December has swept by in a blur. It always does with two children's birthdays and Christmas all within ten days. The house has been full and busy and happy. There's not been much time for quiet. We stole away the day after Christmas for a walk along the beach. I didn't know how much I needed it until we were there - wide blue sky above, the pale winter sun dancing off the water and the sand beneath my feet stretching on and on...
This year's word for me was free. It's been true. There by the river spilling out into the sea I finally understood it. It's not shirking responsibility, abandon, recklessness, selfishness...I've wrestled out from under the weight of those misconceptions...it's knowing who I am beyond the titles of wife, mother, daughter, sister, teacher, friend. It's knowing what it is that makes me come alive and being brave enough to make a leap of faith towards it. Walking along the shore-line, climbing over and ducking under trees brought down in recent storms, I looked back and saw how far we'd come - the place where we started just a dot on the horizon. I looked ahead to a rocky outcrop, a bend I couldn't see around but I knew the open sea and all possibilities lay that way. I keep walking from this year into the next and the promise of good things to come.
