some kind of wonderful

I had a globe growing up. I loved it. With a wonky kind of love only a child can have for a round piece of plastic. I would close my eyes and spin it, letting my fingertips softly float over it's smooth surface as it swooooshed around. when it stopped I would slowly open my eyes to discover my destiny. I always landed on some place romantic. mysterious. exotic. close to the ocean. I never, e.v.e.r. remember landing on Ohio. Maybe there are certain things you cannot, as a child, handle. until you have to. 

I am torn between knowing that I am a fish out of water, and a poser living among people I love who have found their hearts desire with their feet firmly planted on farmland, while I am looking to stretch my sea legs. there have been times when this has filled me up. lifted me. suffused me with knowledge of the land. the overall beauty of the hillsides blanketed in wildflowers. or glistening in the sunshine under millions of snowflakes. the majesty. the infinite vastness. the comfort of the seasons, as they fade one into another. I feel blessed. to learn a place. to know it's people. to carve a piece of my heart for a just such a place. a place I am quite certain is just a layover. Ohio will forever be more than just "the middle" to me. but, I do miss my ocean......

As it is, I haven’t touched the ocean in many months. For me, the sea is my centering, the main thing I visualize when I’m tense or stressed. It is the image I use during happy and sad. the one I use during everyday. It has been too long. it helps, remembering the smell of salty air and trying to capture it in my memory from photos I have taken. resets my soul, makes me smile and reminds me of what life offers. I am planning my next trip, yet as you know, patience is not one of my virtues. It is also probably one of the virtues that I most need in my life, especially right now when so many things seem uncertain. I have become fairly good at maintaining a certain  calm when faced with circumstances that I know I have no control over, but what I am currently having to learn is patience in circumstances where I feel like I should be able to have some control, when I feel like my best efforts should be enough. you know, I am stubborn and tenacious, so I tend to work a problem to death, but I am not always good at stepping back, waiting calmly, listening. letting it come to me.  So, this is what I am trying to learn in my life, a sense of patience and hope and calm. Sometimes the wonderful takes a long time to arrive. And sometimes the long-wished for wonderful comes in another form. if you're patient.

I adore when wonderful catches me unaware. I work so hard to plan and scheme the best parts of my life... I want to see, and do and be everything... I am a complete life marrow sucker. I can't help it. but the most wonderful moments are the ones that arrive as a gift... like the sun sparkling off the ocean. I wish I could have grabbed a little. put it in a jar. saved some for later. I love the slow quiet. where it is just me, my camera, my thoughts, whipping about, wrapping me like a favorite sweater. my eyes on my dream. my heart wide open.  

as the day winds down, easing me into the quiet, I watch as the light turns off at it's source. It is, still, an uphill battle, but as I stand on this rain-soaked, soggy cusp between today and tomorrow, I will indulge myself one more time, wishing for what will be.

I am passionate about the ocean. don't know why exactly, there is just something about it that hooks me, all the live long day! Maybe I like the way it blurs the line between sky and horizon. Maybe I like all the mystery that lies beneath. Maybe I like all the millions of shades of blue/green/turquoise, and everything in between. The waves. the sand. the shells. Maybe I just like every ding dang thing about it. Maybe it makes me feel like I am home. at peace. It just whispers love into my heart. it is my some kind of wonderful.

peace.

Grapefruit Pound Cake

(go here for recipe)