A notable amount of time has passed since my last entry that one would be led to believe that something of significance has happened; something of a worthy cause to divert my attention from my dedication to writing. The truth is I have been engaged in massive quantity of writing, just not the writing I prefer. Blogs and journals and poems and short stories have taken a back seat to essays, research papers, and lesson plans - all of which hold little of my interest to be quite honest. They have taken their toil on my state of being, overwhelming and stressing me to the point of feeling unproductive or unaccomplished. So many other responsibilities fall to the wayside, outmatched by school assignments and work. I haven't been on a trail ride with my nice bike in a couple months now; I haven't applied for new jobs in weeks; I have unfinished poems and short stories;I have stacks of books to read....even cleaning or dishes or laundry go unattended until there's an intolerable smell.
Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend.
I guess it would be pretentious of me not to acknowledge a milestone or two. Like my first pedicure. Oh, and leaving my 20's...that's apparently suppossed to be a big deal. Or feel like a big deal. Its should feel like something, and I'm struggling with that a bit. It felt just like a birthday. Don't get me wrong, people have been beyond attentive and generous. I have actually been blessed beyond expectations, though I'm unsure what my expectations even were. I often find myself asking, "Well, what next?" because endings are suppossed to open up beginnings and beginnings mean something has ended. It always gets tricky when trying to decipher which is which.
But my 20s have ended, the school year has ended, my graduate studies are ending, and Africa is beginning. So I embark, and maybe embarking is so often confused with starting and not undertaking. Life is an undertaking, and though things seem like they come and go or start and stop, this life is an embarkment.
