On Fear, Trust and Learning to Fly

I turned around today and saw the past year slipping off into the distance. Last year at this time I had just lost my father. I was emerging from a very difficult and dark time in my life and finally making peace with the loss of my mother the year before.  I was beginning to make a move that I'd longed for for awhile. It wasn't ideal; but it was my decision, and I was beginning to feel good about the decision.  Who knew that in just three short months, I would suddenly lose my husband also.


Suddenly it's a  full year later and I feel a little frazzled, a little edgy, a little on the verge, if you know what I mean. I'm trying to tell myself that I'm okay right where I am for the moment. I am here and I have a roof over my head, and life, well life is my oyster again. I'm grateful for all these things,

I lost so much a year and half ago. I lost my mother, my father, and my husband. I also lost all confidence in myself. Truly. All of it. I felt utterly alone and desolate. This has been a year and half of trying again. And again. Much good has come of it. I still feel the losses daily, but I make myself try harder. It's an old cliche about picking yourself up and dusting yourself off, but cliches are born from truths worth repeating.

This apartment has sheltered me while I've reinvented my life. In my heart that makes it the best of homes. And when I feel afraid of failing again, which I do almost daily, I look out the patio door. There's that flightless (for the moment) baby bird, making its way across the roofline, guided by its mother, but trusting in its own two feet.