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| Joy and Sense of Belonging |
It has been a long time, almost 18 months and people have stopped asking when I would resume my blog. I had no answer. My emotions were frayed, my hope was diminishing, I felt unmoored. There were times when a moment, an interaction, something I saw felt like the kind of story that I would muse about in this blog. I could not find a way to bring that moment back.
Slowly, slowly something has shifted. The hardness that had been erected (or maybe just took root from an unconscious neglect) around my heart has softened. The isolation that the pandemic tapped, but was not fully responsible for, has lessened, actually it has just gone away.
Once again, I can hold these musings. Actually, they have been held. The stories have been there, waiting. Patiently waiting for me to pick them up and to share them with you.
This is what I learned and relearned about my musings: They are heart stories. For many years I have had much joy and happiness in sharing what has touched my heart. It has created a "rewind" for me that brings me home to myself through sharing with you.
What I have I learned about when I don't blog: There are times when I can't or don't want to share my musings. Being vulnerable is a part of blogging, and sometimes I don't want to make my vulnerable. Sometimes I am just lazy or I am just not willing to be present with this "stream of consciousness" blogging that is about the only consistent thing about my blogging over the decades.
So now that my fingers are actually at the keyboard on my blog page the stories are flooding through. So best to start with today.
This is my birthday week. I will have traversed 72 years on Saturday. I am having a heightened awareness of my heart being touched though memories and very present moments. I bird call that I have not heard from my porch recently just occurred as I sit and type, and I had to stop for a moment to just take it in.
I seem to be juggling another year with the reality that it has been 5 1/2 years since I moved full time to the Katahdin Region. It has been 7 years since I became a co-owner of a house in Millinocket. Instead of having a familiar "seven year itch" I am incredibly aware that I am feeling a deep sense of belonging.
I never had a plan to move to northern Maine. It defied all logic that I not only said "yes" to buying a house in Millinocket with "the Deb's", but that I decided upon retirement that I would move here. Not only did I move here, but I decided to stay here. I left a solid, comforting get away home in Millinocket where I had spent two years immersing myself in community and headed towards the vista's and wide open spaces of the "North End" and my sweet little cabin home of my own right here in Patten, Maine. It is here in this region the North and the South that I am filled with friendship, with community, sometimes angst, as well as an unrelenting pull into the now, the actions taken and the curiosity for what can be the next.
Who knew that growing old could be such a journey. That the possibilities for tomorrow can have so much room to grow. That my memories can be tender guideposts but not barriers to moving forward.
As I start this "72nd Birthday Week" I am so grateful to be feeling such gratitude (it is not a constant that is for sure). I am appreciative to be able to recognize and embrace these moments of joy and sense of belonging.
It is Monday. I am carrying. Let the blogging re-begin.
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