In light of the earthquake and tsunami in Japan, this post is going to feel self-pitying at best, and ridiculous at worst. But we cannot help our feelings, and I must attempt to sort out the confusion of my own life regardless of the misery going on in the rest of the world. The heavy and the worry about the lingering ill health of the children and my overwhelming sense that I’m not doing enough for them. Not able to keep up with work and the house and their needs and my relationships and my creative life. I get older and time accelerates, leaving me actually less time to do these things in, with more of them to do, and my unstoppable tendency of finding myself staring into space instead of attempting any of it. I hate the mid-life shut down, and I want to transform it. Mid-life renaissance, he said, and I want that. The reinvention. Seeing the crazy as an opportunity rather than an unqualified disaster. To accept where we are now–releasing the comparisons to a long-held belief of where we would be now, and what we would be doing/feeling. To commit to this path, the one we are on, and seeking another fork up ahead if we must but walking. Not sitting down on a rock with head in hands, getting bitten by mosquitos and ticks, mourning the path not taken. This is the one we took. For better or worse, so get yer ass up and get hiking.
