regrounding

It’s one of those days that I enjoy looking out the window at the pouring rain from a warm spot on my cozy leopard-print chair, a cup of peppermint tea steaming up the glass and making the trees and the street and the mailbox all look like they are graced with a magical aura.

It’s one of those days in which I feel open.  Heart stretched, eyes awake, doors ajar.

I just spent a good chunk of the day sitting with the book I’m writing, getting ready to pick up my words again; words that were put aside in order to focus on website improvements and holiday hoopla and wellness goals and countless games of Farkle with my kids, because frankly, I can’t get enough of them lately.

However, the trouble with setting down one’s words, even if only for a couple of months, is that by nature we are fluid creatures.  We change, and therefore, the meaning tucked between the letters changes too.

Once upon a time I thought it would be the greatest thing in the world to be a published author.  I had ever-so-romantic fantasies of seeing my book in print with a fancy hardback cover sitting in the window at Malaprop’s (my favorite bookstore ever), and heavily dog-earred copies poking out of women’s purses.

Not that there’s anything wrong with romantic fantasies, mind you, unless they keep you from delving into the nitty gritty, the meaning, the magic, the gut-wrenching realization that you can’t be perfect with a capital P, the passion that opens you up to receive what was always yours to begin with.

My eleven-year old daughter, Zoe, recently started her own blog.  I’ve learned a great deal from watching her and that sense of urgency she has to express herself out in the world.  She doesn’t care about comments…  she doesn’t spend hours on end editing and then re-editing her posts until they’re suitable to share…  she simply has stories and pictures that she longs to give away, to add to the great cosmic collection of meandering thoughts, lessons learned, and wisdom given a voice.  She knows no pretense.  She is purely herself, and knows that her mere existence, imagination, insight– is a gift of profound love.

I hope she never loses that.  Because that’s what her dream of being an author is grounded in, which in my eyes, guarantees her success, whether or not she ever gets a book deal.

So here I am.  Feeling open.  WIDE open.  And slightly teary–  just enough to know that the light is getting in.

My vision of being an author is regrounding itself in the energy that burns through resistance and fear and preconceived notions. It’s the same energy that lights me up when I’m sitting in circle with women and creating art; the same energy that made me weep when Zoe got lost in the woods last weekend- even though I didn’t know it until after she was found; the same energy that breeds patience when I’m helping Noah with his homework, even when he’s tired and on the verge of a tantrum; the same energy that has turned me into a sometimes-impossible-to-live-with healthnut.

I may or may not one day be a published author.  I may or may not ever finish my book.  But I will tell you this.  I will write.   I will write here on my blog.  I will write thank-you notes and love notes and goodbye notes.  I will write articles and stories and letters to the wild women. I will write in my journal, in guestbooks, and in the margins of the books I’m reading.

I will write.

Categories: self-expression   |   Tags: Creativity, intention, writing  |  1 Comment »

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