This is a post I wrote earlier this summer/spring, and wanted to share (and remember):
I wrote earlier that I would not forget Winter; but today I learned to remember Spring. Even without awareness, I had been thinking about endings (school), beginnings (getting married), and of thinking more expansively, planning to start over as I move closer to a new birthday. My energy levels are higher, my brain starts buzzing again, and it feels possible to pull out of the stagnation of Winter and move forward. The impetus for this awareness began one year ago today, when I was in my very last class meeting for my graduate program. The class was a celebration of a culmination, a time to reflect on many years of hard work. As part of that class, we were asked to write letters to ourselves. Those letters would be mailed to us a year later.
This morning, I got up early to go to a co-worker's party. I had to drive the same route I drive to work, and I was going to see co-workers, so it felt like a sixth day of work. I didn't want to go. Yesterday, I said goodbye to a co-worker I had become friends with; I was thinking a lot about not staying at my job for a hundred reasons. But I did go, stopping to pick up flowers, and laughing out loud at the man in the coffee outfit outside Dunks, doing the Roger Rabbit to get people to drink coffee. Trees are in full greenery, flowers line every house, lawns are a miraculous green, and the air is fresh and light. And I had a good time. On the way home, I let myself get lost, purposely driving a very different way home.
I thought about trying to set up a life here, and things felt more expansive than they have for awhile. I didn't feel so trapped. I didn't call home, I didn't worry, I just drove. By the time I got home, I felt good again. I checked the mail, and found the letter.
In that letter was advice about finding a job, and it gave me the freedom to look for a new one. That letter also reminded me to buy a house, a dream I've had for years and years now that never seems to come true. And most importantly, in that letter was a letter for my husband, who one year ago was my fiance. It was a reminder to love him, love him, love him, and a subtle reminder to love myself.
I've been thinking that its possible to carve a life out here, and to let myself do that. But I need to make things shift and think more expansively.
