What a MONTH!!

"Long have you timidly waded holding a plank by the shore, now I will you to be a bold swimmer, to jump off into the midst of the sea, rise again, nod to me, shout! and laughingly dash with your hair." - Walt Whitman

I think that in the future I will look back at November of 2006 as a point where my life really changed. What a month I have had. This morning I sat and read through Michelle's lovely post about her creative dreams and I became nearly frozen in a deep reverie. I feel so different now. I left blogging for a month hoping to sit at this computer and work my ass off. I hoped to get big leaps towards one of my dreams. I hoped that by today things would be different. BOY are they - but not in the way that I'd thought.

At the beginning of the month I went to Seattle. I came back from that reeling with potential and connection and friendship. I came home ready to get on with the business of writing. Then two weekends ago my Grandmother died. Within 24 hours Mark and I were on our way to Heathrow airport and a day and a half later I was at her funeral. I held my niece (and Goddaughter!) on my lap through much of the service, and was held in the tight circle of my family. My Grandmother would have been proud. Both she and my Grandfather gave us all the gift of knowing how important family is. She was an incredibly - almost unbelievably - positive person. I learned a lot from her and I will probably write more about her in the future. In the meantime, we've lost her and she will be deeply, deeply missed.

Between these two trans-Atlantic journeys I have been working and sick in nearly equal amounts. I seem to stumble between the deep desire to sit on the couch watching television and spending hours at my desk spilling my ideas and desires onto the page. It seems deeply unfair to me that I am so inspired and so snotty at the same time. I feel tingles in my writing fingers. I feel like there aren't enough hours in the day to do all of the reading/ writing/ journaling/ creating/ connecting I want to do, but by the time I come home from work all my body wants to do is curl up in a ball and be sick. As I write this I wonder how to look at the illness as a part of my metamorphosis... but maybe it's the cold medicine talking.

I used to wonder if I would ever get where I wanted to be. I think this month, more than any other time in my life, has let me see clearly where that actually IS. I have a vision of what I want my life to look like and what I want to look back on and be proud of when it is over. I know two things now that I didn't really know then. I know that the only thing holding me back from everything I want is me. And I know that I am not alone on this journey. I thought I knew all of that before. But now, thanks to the lessons of this past November, I think I might actually understand it too.

"I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I intended to be." - Douglas Adams.