It’s like being given a voucher, a ticket for some adventure to be redeemed at the prize table of life.  I don’t know what I will be given.  I don’t know what to expect or if I will even like it at first.  Yet, I am confident of this one thing:  I won’t know what my prize is until I get up and get it.

That’s what it feels like to have people believe in me, to hear them say that my hopes are not too fanciful and my dreams are not too big. For with each dare to be great, I find the strength to take one more step forward when my insecurities seduce me to settle for a life of safety, security, and a “real job.”  And with every word of affirmation, it is like another voucher, another possibility, another gift to be unwrapped, be that my dream job or a running list of careers I realize are not for me.

Thus, amidst this quarter-life crisis, as all talent and uniqueness seemingly dissipate into the blinding light of the grown up world, I can’t say that I know what life will hand me.  Nevertheless, far too many people have given of themselves for me not to find out.

Oh to be seventy, wrinkly, and wondering of an adventure that may have been.

May it never be so.

The audience quieted down.  The lights came up.  The music started.  My heartbeat stopped.  These were the moments I lived for, but how I so desperately wanted to make this one go away.  Enter stage right…and commence the hardest and yet most healing dance of my life.

Oh the happiness and heartache of being home, of being with

FAMILY.

This week’s performance really got me reflecting on all the times my they have annoyed, tormented, pestered, plagued, provoked, worried, badgered, harried, harassed, heckled, peeved, persecuted, irked, irritated, bullyragged, vexed, disquieted, grated, bothered, bedeviled, teased, taunted, tantalized, nettled, upset, disgruntled, and aggravated me.  Nonetheless after all is said, done, and danced, I would have to say that it’s all been worth it for the blessed reality that I don’t have to go through this alone.

I was feeling pretty silly.

No one at the studio (now) knew who he was.

But when I saw the look in Wendy’s eyes as she twirled about in reverie, I saw the heartache of a young woman who had now lost two fathers.  And then as I heard the last piano note  fade into the theatre’s stratosphere of lights, I heard Jeremy whisper in spite of choking back tears , “Beautiful, Steph.  That was absolutely beautiful.”  And in his affirmation, I heard the sincerity of a young man who knew my dad, knows me, and understands the magnitude of this duet.  Then just when I thought my heart couldn’t take anymore, Jos called to tell me how touched she was by the piece; and while she gushed, I felt the most colossal wave of hugs and hope break over me and envelope me and move me.

And I knew for sure I was loved.

So what if this is nothing more than a pretty dance in sparkly costumes for the majority of people on Saturday?  If anything I’m sure it’ll be a refreshing change from the ten million toddlers in tutus.  Ultimately, though, I know that for everyone who matters to me, this dance will matter to them.  And be that countable on two hands out of all three shows, that is more than fine with me.

It is a cruel world for stillness.  In society, it has somehow obtained an unwarranted stigma and is thusly thwarted in everyday lives by deadlines, duties, and days that begin and end in exhaustion.

Studying the art of communication, though, has so radically reworked the manner in which I approach moments of stillness.  Instead of something to be avoided, it is has increasingly become something I long to bask and replenish myself in, for it is in these moments that my most imaginative ideas have the opportunity to tiptoe on in.

This is, in large part, what this month at home is for.

For that reason, it is in this place where the contrast between the green mountains and blue Hawaiian sky have become all the more dynamic.  It is in this place where the swirling of the tropical tradewinds have implored me to a greater appreciation of this place that I call home.  It is in this place where I have learned to go to process the many issues at hand.

Brenda Ueland  ( So You Want to Write) pointed out in regards to always being energetic and active, “Your soul gets frightfully sterile and dry because you are so quick, snappy and efficient about doing one thing after another that you have not time for your own ideas to come in and develop and gently shine” (29).That being so, after a year like this past one–heck, after 17 years of formal schooling, I make no apologies and carry no shame for this Sabbath of a summer, for I have learned that stillness is actually and often times more profitable than merely being busy for the sake of busyness.  Before this, I felt the need to always be doing something or going some place and fast.  It was like sprinting a marathon.  Since then, I have learned to welcome water breaks.