Then you're the lucky one

2018 I'm coming for you.



I just can't take on responsibility for the whole world any more. I just cannot do it.


I think we all need to be in this together


I think I need to try to be happy.


Maybe what I mean is that I need to make room for the possibility of happiness.

I mean I need to let it be an option






Even though I love climbing on those big 'ol rocks beside the river and even though I'm getting good enough that surely I'll be topping out on the tallest boulders any day now, I turned down the invitation to climb with him and our long-haired friend so that I could dance and stretch alone in the living room and then lay down on my stomach on my forest green yoga mat and write whatever I felt like writing




These days when Hanna's eyes start to look a little vacant I don't know any more if it's because she's tired or a little out of it or just being her silly self or if it means that another seizure is coming. The not knowing is so challenging, and there's nothing I can do about it, and of course there it is, the lesson again: I cannot control everything. I just cannot take on responsibility for everything.

Just now when it happens I feel anxiety rising up my spine and shutting off my throat. I take a deep breath and I steady myself so that I can steady Hanna, I go to her, sitting down beside her on the brown corduroy couch, kissing her cheeks and petting her head and telling her, as the Reiki master suggested, that she is not alone, and I am right here with her, and she can just stay with me

She settles. From rootching and blank stares and nervous ticks to sleeping quietly beside me on the couch, her cheek pressed against my forearm as I write


Oh my friend, you will never be alone again




I am proud to be descended from Pennsylvania Dutch, my grandparents with an eighth grade education who did not speak English in their home for the duration of my father's youngest life. Sometimes I don't validate enough how rich that is. I don't really know any of my ancestors and I often feel cut off from cultural heritage but I still feel grateful for whomever it is that helped to bring me here




Love is a choice every morning