The best medicine...

The other day I found out I have a mild infection which made everything seem correct...the aches and pains, the emotional crap, and the 'no I'm not getting up early I'm laying here as long as I can and then I want toast.'  But still I was blue - I've got alot going on and have to reel myself in from worrying about things a year from now, know what I mean?  And when you are under the weather, it seems that all that shit that you keep at bay - all the crap you can manage and handle on a normal day seems to come for you.  It tries to get you.  And sometimes it does.  So I just let the words my brother told me comfort me - 'Some days you win, some days the day wins, but there's always tomorrow.'  That tapped my Scarlett O'Hara big time and went in my little case of 'Life Coping Skills.'  

As you know I've been working my ass off for this class.  I will most likely pass and even if the grade is a C (EEK!) it will be the most gratifying grade thus far because I have never worked this hard in a class in my life.  Ever.  I did that Annotated Bibliography (read Bane of my current existence) and I earned a fantastic grade on it which blew my mind!  I had no one to tell though that would really give more than half a shit for me.  I missed my mom.  She would listen, she was a great listener when she was doing well, and she would hear the work I put into it and she would cheer for me and it would be REAL and she would make me feel like the Annotated Bibliography Olympic Champ.  So I did the next best thing - I called my brother John.  It was mid morning and I was out on the lake in my kayak and had my phone so I rowed to the middle and relaxed and dialed....

"Hello?"

"Hey John it's me."

"Hey! Whatcha up to kid?"

"I'm on the water on my kayak, I'm down"  Insert beginning of tears "I miss mom."

"So you're on your Kayak? But today It's a Cry-ak?"  Insert smile and soft cry

"Yes." and then laughter because you can't stay sad when you talk to John.

"Ok, well are you, ya know...stable?  You're not in some ceremonial robe ready to dive to the bottom right?"  he giggles

Then I just start laughing through disappearing tears.

He cracks me up and immediately my mood has changed from sad to 'this shit is funny this life is funny and it's not getting the best of me today'

I wish everyone a 'John' be it friend or brother or both that can ground them in happiness right away.  Ceremonial Robe - haha, no, but I was close.

Then we started talking and he recanted the time I accidentally butt dialed him while he was at work (he's a highschool teacher) and I was sitting by the water at 7AM.  I was having one of my meditative moments on a day off and all he could hear were the loud honks of the 50 or so geese around me.  He got worried and thought I was being attacked and devoured by a pack of wild carnivorous geese. He knew I was alone somewhere, )this is an ongoing somewhat tense thing with my family - that I do things alone.  I hike alone, I kayak alone, I swim alone - but that's just me, it's always been me. Trust me if I get the fear vibe or the 'something isn't right' vibe I move on.) So I hear this far away voice that sounds like someone talking across the lake...only the voice... it sounds familiar.  Then I realize it's coming from my phone in my back pocket so I pick it up and it was John - we had a good laugh that day - no crime scene, no geese murder.

So I'm on the middle of lake with my mood improving and he's telling me about his new trailer and their upcoming camping trip.  All of the sudden every dog that lives on the far side of the lake starts up and barks very loudly, if you live in a place like this you come to realize that they are all signaling one another like some canine instant alert system.  Out of the corner of my eye I see this HUGE black dog on an expanse of lawn and a few seconds later I realize it's a HUGE BLACK BEAR.  I tell John about the bear then ask "Can they swim?"  He says "Start rowing they are excellent swimmers."  So I start having a Bear-turned-Jaws moment and row away down further to my favorite abandoned house (see prior post).  I had hung up the phone and was still laughing over ceremonial robes etc.  

Two red-neck fisherman are trolling in a row boat and I know they hate me because I'm being recreational on a purple kayak of all things.  One time I hit my paddle on the side of my kayak by accident and I guess it messed up their secret fishing spot and one threw half a sandwich at me.  It landed in the water and trying to make peace I said "That's probably good bait!" to which the he replied in a scream like hissing whisper "SHUT-UP!"  I didn't know what to do so I smiled brightly and said "Good Luck!" and as I turned to row he said "Fk off!"  To which I started laughing uncontrollably and rowed away like a giggling mental case.  So anyway they are trolling with the Terminator of all electrical motors like some freshwater version of Deadliest Catch, and on the other side of the lake close to my favorite abandoned house the bear reappears!  He is huge and beautiful and black.  They swoop close to the shore to get a better look and the Brooklyn in me thinks 'Good you dumb asses, He can outswim your boat!  He will get you first and never see me while I make my getaway in an understated purple kayak!"  I hung back and got some good pics the bear was majestic and rambling...

It was quite a day on the lake...  There were eerie trees that nature had taken down, fallen half in/half out of the water.  The sunken ones look ghostly and swollen in their various stages of decomposition.  Those that stick out of the water have tons of baby turtles clinging to them.  There are so many they look like little dark stone buttons, until you get up close - you have to move stealthily (especially in a purple kayak) because they pop off and dive quickly.  I saw a whipping like fish in the water then realized it was a water snake - I was ready to abandon ship if it attacked, thankfully it did not.  There was a bird that looked like a Hatchet Head and another one that looked kind of like a white flamingo they were lone wolves kind of like me.   There was the bear.  And the fishermen that hate me.  All in all it was a good day - and it never fails that I leave the water a better person than when I arrived.  I surrendered to the day and came out with some sort of truce, one with the day - the other with myself.

The sandwich throwers got bored and moved on though not without a few sneers in my direction.  One day I will explain to them that we are kindred spirits on the water - they will most likely harpoon me.  Today I wave at them happily.  Because I was happy, and I am happy.  And some days you win and some days the day wins, but there's always tomorrow.  Always.

I wish for you humor and laughter - the best medicine God gave us

Namaste

On loneliness

I must admit I am a happy person.  Probably one of the happiest people you will ever meet.  And then there is the gratitude I feel and I speak about most of the time.  It truly is a beautiful life sometimes with great meaning, many times with great mystery.  One thing many people don't know about me is that underneath, in the well spring that's me, there is a loneliness that settled in from my beginning.

I have people around me that I love and that love me, believe me.  I am a very very lucky girl.  But I do wonder if anyone else is like this?  All my big moments I am usually alone in my feeling, in my thought.  All of my horrific moments have been of self realization and secondary acknowledgements.  I'm that person that could be in a place filled with other souls, yet intrinsically in a desert hearing the wind.

I'm fully ok being alone with myself, I even enjoy that company most of the time.  I have children who are my life blood, who make my heart beat, who make my mornings sing. I have family that I can call on at a moments notice and wonderful friends that would meet me at 3AM 'just to talk'.

I was in my car one day listening to one of my favorite songs and someone very close to me heard the lyrics and said Oh my God that is you!  "So pretty and oh so bold, she's got a heart full of gold on a lonely road."  We laughed but inside I sighed.  I know it's probably some inner defense mechanism, but do we all have it?  I feel like the depths of me are yet undiscovered.  I give everything, but I don't GIVE enough because I truly can't.  The only place that goes there for me is writing, so I suppose it's an art for me - a release.  But that sharing with others day to day just wasn't the hand that was dealt me.  I could probably go into the reasons why...parentified child, suicidal and clinically depressed mother, a rage filled home, a rage filled youth, a failed marriage, A pervading feeling of hurt and guilt though many times guiltless, an emotional whipping boy in a way.  You reach a certain age and realize there truly is so much shit you will never un-do so you make peace with it as best you can and pick up your bed and walk on.

But I know me.  I know I am like some archaeological tomb in an Indiana Jones movie wrought with dead falls, booby traps, and near misses.  I also know I am like that great line he utters when those around him look to him for direction and guidance, simply assuming he has the answers all the time...'Tell me Indy-Crisy...what's the plan.'  And I'm standing there saying 'I don't know...I'm making this up as I go.'  Are we all like that?  Come on, it can't just be me?  And there it is...at least for me...lonely.

So I'm going to try, really try, to not be this way as much.  That armor fits so well though, it's become so comfortable.  I reach out believe me, but only so far.  My arms are open, but only so wide.  My smile is true, my heart is pure ,so what the hell am I afraid of?  I need to change this - I need to be fearless.  I've been shut down in that inner way for so long.  Bare it all and walk through the desert in my soul and let my ass get a bit sunburned.

Be fearless on the inside and out.

Namaste

Just for today

Yesterday I set out on dads lake with my kayak.  To say it's becoming an addiction would be an understatement.  If I were about 22 years old I would forsake all earthly goods buy a Westfalia VW Van and set off to kayak every puddle in the USA.  The only way I can describe it, and forgive the graphic nature, is that the second I push off from terra firma and begin to float, a slight release of pressure happens in my pelvic floor.  No, it isn't incontinence.  It's like an entire body letting go, a soul release.  The above pic is one of my favorite visions no matter where I am.  Shallow water with the stones, and  vegetative debris, and the small minnow fish that see you off.  It's sort of the beginning - the portal to the liquid meditation EVERY TIME.  The further I get from the shore the less that can touch me.  Any problems, bills, animosity, resentments, stress, laundry...it all stays there on the shore.

I don't just take 'rides' in my little vessel, I totally get into the small space (I think it taps my tiny home fantasies in a way)  I bring snacks, usually some pumpkin seeds or an apple, always water, and in the early mornings a great cup of coffee.  In a ziplock bag attached by an orange bungee is sunblock, a small notebook and 2 pens, behind me a small towel, atop my head my sunglasses that I got in the fishing dept on sale, and yesterday a few books for school.  I'm dying to take my best girlfriend, my little dog Bella, one day.

So in the last week I've accomplished reading a 200 page book every day/every other day.  This weekend is the final push for this online class that has been truly a test of tenacity for me.  I reverted to the rebel teen at one point - I just didn't feel like doing it.  Then surprised myself by letting the adult I've become take over - "The only way around this class is straight through this class."  Last week I checked online for the grade of my last ridiculously involved assignment.  It was a power point presentation of a book we had to read IN ADDITION to the normal reading load then create a power point presentation explaining why this book was included in the Young Adult Literary Canon (why it's read in schools etc for this age group) and include certain points of a young persons journey to identity achievement.  This was truly comical for me because lets face it I'm a therapists wet dream as far as arrested development and identity achievement are concerned, or so I thought....

I SLAVED over this thing and then had my son check it and make suggestions (secretly I wanted to pay him to do the entire thing but what kind of parental example would that have been?  but I must admit I considered it)  I handed it in complete with hyperlinks and Youtube videos on the author and sound effects and the damn bibliography ( I HATE BIBLIOGRAPHIES AND I SHALL ALWAYS FEEL THIS WAY FOREVER I IMAGINE MY TOMBSTONE - CRISY LOVER AND LIVER OF LIFE...HATER OF BIBLIOGRAPHIES) and photo credits and sent it into cyber space and wondered yet again why did I take this class and do this to myself???  So I logged on early one morning at work and there was the grade for the power point - 10/10.  I refreshed the screen - 10/10.  I checked to make sure I had logged onto MY page and there it was again 10/10 - a perfect grade.  I ran (sprinted actually)  into the lab to tell my friend (who in some weird way has become a cheerleader for me with returning to school)  and she just smiled and said 'Of course you did, see you got this!'  I reveled in that then the stress of the next and final assignment began.  Guess what it is?  An ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY on 7 more works.  This is when I know God has a great sense of humor....and a great reward system....

They changed the portal on the University website, they completely updated it etc and there under MY NAME was a notation ***for registration purposes your status is Senior***  I am a senior...at a university...I'm almost there...It was that little push of hope that I so badly needed.  The sense of accomplishment was unreal.  Me.  Single Mom.  Ex moron.  Never really got it. Uncertain. Unsure.  Unwanted. Self esteem depleted.  Divorced.  Deserted.  Treading water.  Trying like heck not to sink in every way. A Senior at a University.  My vision got blurry from the tears.  I deserved this moment.  Everyone Deserves a moment like this.

So the last few days have been reading, noting, writing, dreaming of burning laundry and setting the kitchen on fire.  So I decided I needed a change of scenery but felt guilty to go play with my course work needing attn and my house ready to be condemned....

So I brought my books with me and rowed out to the middle of the lake.  Hours later I had caught up on my reading, worked on my vitamin D, and upped my happy quota.  Then I decided a little physical release was needed so I strapped all my crap down in my little 'cabin' and took a very swift row around the lake.  I stopped by a house I loved as a child and only saw a few times from a random rowboat with friends.  I was one of those weirdo tough ass kids but I would get lost in some things and I thought way too much for a teenager...and undercover oddball to say the least.

  

Picture this - A low white house with some kind of strong Mediterranean Vibe, long sweeping stone steps that led to a private beach - yes they had truckloads of sand every spring it seemed and they had their own little beach...As a kid I imagined some exotic family lived there - most likely Greek and they missed home.  They missed the timelessness of stone and lapping spice scented breezes coming in from the sea.  They admired lemon leaves because they were shiny, and gazed at their olive trees.  They drank red wine at a small wrought iron bistro set on the veranda and ate amazing sea food and healthy fruits and nuts and cheese.  At night a woman would descend the pristine stone steps with bare feet and stand in the water then sit by candle light under the moon and write to her family back home....Strange for a kid but this is what I saw in my mind when I rowed past with friends....Today the original image sits in my mind like a postcard you would find in a Catskill Antique shop for a quarter. 

A tough economy has left many homes empty in our area.  This house never fit the 'gotta-have-the bigger-the better-Center Hall Colonial' dream.  I don't know the back story but I can only guess that the people that owned it maybe couldn't keep up, perhaps passed from old age, and there it sits....This is the house now

This is the view from what I call 'The Cove' The property to the right of this place has a great spot that curves out to some rocky outcroppings where we would swim (illegally as kids)  But I've always felt that this little property (above pic) was the nicest spot on the lake.  

This is the view as you come toward 'The Cove' There is an abandoned Geese shit piled dock that belongs to this house.  It still has the hooks - I may bring a rope with me one day soon and tether myself out from it about 20 or so feet and enjoy a good book and lunch and 

pretend the entire place is mine for a day.  

Yeah, I get into crap like that.

It has a cinder block construction garage next to it which would be perfect as a granny flat or some art studio...maybe a potters wheel, clay, bright paints and a kiln

The rear has a 'screened in' porch (windowed in)  and the stairs come down to a rock walled area that is in the shape of a whales tale.  This is where the sand was and it would shine bright on a summer day.  I suppose all those deliveries of sand is what gave the cove in that spot it's gradual mild undulating walk into the water.  It's still pretty subdued under the surface here.  I have always loved this place.  And looking at it now with adult eyes (and past realtor eyes) there is enough sun for a lovely garden to the right and a pergola could certainly be built to the left and off the garage a small hen coop would fit.  The wall of windows would be outstanding with linen curtains that could blow in the breezes for 3 seasons.  The fall wound deposit red and orange leaves on your shore and in winter one could imagine a small pot bellied stove and a cast iron crock with chilli slow cooking all overlooking an icy lake and a basic wood desk to write on...

I sat in Xanadu (my kayak) for a long time looking up at this place as the wind blew around my body and up the lawn to the busted door.  This time next year my entire life may be different.  I will have (God willing) finally graduated college and be readying for a career in the fall.  It scares me to think like that because I've been so used to disappointment my whole life.  But that's the thing about hope and clouds with silver linings, you never really know...you just keep going.  You thwart the nay-sayers..."Bad time for teachers'  "No one finds a job now'  'maybe you're a bit too old?'  You don't let those demons near you...they may be right...but then again, they may be wrong   But you will never find out if you take your eyes off that goal you hold fast to.  In the very least it may not be what you imagined, what you worked for...damn it may be better than that, yes it certainly could be better than that - but you've got to keep on keeping on.  

I rowed away thinking this time next year things will be different...they always are.

What if all these trials and tribulations were training you for something really great?

What if Life really is on your side?  Hold onto that

Namaste

Kayak Part One

Up to Speed

I have received many emails in the last few weeks that went something like...."Hey what's up with the blog?  You haven't been writing, is everything ok?  and they finally from a close friend "You're blog has been quiet."

As always I am amazed and touched at the amount of folks who read it.  A strange thing happened a few weeks ago and I went with it - All In.

To bring you up to speed - Currently I am in an online class that is condensed (read wtf was I thinking) a summer class of a mechanical like literature (again read wtf was I thinking) where the 'guts' -which is what I usually write - takes a back seat to the semi-colon, the comma, and the citations (truly WTF WAS I THINKING)  But a good thing has come out of it and I can assure you it won't be a high GPA.  I've realized, at heart, I am a writer.  I am a clue observer.  All the books, all the lessons were simply other souls leaving us a breadcrumb-like written confetti -scattered batches of clues on what it means to be human in the time you are given.  I've put it to rest.  Should I never publish a book, spark a dream, or change the world, I live my life knowing as the sun rises in the east that I am a writer - and that's ok.  This class will pass, and hopefully so will I with at least a respectable B.  I've given up on the A as it only serves to mock me and piss me off.  3 weeks left and believe me I am counting the minutes with every book I must read, analyze, and regurgitate.  No fun really but no one said this business of going back to school, raising two young men, holding down a job, and dreaming of burning all the laundry was going to be easy.  So it's one day at a time - one class, one credit at a time.  This degree has become one of those things that I will not go to my grave without.  It's that much.  Up to speed with that and my current mental state - onward...

Looks like sun in a bowl

I went to my fathers and the spring lawn was filled with dandelions.  I began picking them, and picking them and picking them with the intent of making dandelion wine.  I found a 100 year old recipe that farmers used and decided this was the spring it was going to happen...I have long been smitten with ancient recipes before I became an unabashed Diet Coke head.  I reveled in learning how the Romans purified their water (vinegar), how the aqueducts were built with such precision - the gallon count brought to the city, the desert dwellers that dug roots and drank, the water witch dowsers that are right on the money, and the survivalist who soaks up the morning dew with a bandanna and drinks.  Water is holy to me as you all know.  And I'm not quite right when I am away from it. I want to get back to drinking things that aren't so chemical that aren't so created in a lab...So currently in my bedroom walk in closet there is a two gallon homemade closed fermentation system going on that should fetch me 10 regular wine bottles of dandelion wine.  My son saw the system and called me Mom Breaking Bad.  (He really is a pisser this kid!) A hose connects to a sealed saline bottle and the gases bubble through.  And just when I thought - How the hell can I possibly do this?? I thought of all the farmers that have been doing it for God knows how long.  June 23 is the launch date for Crisy's Dandy Dandelion Wine - should it prove good I will be picking and fermenting en mas next spring. (Nice Christmas gifts!)  And next year I want to make Meade (Honey Wine - read the epic Beo-Wulf,  (Meade Halls how utterly romantic.!) So I am making wine in my bedroom closet - enter MY normal- onward...

My fermentation system...currently residing in my walk in closet

I don't even pretend to be 'normal' anymore

There are six chickens in two temporary coops...in my bedroom.  Yes.  You read that correctly.  I have hand raised them since little puff balls to send to a farm.  Townhouse be damned I will have chickens in some capacity til I get to my own dirt.  Do my kids think it's odd?  No they just tell their friends "That's just my mom."  I dig those kids.  My son wanted baby ducks -two of them - that he could train to swim in the bath-tub - and a miniature pig because they are intelligent like dolphins...I guess the apple doesn't fall far from the tree.  The chickens should be leaving us soon and I would be lying if I said I wouldn't miss there soft trills as I fall asleep and they bed down for the night - onward...

My Tiny Home dabble...

Somewhere in the last few weeks I was driving on Route 284 to the wildlife refuge to take my lunch break from work (sometimes you need to just escape even if its only for a while and sometimes you run screaming for solitude)  I was about to turn onto Bassetts Bridge road when I spied a tin can trailer leaning precariously toward the edge of a property.  After work I knocked on the door and asked if they wanted to sell it.  $100 bucks they said.  I checked it out and it was the right size to be my first reno/adventure toward Tiny Home Life.  Sadly upon the further inspection of two friends (who know what the hell they are looking at) it was so outdated that just to move it would be $400 in and another (conservative )$2500) to get it up and going.  So, after a couple of weeks of dreaming, youtubing trailer repair videos I was able to make a more educated and less emotional decision to pass on it.  HOWEVER I will find one and reno it - my dad's on board  with the idea and honestly I would love to do a project like that along his side - the guy is 75 and sprightly and I have memories of him building just about everything in our house growing up - a dad and daughter moment for sure.  He did the back addition and was on a ladder asking me for a cup of Apple Juice and when I gave it to him he called in the Juice of the Gods - Funny what you hold onto from childhood. It'll happen - a trailer project- the Tiny Life Calls me daily. - onward...

Me on the Bay in LBI ...I had just learned how to stand a few minutes prior

Somewhere in all of this I went away and did a paddle board race with a friend that owns a shop.  It was in LBI (my refuge any time of the year - preferably in the shore like Apocalypse of winter - I'm weird , I know , please don't state the obvious -just let it wash over you like Shakespeare and go with it.) And of course it couldn't be just a day in the bay - which happened to be unseasonably warm this time of year, it turned into a frigen full blown spiritual experience.  I had a 15 minute instruction on how to get on the board, stand on the board, then row.  The 'race' started and it was one mile around the bay.  I have to admit I was running all kinds of scenarios which ranged from a shark attack and feeding frenzy to an unfortunate collision and speed boat accident.  I put all that to rest and just paddled.  The sun was hitting the water and every now and then there were these 'under the surface ' islands of vegetation that seemed to be floating like some sci-fi world in space - these amazed and delighted me.  Paddle Boarding is no joke , it's strenuous and my arms went numb about halfway through.  I entered some water zen zone and just kept paddling.  And in the community of paddle boarders they cheer when you pass the finish line.  You couldn't get the smile off my face.  Then it occurred to me that you couldn't get me off the board.  I laid on it in the shallow water, I dangled, and theynfinally I was sitting on it side saddle and it felt like a swing.  My feet were on the soaked sand of the bottom and the sky felt as open as I was and the moment came - this is what had been missing in my life - play.  Just to play, like a kid that wont get out of a pool even though the family bbq is done.  That was me.  And tears of relief came.  Years upon years of time I wont get back, balls to the wall work schedules, saying yes to holiday pay when I really wanted to be with my kids but I really had to keep the fridge full and the lights on.  It's over.  Those times are done.  It's time for play, it's good for the soul.  I'm choosing a life of experience instead of things.  When you make the right choice your belly lets you know - never doubt that.  And get in the water if possible.  Onward...

The Bay appears choppy in this spot but it was smooth as glass at the race

All of the chain of events that you have read above started with one decision.  The Kayak.  Folks that know me and read this know that I have been moving toward a life of decommodification for a while.  From the material girl in the 80's to the tree hugger of today - so be it.  (by the way if you buy local honey it does contain indigenous pollen that is proven to help build some kind of immunity for allergies) - See what I mean?  Who walks around with this on their brain??

So I had been talking about a kayak for a long long time.  I would pass the Wallkill River dropoff point wistfully wanting to be that person who would be boating down the river.  I would look over brochures of rafting trips on the Delaware with a hushed awe.  but something ALWAYS deterred the purchase - sports signups ($200) The boys needing shoes ($150) The water/hydro bill ($250)  something always pushed it further away.  But $10 here $25 there in a Kayak envelope and soon the $ was there.  My son had a pickup truck and I said "Ok can you drive mom to the sporting goods place I think today is the day."  That kid had me in the truck like lightening.  We perused the store which always makes me crazy - consumerism on a grand scale makes me head for the hills.

I was after a small blue one, the only thing I knew to go one(at the advice of my paddle board friend) was a wide base for stability as a beginner and foot peddles because I would need them for leverage while paddling.  The blue one didn't have foot peddles, and I didn't like the yellow (I've always found certain yellows to be stressy colors)  but there was a purple one that had everything.  But purple?? Oh my.

It was then that my son turned into an adult - "We are not leaving here without this - you have wanted this you deserve this.  We aren't ordering anything, we are leaving here ready to kayak."  Did I raise that kid right or did I raise him right?  He even picked out the temporary racks for the car so I could transport it the very next morning to the lake.  There it was ...I owned a kayak.  I struggled with a bit of shame over spending that much on myself.  But then I thought about a life of experiences, not a life of things.  But it would be this very thing that would bring me much experience.  Guilt sucks the wad - don't dabble in it too long, it's engineered to immobilize you.  Go with your gut, save your money and enjoy your experience....

The Big Day that was a year and a half in the dreaming

I named her Xanadu

I read one time that if you teach a man something you have taught a man something, but if you teach a woman you have taught a family.  This was yesterday...

Yup those are my boys, older now, strong and true, 

we will be camping this Aug and tubing down the Delaware

Am I a lucky Mom or what?

We went to the state park and I was able to rent them kayaks and we all paddled on that liquid space together.  We tied up our boats and explored a small island in the middle of the lake - adventurers we three... I even caught them taking pics and sending them to their friends.  Then we hiked around the lake.  It's so dense and massively green and the roots of the trees that rose high above our heads looked like long bony fingers, reaching toward the shore line.  At times the roots were so intertwined it was as if the whole forest was holding hands and we were a part of it - we were so connected.  We walked further and found a secret shady waterfall where we dipped our feet in.  We talked and they told me some of their dreams which included mountain biking, hiking, and culinary school.  I told them mine which included riding a horse (because I really haven't) and taking a helicopter ride (when I was young I wanted to go air-force in a big way), How and why I want to be a teacher  realizing this is my giveback as a human showing students how to read the clues left behind in ink (because it's not too late) and maybe even learning to fly a small plane of my own one day. God makes dreams big so you can grow into them.

Needless to say it's been a few turbulent but overall good weeks.  I promise to write more, thank you for your support if you read this - it still blows my mind.  I am a lucky woman!

I wish for YOU a life of experiences!  Get out there and do it!

Namaste