Watch your step!

I take Willow out to the back field to "do her business" in the evenings using a flashlight to avoid the spots where she previously "did her business". Head down, each step is carefully made concentrating on the next spot I will place my foot. It's dark out in the country.

I took her out the other night with this same routine and we reached the end of the field. Something prompted me to look up for a second and what I saw was a sight to behold. My 86 year old neighbor who meticulously cares for the home he shares with his disabled wife had decorated his house and yard with lights and other holiday decorations. It was dazzling! His house is on a dead end leading to the lake and few people will even see this display yet he takes the time to cover his house with a lovely holiday glow.

I thought about this moment as a way we sometimes live our lives. We carefully plan each step so as not to make a mistake yet we miss the beauty of what is right in front of us if we don't simply stop, look up, and take in the beauty of our surroundings. So many of us are afraid of "stepping in it" and making our lives messy and the moments like this go unnoticed and unappreciated.

I said a silent thanks to my sweet neighbor for taking the time to bring beauty into our little corner of the village and for teaching me of an important lesson. Unexpected surprises await if I just look around!

Morning of March 29, 2011

There are many mornings I take Willow out for a walk in the back field and wish I had my camera with me. There is something so beautiful about the silence of the morning
and saying hello to the lake.

I send up a silent prayer of gratitude for having this beautiful scene greet me in the morning. So many wake up to a busy urban neighborhood and while I crave that environment at times,
this is what brings me peace.

Winter's end

I take Willow out tonight for her usual last visit to the yard before bedtime. It is dusk and the sun is just starting to disappear over the lake making a pink horizon and the black branches of the trees, a silhouette.

The snow has a hard crust on it which gives me the feeling of walking on the smooth surface of the moon. My boots make a crunching sound, the only sound I can hear now. I see reminders of warmer days; my neighbor's barbecue grill, the picnic table. They are reminders of good times, warm times. Iris' Puerto Rican specialties are the focus of those gatherings where I bring a bottle of wine and a lawn chair and we laugh and sing Luther Van Dross tunes after Sergio has given in to our pleas to haul the speakers out onto the lawn. This country life is new and wonderful to them and I smile at their appreciation of a starry sky and clean air. As much as I try to avoid the drama coming from their apartment across the hall, I am grateful to them for these memories.

It feels like the dead of winter tonight even though the calendar tells me spring is less than three weeks away. The air is cold and crisp and I'm amazed at how 21 degrees can be so tolerable when the air is still and free of dampness.

Willow does her business and we head back into our warm apartment still smelling of dinner and clean laundry. Soon it will smell of fresh air coming through open windows. Soon.

The light at the end of the tunnel

"A part of you has grown in me.
And so you see, it's you and me
Together forever and never apart,
Maybe in distance, but never in heart."

In a small line at the end of his status update, Bob made an announcement that will change both of our lives forever:

"I'm moving to NY to be with Chris."

Now, this plan has been in place for 5 years but one thing after another got in the way. It wasn't until both of us realized how much we meant to each other and how quickly we could lose it did anything change.

My mind has been whirring lately with the thought of welcoming this man into our everyday lives. I'm making room in my closet, my dresser is now his and I think about how every single facet of my life and my girls' lives will change. I will no longer be alone. I will no longer ache to see him, to touch him.

I think back on all the times when something has happened to him and I wasn't there to offer comfort in a way instant messages and phone calls cannot do. There's nothing worse than being spiritually there for someone yet out of arms' reach.

I will have someone to spend evenings with watching movies or in conversation over a glass of wine. To know I will have a dinner partner every night; to have someone to fill that empty chair at our table. My future will no longer be a question I ask only myself.

I'm sure there will be some logistics to work out. For now, we're in my small three-bedroom apartment with one bathroom to share between four of us. Willow will most certainly be unhappy about being displaced as my bed partner. Then there's the question of what will happen with all his "stuff". Those things will work themselves out. I'm certain of that.

I'm also certain that this will be the greatest adventure of our lives.