Breathing Underwater

The definition of the word ' live ' is: "to be alive." The definition of the word ' deliberately ' is: "consciously and intentionally; on purpose." So, when you put them together, ' to live deliberately ' means "to be alive, consciously and intentionally; on purpose."  That? Does not describe the way I'm living. It doesn't. In fact, I haven't been living deliberately for a long time. I mean, I experience little pockets of living with intention , but by and large, my life over the long last while has been happening to me, not because of me. I expect most of us could say that at times. We get so caught up in the 'must dos,' in the putting out of fires, in the crisis management, in the daily drudgery, that we forget what it means to really live consciously.  Please say that's not just me. It's you, too, right? Sometimes? Ever? Regardless, I've decided it's time to make a ch...

Today's blog post is inspired by the word 'Joy,' submitted by my friend Suzanne Vance (one of the most joyful people I've ever known).  I actually groaned when I pulled this word (randomly) from my prompt jar. I haven't been feeling terribly joyful lately. In fact, I've felt like I've been teetering on the edge of that black hole we call depression for a while. But my self-imposed rule (in order to train myself to write about whatever topic is thrown my way) forced me to work with the word I pulled. And as I promised I would, I sat down and wrote. When doing timed writings, the whole point is not to think about what you're putting down on paper. The goal is simply to write; to keep the pen moving and not stop for the duration. If you suddenly find yourself with nothing to say, you simply write, "I don't know what to say" a few times... and inevitably, something will appear. It might not be related to what you started with, but t...

I started blogging eleven years ago (on my  old blog ). Back then my daughter Ryan was 8-years-old. She was brilliant and beautiful, gregarious, precocious and wise beyond her years, willful, stubborn, talented, creative, quick-witted, and hilarious. She loved to swim and read and write stories and go camping. She had just given up her belief in Santa and the Easter Bunny, but she was holding (if tenuously) onto the certainty that fairies were real and existed in our garden. She was perfect - to me - in that way that parents see perfection in their children; not in their behavior (lord knows!) or in their physicality, but in the pieces of them that come from the purest parts of ourselves - those parts formed of deep and abiding love, untainted by pain and loss. Perfect. Today, she is 19 and a sophomore at one of the best universities in the country.  She is still all of the things she was when she was 8 - brilliant, beautiful, gregarious, wise, willful, stubbor...