It’s that time of year, when the world falls in love…
How is 2021 nearly over? It surely just began last week.
My word for 2021 was quiet, and it may have been my favorite
word I’ve ever chosen. Quiet suited everything that I held dear to me in the
past year- quiet was just the year that I needed.
I have a thing about 7th years of life-
historically speaking, for me, every seven years my life shifts. 42 was a seventh
year, and life simply shifted in my embrace of who I am without all of the
apologies. My writing shifted. I moved away from who I was at 35, which I didn’t
even realize I was clinging to.
And now the page has turned to 43 and all of life seems to
be right where I want it. For an anxiety prone person, that is a frightening
statement. Truly, though, I couldn’t be happier or more content- I know all too
well that life will shift again in one short year and my Betsy will spread her
wings and find her way without me. It’s more than I can bear to think about,
and so I push it far to the back of my mind and focus on the here and now.
Being a parent to teenagers is such an incredibly fun ride,
even though it is tangled and prickly sometimes, and figuring out one girl responds
to me in a completely different way than the other one does, and it’s a constant
dance that the three of us are finding our way through. I am blessed beyond my
wildest dreams with my girls.
Entering this 2022, and this year that will fly by much too
quickly, as we try so hard to soak in every minute, the word that I have chosen
is joy.
There were times when I forget the lows
And think the highs were all that we'd ever known
These words have become my mantra. Along, of course, with a million other words. But those in particular hit a chord. My head is full of all the highs, and it's not that I forget the lows so much as I have found a home for them to exist. Memories of who I used to be then.
Joy is where I'm fairly certain I am, joy is where I want to remain.
Here's to 2022. All the best is yet to come.
