What journeys have you found yourself on recently? Life offers us a wide variety of them and, of course, let us not forget about the journey of life itself.
My recent pathways have included caring for my aging parent, teaching my teenager how to drive, expanding my knowledge and experiences as an educator, embarking on a new course of wellness and self-care, and dealing with the consequences of a clogged cellar drain and a higher-than-usual water table in the backyard…fun…just to name a few of the myriad travels I've experienced over the past few months. I’ve been busy, but today I’ll go nowhere…as long as you don’t count treating my father to breakfast at the cozy eatery in town or the trip to the local grocer. I’m still on all of the journeys above and more (although, thank God, the cellar drain issue has recently veered off its bumpy, rocky road, in favor of a much smoother route), but today I’ll enjoy a precious moment of stillness. I’m a teacher enjoying the first snow day of the school year. The snow hasn’t arrived yet, and I know it’ll bring some work, like shoveling the deck, clearing the cars, and snow blowing a path to the mailbox, along with the possibility of treacherous driving conditions—all the more reason to stay home—but it also brings an opportunity to unplug. Sure, I’ll get ahead on a bit of school work, write another—much delayed—blog post, and accomplish some random “to-do’s” (a few items seem to have taken up a near-permanent residence on my list), but I’ll also make time to unwind and simply “be,” however that unfolds today. As Anne Lamott reminds us in chapter four of Almost Everything: Notes on Hope (a great book recommended to me by a dear friend that I’d suggest for anyone looking to read a real, humorous, touching reflection on life), “Almost everything will work again if you unplug it for a few minutes, including you.” That’s it. Chapter four. All of it. (I love when authors use brevity for emphasis.) Unplug. That’s just what I’ll do today, and I invite you to do the same. Here and now, the snow is beginning to fall, lightly and beautifully. Life’s journeys can be all at once exhilarating, exciting, and exhausting. Take a moment to unplug, wherever you are on your journey, if only for a moment. Unplugging will hopefully offer a sense of renewal, supporting us as we continue on our ways in bright-eyed wonder and amazement of all that is.
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