry.
Tuesday I talked to wonderful person.
Tuesday I was told I am "crazy - insane - dramatic"

Tuesday I realized I sometimes I am "crazy- insane - dramatic,"

but
sometimes "crazy - insane - dramatic" creates its own beauty. 

and Tuesday I just decided to embrace it - 

‎"I like to see people reunited, maybe that's a silly idea, but what can I say, I like the impatience, the stories that the mouth can't tell fast enough, the ears that aren't big enough, the eyes that can't take in all the change, I like the hugging, the bringing together, the end of missing someone."

Jonathan Safran Foer

“To live content with small means; to seek elegance rather than luxury, and refinement rather than fashion, to be worthy, not respectable, and wealthy, not rich; to study hard, think quietly, talk gently, act frankly, to listen to stars and birds, to babes and sages, with open heart, to bear all cheerfully, to all bravely await occasions, hurry never. In a word, to let the spiritual unbidden and unconscious grow up through the common. This is to be my symphony.” 


― William Henry Channing

I hear the birds outside my window.  Their sweet, delicate chirps remind me that spring will come, the ice will thaw and seasons will change.  And that gives me hope.  

"Therefore do not worry about tomorrow,
for tomorrow will worry about itself.
Each day has enough trouble of it's own"
Matthew 6:34

Key West Light

I'm up early watching the sun rise. I'm sitting sideways on a bright white hammock, gently swaying with the rhythm of the wind. This wind is heavy with salt and stings my sun stripped skin. It blows the palm fronds, making them unruly, just like it blows the wispy curls of my sweet mommas hair. I'm wrapped up in my trip companion:  a striped terrycloth bathrobe, pulled over my just slept in skivvies.  The hammock sits quite high and is extremely taut.  My mom jumped up to snuggle me, only to be bounced back like the beach rocks I tossed at the palm trees yesterday.  My dad and I belly laughed for he had just wrestled with the much too tight, much too white hammock as he hoisted up next to me for a sway.  

My toes can barely reach the cream colored sand, but they do. I love the way the sand molds under foot. How its cool, smooth, yet rough. I like to watch the grains of sand balance on the top of my feet and then slowly blow away - feeling the sand move from weight to weightless. The seaweed, brought in by the high tide, is still stacked on the beach.  I like it this way.  But in the next thirty minutes the stacks of spindly, slimy seaweed will be gone. And with it, the sweet smell of the fishy sea.   

The waves come and go, crash and flow. The white foam of the fallen crest leaps over the calf-high rock wall. And I can hear the hollow sound of the wind as it passes by. And the soothing voice of the waves as the break against the rocky shore. They don't crash, or lap, or roll. It's more like they tumble.  Like a small child teetering on their two spindly legs as they first are learning to do a summersault. They bend at the waist, put their head on the ground and then hoist their legs over. Not much rolling, usually just a jostled landing on the back, then prying up their heavy heads, with a goofy opened mouth grin.  Just to do it all again. 

Time

"Keep. Hoping. And. Everything. Will. Be. Okay." 

This has been my mantra for the last few months.  In the past six months it seems my life has turned upside down, right side up and then toppled over again.  It has been liberating, exhilerating, stressful, scary and sometimes absolutely lonely. Most days I find myself wondering how I got to where I am and where I will find myself in six more months.  

They say time heals all things, I sure hope "they" are right. 

"Useful Things" Thomas Morton, The Native Americans of New England (1637)

". . . . According to human reason, guided only by the light of nature, these people lead more happy and freer life, being void of care, which torment the minds of so many Christians: They are not delighted in baubles, but in useful things."

Dream. Job.

How I wish I could spend my days:  

http://petrastorrs.com/category/blog/

I wanna be lucky.

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