The thin, cold skies of November are filled with wisps of smoke from all the burning leaves. Hands thrust into my pockets, face tucked into my turtleneck to save my chin from frostbite, I walk determinedly ahead. I consider my dogged persistence in not sitting still one minute longer than I am required to, and it begs comparison to...then.
I do not regret my going. That open door beckoned and for far too long I told the longings of my heart to be still and abide. I pled with the angels for the fortitude to withstand it, all of it. I looked at the earnest, eager faces of my children and begged God for something to change so that we could all just be happy. Still, the gap between the threshold and the road whispered to me of promise, of freedom, a path whereby I might find my escape.
I struggled with the wanting. The dark angel on my other shoulder wrapped her small claws around the top of my ear and said Illusion. Its wrong to go. Stay and suffer.
The process of setting aside my doubts was a process of years, not days or weeks or months. At long last, the final drawn breath of what might have once been love, and then...freedom.
With faith and hope I pulled on the thread of possibility and it unwound sparkling into a new life. I began to stand ever taller, remembering my dreams. Welcoming possibility. I put one foot in front of the other and what began as a slow trudge became a brisk walk, a run. Sometime along the way I found myself. Loved myself. Forgave myself. Stumbled upon the one person whose need to heal matched mine.
Like hand in glove, our hurts and our love met in perfect harmony. In one shining moment of grace I let the refuse of the past burn in the steel barrel with the November leaves, gone into smoke and blown away. There is no need to dwell there, no time to be filled with regret or loss.
We did what we did.
We are who we are.
I am loved. I am happy.
I wish you well.
